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APPROVED ; The recent emergence of authoritarian countries, such as China, as leading economic powers, increasingly engaged in the developing world, has coincided with a 'democratic recession' in certain developing countries. Are these two processes related? Is the rise of authoritarian powers leading to authoritarian diffusion in the developing world? These important questions can be studied from several angles, one of which is whether authoritarian diffusion is happening because of the increasing economic linkages between developing world and authoritarian powers. So far, the scholarship has focused on studying the impact of authoritarian regimes on neighbouring countries but it has not investigated whether, through economic links, they might be having influence beyond their own neighbours. China's increasing role in Sub-Saharan Africa provides an ideal setting to explore this issue as democratic and liberal institutions in these states have not yet been consolidated (Lynch and Crawford 2011) while China has different levels of engagement in different Sub-Saharan African countries (Mohan and Power 2008). This research tests the hypothesis that higher economic linkages with China might have negative impact on both levels of and attitudes towards democracy in African states. First, the hypothesis is investigated at individual level, by testing the demonstration effect of the Chinese financed projects, whose geolocated data is combined with the sub-national variation on citizens' attitudes toward liberal-democracy. Then, it tests the learning mechanism through an original survey-experiment conducted in Kenya, which is a typical African country. Last, the hypothesis is investigated at institutional level by using time-series data on levels of Chinese economic engagement and levels of liberal-democracy. Overall, this project contributes to our understanding of the diffusion of authoritarian norms and practices in the developing world by providing a first test of whether China's increasing presence in Sub-Saharan Africa is leading to changing levels and attitudes towards liberal democracy.