This book gives a compelling analysis and explanation of shifts in China’s non-intervention policy in Africa. Systematically connecting the neoclassical realist theoretical logic with an empirical analysis of China’s intervention in African civil wars, the volume highlights a methodical interlink between theoretical and empirical analysis that takes into consideration the changing status of rising powers in the global system and its effect on their intervention behaviour. Based on field research and expert interviews, it provides a rigorous analysis of China’s emergent intervention behaviour in some key African conflicts in Libya, South Sudan and Mali and broadens the study of external interventions in civil wars to include the intervention behaviour of non-Western rising powers.

Obert Hodzi is Visiting Researcher at the African Studies Center, Boston University, USA, and Postdoctoral Researcher at the University of Helsinki, Finland.