Introduction The thesis treats the influence of China in the urbanisation of African cities in general as well as the specific case of Addis Ababa with the construction of a Light Rail Transit (LRT) by the China Railway Engineering Corporation (CREC). It is therefore divided into two parts: the first one treating the hypothesis of the “chinaization” of urban Africa, including a historical background of the Ethiopian capital and the second part consists of a case study on the construction of the LRT in Addis Ababa. The case of Addis Ababa seemed particularly interesting because throughout the course of “villes africaines” the focus was on European (French) intervention and support for sustainable urbanism. As African cities are growing rapidly it seems as if the European way of planning wasn’t fast enough for the urgent need of infrastructures. I was therefore particularly interested in the relationship between China and Africa and China’s influence on Africa from an architectural point of view. “Chinaization” of urban Africa Addis Ababa is a rapidly growing city. The young city of 129 years is one of the few ones that have never been colonized. Due to its political independence, it kept an indigenous urban tissue with a village-like settlement structure, however it is now aiming to become an international mega city with role models like Dubai and Shanghai. Masterplans are being developed, slums have been demolished (80% of Addis Ababa consists of slum dwellings). Therefore, many people have been resettled (forced and voluntarily) and are now forced to move longer distances which makes new transport systems indispensable. The LRT project completed in 2015 is a Chinese designed, contracted, constructed and funded Light Rail Transit network. How come? What is the interest of China in investing in Africa? Africa offers natural resources in return of aid with infrastructural constructions, adding to the need of natural resources, China seeks new options for market entries (China suffers from industrial overproduction). As China has risen “from a poor developing country into the world’s second largest economy within less than half a century, many African leaders aim to follow their model of success.” Ethiopia is currently one of the fastest growing economies, however only three decades ago it was dominated by famine and poverty. It might seem, that African cities are becoming more and more dependent on China. “Despite the country’s historical pride of an ever- independent nation, it is creating a growing dependency on Chinese investments, loans and construction.” The problem with Chinese constructions is also that the quality is often quite low and as Addis Ababa is transforming so rapidly, public spaces, local heritage and social networks are often neglected. “The speed of this rapid development destroys the local identity as the desire to become a world-class city has dominated planning at all costs.” Furthermore, a problem consists in “copy-pasting” models regardless of the urban and social context which leads to ghost towns such as Kilamba New City, in Luanda, Angola. “The Chinese are exporting parts of their urban model to Africa: new Special Economic Zones in Zambia, Nigeria and Ethiopia, Chinese residential models in Angola or Kenya and Chinese roads, airports and railways all over Africa. There is also a new approach of soft power with Chinese-led African newspapers and television stations, Chinese language schools, university grants for African students and professionals, and Chinese medical aid projects in Africa. We think this phenomenon deserves an unprejudiced look as to what this means for the development and the future of African cities.” Roggeveen & Hulshof, 2014 “In 2010 the French Development Agency, Lyon Town Planning Agency as well as Ethiopian Mathewos Consult have supported the Addis Ababa City Government in the “Evaluation of Addis Ababa’s Master Plan (2001-2010).” One could also ask why only the Chinese influence seems to be treated as alarming, seeing that the European influence might be just as big. Of course, from my point of it is difficult to be critical towards the European way of urbanizing, but it would have been interesting to hear opinions from locals comparing the European way of intervening as opposed to the Chinese way. “We can summarize that Addis Ababa’s growth on all levels (physically, economically, etc.) is strongly transforming the urban landscape, a landscape that has been shaped by foreign actors throughout the city’s existence.” Furthermore, as stated in the thesis: “On the one hand there are (especially Western) voices that call out China’s “neo-colonization” of Africa, on the other, notably African leaders, are in favour of doing “eye-to-eye” business with China.” Construction of LRT and its spatial influence The LRT is the new main transportation system consisting of two lines building a cross over the city. The LRT runs on electricity and will therefore reduce carbon dioxide emission compared to the priory dominating informal buses and taxis. However, one should not forget about the large number of pedestrians, mostly people who could not afford to take public transport. In order to evaluate the impact of the new transport system, urban nodes have been selected and repeditively observed during the construction (unfortunately not after its completion). The tools being used where: Photography, Maps/mapping, Infographics/Schemes, 3D-Modelling and Interviews. The results of the socio-spatial impact where classified in deconstruction, spatial segregation, inaccessibility and reuse of space. The new network “separates paths for vehicles (roads), pedestrians (sidewalks) and the LRT (rails), segregating the space according to its uses, a typology that did not exist before, when the bustling roads were inhabited by unregulated traffic and pedestrians, moving and crossing whenever and wherever needed.” The two lines imply an axial development of the city, “enhancing urban fragmentation and social segregation through its increase of land value and construction of new buildings.” Apart from the parts where the LRT passes underneath the surface, the mostly elevated LRT creates a physical separation between parts of the city. The LRT divides the city into 4 “urban islands”. It is important to know however that this segregation could have been produced by any kind of mega structure, no matter if Chinese or not. The corridors had already been planned in the early 2000s prior to the LRT project. It seems that the main concern of the population of Addis Ababa (information thanks to interviews) is not the fact that the Chinese are taking a big influence on the urban development of the city, but the untransparent and aggressive way of top-down planning encountered in projects throughout the city.

The author is an American-born, German PhD candidate at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) in Switzerland. She has lived in Ethiopia during her childhood, and she is educated at the University of Stuttgart, University of Tokyo, and EPFL. The thesis was presented in 2015 at the Urban Sociology Laboratory (LaSUR) of EPFL’s School of Architecture, Civil and Environmental Engineering (ENAC), and it investigates the impact a Chinese-sponsored infrastructure project, the Light Rail Transit (LRT) system, has on Addis Ababa’s urban form. The thesis proposes a hypothesis that African cities are going through a “Chinaization[sic]” process in urban development as a result of growing Chinese presence in Africa. The thesis starts with an introduction of the effects globalization has on cities and the emergence of “global cities” as a result. Cities like London and New York have become centers of the world economy, or “global cities”, in the backdrop of globalization. More and more cities from emerging economies are rising to such status as they engage in the global economy. Dubai and cities on China’s east coast such as Shanghai and Hong Kong provide some of the most astonishing examples of rapid urbanization and modernization (p.40). Though late to the game, African cities also aspire to rapidly urbanize and modernize to better participate in the global market, and they look to Dubai and Chinese cities for development strategies in the hope of achieving their miracles (p.96-97). However, one of the biggest problems of such rapid transformation in many African cities is that “the pace of urbanization is faster than that of urban planning” (p.46). And as they are modernizing, many African cities still cannot provide basic infrastructure and services such as water, electricity, and housing. This is a manifestation of the reality that African states are losing their ability to govern. African cities are developing because they have to, but they are not ready. As a developing economy, they really have no choice but to follow the global trend. Their actions are dictated more by external factors than internal ones, and their traditional society has to make way for modernization (p.57). It is clear that what has worked for Dubai and China is not working for Africa. It is not hard to see why. Africa does not have Dubai’s wealth or China’s strong central government. African cities have their very unique history and structures, simply copying another development model out of context not only cannot solve problems but will cause even more problems. It is thus important for African leaders to take into account local issues before adopting foreign models. The fact that Africa experiences tremendous external pressure to develop segues into a discussion about the role China plays in African cities, especially their investments in infrastructure. The author makes the important point that this unusual relationship between China and Africa is not an altruistic move from China’s part. China has its own interests in helping Africa, and that is to secure raw materials for its own development and to help Chinese companies expand into the African market (p.66-67). The author also points out that when dealing with Africa, while Western countries focus on aid, the Chinese approach is based on a mutual business partnership (p.69). The thesis then proceeds to show just how involved China is in Africa by pointing out, for example, “35 out of 54 African countries were involved with Chinese financing for infrastructure projects or in discussion of the funding” (p.78). And because of this amount of involvement, the author proposes a hypothesis that African cities are becoming more and more like Chinese cities, hence Africa is going through “Chinaization.” She points out that “Chinaization” affects a broad range of areas including architecture, culture, urbanism, and development models and strategies (p.101). A small study of the evolution of Chinese cities follows, yet the author does not compare them with African cities by explaining that the thesis does not try to “look at a ‘classic’ comparative study between the development of Chinese and African cities, but rather elaborate a notion towards an influential impact” (p.123). In the next part of the thesis, the author studies the Light Rail Transit (LRT) system in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, which is constructed and financed by a Chinese company, to analyze if Addis Ababa is “CHINA-ied [sic]” (p.123). The study of the LRT system and how it has impacted Addis Ababa’s urban form is documented through photos and is analyzed through 3D computer models and diagrams. The author concludes that the LRT system has resulted in the destruction of many existing buildings, spatial segregation within the city, reduced accessibility for public space and roads, and the reappropriation of structures supporting the LRT into shelters for homeless people and parking space for vehicles (p.222). The study then ends with a conclusion and summary of the whole thesis. However, by ending the thesis here, the author leaves the thesis in suspense. At this point, the connection between the study of the LRT system in Addis Ababa and the author’s more comprehensive hypothesis that Africa is going through a “Chinaization” process seems extremely weak and forced. On the one hand the thesis is about studying the impact of the LRT system on Addis Ababas’s urban form; on the other hand the thesis tries to make the case that because of China’s growing involvement in Africa, Africa is going through a “Chinaization” phase. However, these two phenomena are not necessarily connected. Every urban development project inevitably affects the existing urban form, for better or worse, and simply pointing out there is a change in the cityscape of Addis Ababa as a result of the construction of a Chinese-sponsored transit system is not sufficient to prove that Addis Ababa, or even the whole of Africa, is going through a “Chinaization” process, especially when non-Chinese entities are also involved. French and German governmental agencies (i.e. Town Planning Agency of Greater Lyon and GIZ) are directly involved in Addis Ababa’s master planning from 2001-2010 (p.177), so are many other organizations from developed francophone countries. This calls into question if Addis Ababa is going through “Chinaization” or instead actually “internationalization” involving many different nations. Moreover, just because the LRT is designed, contracted, constructed, and financed by China does not mean the system is particularly "Chinese." Not only because such light-rail transit technology is not a Chinese invention, but also because if the system was in the hand of a non-Chinese company, there are still chances that it might produce the same impacts on Addis Ababa's urban form. The "Chinese" characteristics of the LRT project has not been clearly pointed out by the author. The author’s thesis also suffers from the lack of precision. We know “Chinaization” is about Chinese involvement in Africa, but what is it exactly? If we understand it from a broader sense, as the author has given a very broad definition for the term (p.101), countries like the US, India, and Turkey are also involved in Africa through the agricultural and manufacturing sectors (p.175), not to mention many Western aid projects already in place in Africa. It will be misleading to say that China has the single greatest influence on Africa’s recent development, as the term “Chinaization” is trying to suggest. But if “Chinaization” is limited to the transformation in architecture or urban planning, the concept also would not hold up, because Dubai and Singapore seem to be equally influential in the decision making of African leaders through their skyscrapers and “high-tech” development (p.183). It seems as though by focusing on this recent phenomenon of China-Africa collaboration, the author has forgotten the presence of other countries in Africa. The author’s refusal to compare African cities and Chinese cities makes the thesis even more confusing. “Chinaization” suggests a morphological process where one entity becomes more and more like China in certain aspects, and a comparative study is essential to prove this process. There are certainly similarities such as the violence of demolition and the repetitive residential housing, but the author has failed to study them in detail. All in all, this thesis is trying to accomplish too much in one go. The impacts of new infrastructure in African cities, the similarities between emerging African and Chinese cities, and China’s influence in Africa’s recent development should have been studied in three different theses.