Digital Authoritarianism in Africa: Chinese Strategy or African Legacy

Over the last two decades, there has been a remarkable increase in the practice of digital authoritarianism (DA) in Africa. Yet researchers remain divided as to the drivers of this trend, especially as it relates to its international origins. Some scholars have portrayed China as a foreign supply-side driver of the technologies and the practice of DA in Africa. Others argue that such origins are overstated, contending that little evidence exists for a direct role of China in Africa’s increasing turn towards DA. Some that make this argument claim that DA in Africa is merely Africa's authoritarian legacy playing out on a more modern platform. In this paper, I use a norm diffusion and order project approach to propose and test an innovative theory of the supply and demand of DA in Africa. I argue that China’s strategic supply of its model of DA to Africa satisfies African governments' strategic demand for DA in a coherent fashion. I also posit that there is some credence to the authoritarian legacy argument, as I argue that regime type facilitates this trend. To test this theory, I conduct a statistical panel analysis of African countries for the years 2000–2020. I also conduct case studies in several African countries. My results confirm my theory and present novel findings that have implications for technology governance, African politics, China’s rise, and China’s strategic contestation of international norms.