Hacker News Reader

Comment by mothsonasloth | Hacker News Reader

I think I posted this before but my old university buddy who's from Zambia, jokes with me that the Chinese are colonization 2.0

The Chinese government have no scruples which is why they are out-competing Western companies and governments in Africa, who are tied behind political and moral restrictions. Also the Chinese have a major resource in man power which they can deploy anywhere for cheap.

View on HN

Globalization and colonization have been always linked and globalization usually starts with either with colonization or something that looks like it. Adam Smith himself argued that the discovery of the Americas by Christopher Columbus accelerated the process of globalisation [1] (without using the word globalisation).

When Chines build roads to extract resources with questionable intent, those roads and electric grids are free for all and not all traffic goes to China. Some even question the net value of Chinese efforts for the Chinese.

[1]: https://www.economist.com/free-exchange/2013/09/23/when-did-...

> my old university buddy who's from Zambia, jokes with me that the Chinese are colonization 2.0

Lived there myself, can confirm.

Yup, China built railroads and other infrastructure at a relatively low price in Africa, they have no scruples. Not to mention died dozens of workers in 80s. Some Western companies are plumbing oil in Africa, they are moral heros.

[0] https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/aug/04/shell-ni...

Reply on news.ycombinator.com