engleski

The United States of America vs. People’s Republic of China – A Quest for Oil in Sub-Saharan Africa

The paper studies a quest for oil in Sub-Saharan Africa, pursued by the world’s great powers, the United States of America (the U.S.) and the People’s Republic of China (China). Since the beginning of the 21st century, China shows rapidly increasing demand for natural resources, and especially oil. The establishment of the association of BRIC countries and the policy of diversification of energy resources pursued by the U.S., China and other developed and emerging economies has made Sub-Saharan Africa ever more important in the global geo-economic and geostrategic relations. The political and diplomatic activities, as preludes to the economic activities of China in Sub-Saharan Africa have increased significantly since the beginning of this century. These activities were primarily aimed at the exploitation of natural resources, directly through resource extraction, and indirectly through infrastructure projects, such as roads, railroads and pipelines. Chinese workers, followed by merchants, are present in many important i.e. resource rich states of Sub- Saharan Africa. The only superpower of present day, the U.S., does not look at the activities of China in Sub-Saharan Africa with favor. On the contrary, the U.S. has increased its military build-up in Africa and established new military bases. Consequently, Sub-Saharan Africa has already become the stage for geo-economic rivalry between the U.S. and China, and the future of the region will be marked by geo-economic and geopolitical conflicts, as an expression of the geo-economic rivalry between today’s (and future) great powers . The two regions most affected by this rivalry would be the Gulf of Guinea and the Horn of Africa. They are strategically most valuable regions of Sub-Saharan Africa, primarily because of their oil reserves.

the U.S. ; China ; Sub-Saharan Africa ; oil ; geo-economic rivalry ; the Gulf of Guinea region

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