The EC’s development assistance in China began in 1984 but it only took off
in the wake of the 1985 Trade and Cooperation Agreement, when an increase in
size and scope of development assistance can be discerned. Then, between 1991
and 1994, under the basic budget lines for development aid and economic
cooperation in Asia, about ECU 20 million were set aside each year for China.
Mirroring the lack of any involvement and attention to the domestic situation
of China which characterised the EC and the member states’ approach to the
country in the 1980s, during those years and up to 1995 the EC’s development
assistance to the PRC did not cover concerns for principles of democracy,
human rights and good governance but was concentrated on infrastructure,
agricultural and rural projects.17
Although the Asian and Latin America (ALA) Regulation, which governs
development assistance activities of the EC with China, provided an extensive
human rights clause incorporating to a large extent positive conditionality, it is
interesting to note that from the beginning of the development activities in the
country and up to 1994, the EC’s development assistance to China was not
significantly affected by events occurring in the PRC, including the Tiananmen
17
The projects centred on the rural sector in its broadest sense, covering varied fields such as soil and water conservation, food processing and storage, as well as the improvement of crop yields. In parallel with the programme of technical and financial assistance a programme of economic cooperation developed in the 1980s.
Massacre. Apart from a brief suspension in the aftermath of the June 4th events,
the previously agreed development assistance activities continued unhindered.
The EC’s approach began to change with the 1995 Commission
Communication, which reflected China’s graduation from a traditional
‘developing country’ to an ‘economy in transition’.18 At the same time the EC’s
budgetary resources tripled reaching EUR 70 million per year up to 1999.
Accordingly the Commission and China’s Ministry of Technology and
Commerce (now Ministry of Commerce – MOFCOM) took a strategic decision:
to move away from individual infrastructure and rural development projects, to
a broader range of projects aimed at supporting the overall reform process.
In particular, the 1995 Communication stated that development assistance
should be aimed at underpinning the Chinese government’s strategy to
accelerate economic, social and administrative reform and China’s integration
into the world economy. From the mid-1990s China also became a beneficiary
of a number of the EC’s regional programmes, such as Asia Invest (China was
the biggest recipient), Asia Urbs, Asia Pro ECO I, Asia IT&C, Asia Link, as
well as EC thematic programmes, such as the European Initiative for
Democracy and Human Rights. Yet, notwithstanding the web of different
budget lines, Richard Youngs notes that “even if community aid to China
increased significantly in the first half of the decade, it was by a lesser
proportionate amount than development assistance to most other Asian states”.19
Reflecting the institutionalisation of political and economic dialogues and the
Commission’s stated objectives of supporting China’s reform as well as its
integration into the international system, the subsequent Communications
prescribed that EC-funded cooperation programmes needed to be even more
18
Interview 1. 19
closely linked with the EU’s broader China policy. The Communications called
for the EC to seize the chance to underscore its policies with concrete assistance
projects.20
Negotiations progressed slowly due to the reluctance of Chinese officials to
open up new and, most importantly, sensitive sectors of collaboration. At the
same time the negotiations closely followed the trajectory of the ECDHR, thus
being suspended in 1996 and resumed the next year as a ‘reward’ for the EU
member states’ policy shift at the UNCHR.
Subsequently, the 2001 Communication suggested and defined concrete and
practical short- and medium-term actions for the EC’s policy to progress more
effectively towards the long-term aims defined in 1998. It also prescribed
making better use of the EC’s cooperation programmes with China by
reinforcing long-term programming, agreeing on a Country Strategy Paper
(CSP) and focusing the EC’s assistance activities in three main areas. These
were (i) the promotion of sustainable development, (ii) the encouragement of
good governance initiatives and the promotion of the rule of law, and (iii)
support for economic and social reform.21 In 2001 these three areas were
incorporated in the CSP for China.
20
Up to 1998 the EC had tended to concentrate on high-budget programmes spread over several years in order to maximise the impact of a limited cooperation budget. However the 1998 Communication proposed five important refinements: (i) facilitate rapid funding of small, short- term projects requested by Beijing; (ii) increase synergy between the EU’s China policy objectives and cooperation programmes; (iii) improve synergy with EU member states; (iv) cooperate with the EIB to expand EIB activities in China within existing mandates; (v) strengthen regular dialogue with China on programming and project cycles.
21
The budget for the EU-China cooperation programme 2001-2005 was around EUR 250 million (grant form). In 2000 the annual EU-China Joint Committee meeting agreed that cooperation priorities for the near future (2001-2003) would include assistance in support of WTO accession, the fight against illegal migration and trafficking in human beings, social security reform, the telecommunication/information society, environment, energy, and human resource development. It was also agreed that Western provinces should benefit more from EU assistance and that China should be more involved with future planning and programming (ownership).
In a recent review of the EC’s China development cooperation it emerged
that since 1998 the EC has allocated EUR 456 million, which were mostly
distributed as follows: EUR 195 million to economic and social reform, EUR
138 to environment and EUR 70 million to human rights, the rule of law and
good governance.22 It is worth noting once again the limited value of the EC’s
co-operation budget, which represented only 1% of net ODA devoted to China.
With regard to grant aid, the figure stood at 2% (see Table 4).
Table 4: The EC’s ODA to China (1985-2008)
Years Total ODA ODA share (DAC)
1985 0.9 0.10% 1990 41.2 1.98% 1995 32.7 0.93% 2000 27.44 2.18% 2005 66.87 3.95% 2008 42.07 3.58%
Source: OECD, http://stats.oecd.org. Own calculations. US$ million.
Similarly, in the case of the activities undertaken it is worth pointing to the
fact that only one of the three objectives included human rights promotion. In
addition, the sector of socio-economic development was merely concerned with
support to administrative, financial and economic reforms, in particular with
reference to China’s entry into the WTO, as has been shown in the previous
section. Thus little space was left to promote social and economic rights through
this budget line. The next sections specifically analyse the main projects set in
place for the promotion of the rule of law and human rights through the specific
budget lines set out by the Commission.
22
European Commission, Evaluation of the European Commission’s Cooperation and Partnership with the People’s Republic of China, Country Level Evaluation, 2nd Draft Final Synthesis Report, March 2007.