A Libertação não virá do Oriente!: A inserção internacional da China e o reforço da dependência nos países periféricos

Abstract

The international insertion of China, without a shadow of a doubt, constitutes one of the most relevant systemic phenomena in recent decades. Its intense process of socio-economic development and its international insertion have fostered several debates in academic environments and in civil society alike. Debates which have given rise to different interpretations on the characteristic phenomena of Chinese society, on China's actions in the international system and on China's relations with other international actors. Despite being an extremely important topic, there is little literature that analyzes or discusses the negative effects of China's international insertion for peripheral economies. Not because they do not exist, but because the discussions tend, not infrequently, to be polarized between "pro-Western" and "pro-Eastern" fields. Added to this, it’s recognized the fact that, since the beginning of globalization and neoliberalism, imperialism - here understood as a theoretical concept and social phenomenon - has been marginalized not only from the political debates present in civil society, but also from academic discussions. That’s especially true in the field of international relations, so in recognition of the fundamental importance of understanding imperialism for anti-imperialist struggles and the various historical phenomena of the last century and understanding that this phenomenon persists to the present day, this monography aims to both analyze and explain what imperialism is, how it develops and presents itself in modern times, also it proposes to explain the conditioning aspects of China's insertion in the International System. Analyzing China's behavior in relation to Latin American and African peripheral countries, in order to understand whether or not China adopts an imperialist position in its relationship with the peripheries of the world system. The present research was carried out having as theoretical basis classical Marxist authors such as Marx and Lenin and authors of dependency theory such as Ruy Mauro Marini and John Smith. In turn, exploratory research was initially adopted as a procedural method, aiming to gather, and read bibliographies and obtain data relevant to the issue. The main data sources used in this research were taken from the databases of large international organizations or Chinese government agencies, namely: the International Monetary Fund (IMF); the World Bank; data compiled by the National Bureau of Statistics of China and The Observatory of Economic Complexity. After the exploratory research, we performed an explanatory analysis of the data and arguments raised in order to achieve the research objectives.