Do country sizes matter? What motivates China’s trade decision in Southern Africa?

This paper aims to test the political-economy hypothesis that country sizes are related with constraints associated with Chinese trade.

This study applies a generalized linear mixed approach on panel data of Southern African (henceforth SADC) economies from 2001 to 2014 to observe common Chinese trade patterns among SADC countries.

Empirical results support the hypothesis that structural differences exist and smaller SADC countries are disadvantaged in their trade relations with China.

This paper is exploratory by nature. Its scope and the depth of analysis is constrained by data availability.

The manuscript has been approved by the author and has never been published, or has been considered for publication elsewhere.