The Return of the Ugly American: How Trumpism is Pushing Zambia towards China in the ‘New Cold War’

Abstract

A growing number of scholars have written about the “New Scramble for Africa” as the attention of China and the US to the continent has grown. This is better understood as a new “Cold War” in which the world’s superpowers have been engaged in a war of influence and “soft power” (Nye, Jr. 1990, 2004) in Africa for two decades. Focusing on international and local development workers in Zambia, this article outlines the contours, and implications, of Trumpism in the “New Cold War.”