The “New Scramble” for Africa

Abstract

This chapter examines France’s efforts using the “soft power” of language to maintain a presence particularly in French-speaking Africa, and similar efforts by China in its Belt and Road Initiative to gain an economic foothold in the continent. It discusses the ways in which French president Emmanuel Macron has cultivated France’s relationship with the nations of the Organisation internationale de la Francophonie, the critical responses of African intellectuals to his strained attempts at navigating the colonial narrative, and his repeated calls promoting linguistic pluralism over a common language in English. It explores China’s “charm initiative” in spreading its language and culture through its Confucius Institutes and Confucius Classrooms and the mounting opposition to those programs for their lack of transparency and limits on academic freedom. It suggests that France and China may be facing renewed competition from the United Kingdom and the United States in the “new scramble” for Africa.