Author: Sven Grimm.

The 5th Forum for China Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) will be held in Beijing in July 2012. The Forum, established for the first time in October 2000 in Beijing, constitutes a platform for African and Chi-nese policymakers to enhance China’s relations with African countries. The years since 2000 have seen growing political, economic and diplomatic interests in China-Africa relations, attracting global attention toward China’s engagement in Africa. This has led to increasing analysis, research and studies which seek to better understand Sino-African partnerships and cooperation. FOCAC has deep-ened China-Africa’s relations in various fields: politics, economics, investments, trade, south-south cooperation and aid; etc. For Chinese and African officials, FOCAC constitutes a multilateral platform to evaluate the achievements and discuss the perspectives of Sino-African relations. This paper ex-plores the political partnership element of FOCAC and looks into the workings of the institutions.