ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that there is an unbroken intellectual trajectory of anti-imperialist left thinking in the global South, from Bandung to present-day China. This vision seeks the development and modernisation of all countries for the benefit of their citizens, alongside the formation of a balanced and democratised international order in which all states will be equal and in which state sovereignty is paramount and diversity is embraced. China's successful modernisation has been based on the approach of ‘autonomous development’, enabling China to modernise along a different path to that of the West. China's approach to international development is also different from that of the West, seeking to bring about a comparable modernisation in other global South countries through forms of South-South cooperation that will build each country's ‘autonomous development capacity’ through a similar approach, but articulated in relation to their different histories, cultures, resource levels and positionality in the international order. As such, the countries of the global South, unified in aim and vision although heterogeneous in many other respects, can work together as a type of global left in order to create a more balanced international order based on traditional left values of equality, collectivity and justice.
