A Counter-Hegemonic Challenge in the Western Hemisphere? The Relations between China and CELAC (2008-2018)

This article examines China’s engagement from 2008 to 2018 with the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC). We ask whether China has utilized CELAC as a counter-hegemonic challenge to US dominance in the Western Hemisphere. To analyze this question, we delved deeper into the theoretical debates around rationalist and neo-Gramscian notions of hegemony and applied four types of China-promoted multilateral institutions to CELAC. We argue that China’s engagement with CELAC functioned as an “institutional offshore balancing” strategy, advancing a largely pragmatic and non-confrontational to avoid a Kindleberger Trap.