Contours of Qatar–Sub-Saharan Africa Relations: Shedding Light on Trends and Prospects

Within the context of expanding South–South cooperation on trade and aid, this paperexplores Qatar’s economic engagements with Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), both throughstate-sponsored charity and business enterprises, over the last half decade. We gatherinsight for understanding the Qatari strategy towards SSA by reviewing the state’sobjectives as they are laid out in the Qatar National Vision 2030 as well as by drawingon Qatar’s use of ‘subtle power’ in its foreign policy. More specifically, we problematise Qatar’s engagement with SSA by comparing Qatari charitable programmes in theregion with the state’s economic interests; we then compare the SSA economic interestswith recent economic engagements with Asian nations, and evaluate the difference. Weconclude that Qatar is utilising different strategic approaches in different regions. Itsforeign policy practices of insisting on its neutrality in its relations with conflictingstates and sub-state actors have demonstrated a unique and broad agency that maybe on display as the state diversifies its economy into SSA and East Asia. Moreover,the state is promoting its national brand in both regions: in one through economicinterdependencies, and in the other through charitable aid that can assist in developing and promoting economic entrepreneurship that could eventually benefit Qatariservice enterprises in the region.