Abstract:
China’s economic rise has become an unavoidable discussion in the sector of international affairs.
By achieving incredible feats of developments, China made its presence known in the global
geopolitical sphere. In doing so, it utilized its massive capabilities as a tool to forge ties with
regional and global players rivalling the western hegemony, later translating into political
alliances, a method discussed under the dependency theory. As a global provider, China itself is
in need of massive resources, most notably oil, abundant in the Arab Gulf. This thesis aims to
study how China used its economic prowess in order to make the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and
the United Arab Emirates, 2 main players of the Arab Gulf, dependent on its resources in the field
of technology (microchips) and solar energy (solar panels) due to their futuristic plans of
developing those 2 sectors, and through that economic dependency instill its political aspirations
and influence, manifesting the dependency theory.
