Chinese and United States Overseas Foreign Direct Investment and Democracy in the Developing World

This paper integrates the political influence and foreign capital literatures and examines the association between United States and Chinese overseas foreign direct investment (FDI) and host states’ political institutions. Using up to 109 developing countries from 2003-2019, and employing two-stage least squares selection modeling, we find negative and significant relationships between Chinese FDI and host states’ democracy while U.S. FDI has positive and significant associations. Our study suggests Chinese FDI and host state leaders may mutually benefit from increasing authoritarianism, producing closer political and economic ties between China and the developing world.

本文整合了政治影响力与外资领域的相关研究文献，考察了美国与中国对外直接投资（FDI）与东道国政治制度之间的关联。本文基于2003至2019年间多达109个发展中国家的样本，采用两阶段最小二乘选择模型（two-stage least squares selection modeling）开展分析，结果发现：中国对外直接投资与东道国民主水平呈显著负相关关系，而美国对外直接投资则呈现显著正相关关联。本研究表明，中国对外直接投资与东道国领导层或可通过提升威权程度实现互利，进而推动中国与发展中世界之间的政治与经济联系更为紧密。