Banking unconditionally: the political economy of Chinese finance in Latin America

Globalization scholars have long-debated to what extent economic integration, and, specifically, mobile private capital, constrains national policy-making. With Western capital reeling from the 2008 financial crisis, state-owned capital made inroads globally. China, as the world's largest saver, expanded its cross-border lending, funneling almost US$300 billion to developing countries since the crisis. What are the implications for debtor governments’ room to maneuver? I contend that China's state-led capitalism is an important form of patient capital, characterized by a longer term horizon. I argue that its rapid global expansion has transformed the traditional relationship between economic interdependence and national policy autonomy. Without the market's threat of short-term capital withdrawal, national governments have considerably more room to maneuver. Given the recent emergence of Chinese financing, I employ a comparative case study analysis of two of China's largest debtors – Brazil and Venezuela – before and after the introduction of Chinese credit. I find that government budget deficits increase as Chinese state-to-state financing accounts for a larger share of total external public financing. These findings offer important new insights for the study of globalization, Latin American development, and China–Latin American relations, by helping explain the conditions under which nations veer from Western governance models.