This paper addresses a challenge with which the EU is faced more and more in an increasingly interconnected and multipolar world: that of formulating strategic narratives which appeal to audiences at home and abroad and which are able to compete with the alternative narratives projected by other international actors.
The paper puts the EU’s effort in this field in a comparative perspective, by looking into the diverging narratives on development and development cooperation formulated by the EU and China vis-à-vis Sub-Saharan Africa. While the content and historical roots of the European and Chinese narratives are quite well known by now, this paper zooms in on the hitherto understudied aspect of how these very different EU and Chinese narratives are received by African publics. Are they accepted, rejected, recreated in new ways? Which specific elements are deemed attractive or convincing, and which ones are not? How is narrative reception influenced by counternarratives, government narratives, historical legacies and discrepancies between rhetoric and action?
Building upon a previous research phase that analysed cross-country survey data, this paper presents the first results of a more in-depth qualitative inquiry into such narrative reception. It analyses data collected from South African university students through Q sort methodology, a little-known technique that allows for a systematic yet flexible inquiry into respondents’ subjectivities. The findings shed light on how these future South African elites interact with contrasting narratives and how they orient themselves geopolitically in a changing world. In doing so, they also provide a novel take on the EU’s efforts to redefine its relationship with the African continent.
