Urban development amid the 'new scramble' for Africa

非洲大陆的大部分地区目前正在经历一场“城市革命”：直到最近还以农村和农业为主的社会正在无情地、往往是迅速地城市化。这对非洲国家和社会具有深远的影响，特别是考虑到非洲大陆许多城市的经济基础有限。这也给世界银行（World Bank）、英国和美国等传统援助捐助国带来了新的挑战，这些国家长期以来一直倾向于把大部分精力放在农村贫困问题上。与此同时，近年来，新兴全球大国与非洲大陆国家之间日益密切的接触引起了广泛关注，尤其是中国作为援助捐助国、投资者和移民来源国所发挥的作用。一些人谈到了“对非洲的新一轮争夺”，类似于19世纪末欧洲列强的到来，关于这对非洲人最终是好是坏的争论正在进行中。虽然关于中国在非洲参与的研究越来越多，也有相当多的学者关注非洲的城市增长模式和城市发展前景，但探索这两种趋势之间相互关系的研究却很少。然而，中国参与的城市层面是一个关键问题，特别是（与许多西方捐助者不同）中国不反对资助主要的城市基础设施和建设项目，并在非洲城市边缘开发了许多经济特区。因此，该项目旨在解决现有研究中的关键空白。它将通过研究中国参与对埃塞俄比亚和乌干达这两个战略选择的非洲国家的直接和间接影响来实现这一目标，特别关注亚的斯亚贝巴和坎帕拉这两个“核心”城市。它还将探讨中国机构、其他在非洲投资的新兴大国、“传统”捐助者和非洲政府之间的互动如何影响人们对城市发展挑战和机遇的理解和采取行动的方式。该研究将通过探索三个关键问题来进行：城市土地的治理，特别是关于中国租赁土地为城市发展融资的方法；主要城市基础设施项目及其对低收入群体的影响；努力创造大量工业和服务业就业机会。本文将采用一系列方法，包括对非洲市政和国家政府、国际捐助者、投资者和中国移民商业人士的访谈，来构建中国城市参与对每个案例的影响的丰富画面；城市社区的小规模调查和焦点小组；收集背景定量数据；分析政策文件，追踪国际文献资料和政策论坛的思想和话语；并与一系列国际参与者进行合作的城市场地分析。作为研究计划的一部分，我将对北京大学林肯研究所城市发展与土地政策中心进行机构访问，与两个研究国的机构合作伙伴保持联系，并在为期两年的项目中在战略地点召开三次研讨会。与学术界一样，非洲国家的地方和国家政府、国际政策制定者（包括一系列联合国组织）、多边和双边援助捐助者以及发展非政府组织也会对这项研究感兴趣。实现影响的策略在影响摘要和影响途径中有详细说明。

Much of the African continent is currently undergoing an 'urban revolution': societies that until recently have been overwhelmingly rural and agriculture-based are inexorably, and often rapidly, urbanising. This has profound implications for African states and societies, especially given the limited economic base of many cities on the continent. It is also throwing up new challenges for traditional aid donors such as the World Bank, Britain and the US, who have long been inclined to focus much of their effort on rural poverty. Meanwhile, the increased engagement between emerging global powers and countries on the African continent has attracted widespread attention in recent years, particularly with respect to the role of China as an aid donor, investor and source of migrants. Some have talked of a 'new scramble for Africa' akin to that of the arrival of the European powers in the late nineteenth century, and debates about whether this is ultimately good or bad for Africans are ongoing. While there is a large and growing body of research on Chinese engagement in Africa, and considerable scholarship focusing on African urban growth patterns and urban development prospects, there is very little research exploring the interrelationship between these two trends. The urban dimension of Chinese engagement is a key issue, however, particularly as (unlike many Western donors) China has no objection to funding major urban infrastructure and construction projects and has developed a number of Special Economic Zones on the fringes of African cities. This project therefore aims to address critical gaps in existing research. It will do so by researching direct and indirect impacts of Chinese engagement in the two strategically-selected African states of Ethiopia and Uganda, with particular attention to the 'core' cities of Addis Ababa and Kampala respectively. It will also explore how interactions between Chinese agencies, other emerging powers investing in Africa, 'traditional' donors and African governments are shaping the way urban development challenges and opportunities are understood and acted upon. The research will be pursued through exploring three critical issues: the governance of urban land, particularly with respect to Chinese approaches to leasing land to finance urban development; major urban infrastructure projects and their impacts on low-income groups; and efforts to create mass industrial and service sector employment. A range of methods will be employed to build a rich picture of the impacts of Chinese urban engagement in each case, including interviews with African municipal and national governments, international donors, investors, and Chinese migrant business people; small-scale surveys and focus groups with urban communities; gathering background quantitative data; analysing policy documents and tracing ideas and discourses across international documentary material and policy fora; and undertaking co-productive urban site analysis with a range of international actors. I will undertake an institutional visit to the Lincoln Institute Centre for Urban Development and Land Policy at Peking University (PKU) as part of the research programme, liaise with institutional partners in the two research countries, and convene three workshops in strategic locations across the two-year project. As well as the academic community, the research will be of interest to local and national governments in African states, international policy makers (including a range of UN organisations), multilateral and bilateral aid donors, and development NGOs. The strategies for achieving impact are detailed in the Impact Summary and Pathways to Impact.