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38 3. LITERATURE REVIEW ON THE STUDY OF BRI
The One Belt One Road is the new, impressive Chinese diplomatic initiative, which has attracted the attention of the world. Recently, especially from the year 2016, many scholars and journalists have written countless articles and papers about it and its impact on world politics. This chapter is aimed at analyzing the existing literature about the two main themes of this research: the diplomatic relations between China and the European Union; and the OBOR in general, as well as its impact on Europe.
3.1 CHINA-EU RELATIONS
The relations between China and the European Union are very complex; this section is aimed at analyzing the current debates on some of the aspects that are interesting and significant for this research. Since diplomatic relations are always undergoing changes, the articles that have been selected are all very recent, in particular most of the references have been published after Beijing proposed the One Belt One Road, in 2013. Furthermore, it is important to remark that the China-EU relations are influenced by the United States, and especially by each side's relations with Washington. It is also necessary to keep in mind that the EU-China relations cannot be only understood simply as classical bilateral relations, but it is important to consider the various national interests and the relations of China with each EU member state. In fact, as Mu Chunshan, a Beijing-based journalist, explains, the EU-China partnership can be classified into two dimensions: the continental level and the national level; the latter can be further divided into China-European Union relations and China-Euro zone relations (Mu, 2014).
Since the relations between Beijing and Brussels are mostly economic, the majority of the current debates are focused on trade and finance issues, such as the future Bilateral Investment Trade (BIA), that the two parties have been negotiating since the 16th EU-China Summit held in 2013, which will probably lead to the distant but likely China-EU Free Trade Agreement (FTA);
and the decision that the EU must take on the Market Economic Status (MES) of the PRC. These
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39 are remarkable factors in their diplomatic relations and their results will probably influence the outcome of One Belt One Road, and consequently of the Sino-European relations. On the other hand, the political and cultural factors of the diplomatic relations are the diverging political systems as well as the issue of the human rights situation in China, together with the different ways in which each EU state member decides to deal with it.
The diplomatic relations between Beijing and Brussels can be classified into the three pillars presented in the second chapter: the High Level Economic and Trade Dialogue, the High Level Strategic Dialogue for political and global issues, and the People-to-People Dialogue. As already explained, most of the existing literature focuses on the first pillar, being the most important aspect of the exchanges between the two sides.
From a general perspective, the partnership is often described in very positive terms by many scholars and politicians, both Chinese and European. Many authors, namely Shada Islam (2016), Jing Men (2016), Hans Dietmar Schweisgut (2016a), Miroslav Lajčák (2016), Feng Zhongping and Huang Jing (2015), Wang Yi and the High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Federica Mogherini (2015), the US- China expert David Shambaugh (2004), the director and the deputy director of the Centre for European Reform, Charles Grant and Katinka Barysch (2011), agree that the EU and the PRC are strategic partners, whose relations are improving to include more and more heterogeneous issues and aspects. Shada Islam, journalist and scholar of the European Think Tank "Friends of Europe" stated that "the EU-China relationship is the EU’s most developed and dynamic relationship with an Asian country and an emerging power. The partnership is varied, diverse and dynamic, including 70 or so sectoral dialogues, and constant engagement at many levels" (Islam, 2016). The Deputy Prime Minister of the Republic of Slovakia, Miroslav Lajčák, presents the bilateral relations in very positive terms:
"When considering the current state of our relations with China, numbers are hard to escape – the combined size of our populations, economies and flows of trade and investment makes our cooperation with China one of the most important
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40 global partnerships of today. Our relations have evolved and over the past few
decades moved away from mere bilateral considerations" (Lajčák, 2016).
Also both the Ambassador of the European Union to China, Hans Dietmar Schweisgut, and the Director of the EU-China Research Centre of the College of Europe, Jing Men, stressed the importance of the Comprehensive Strategic Partnership explaining that "[w]ith the EU-China Strategic Agenda 2020 remaining the common framework for EU-China cooperation, new fields of collaboration are emerging, highlighting the increasing roles and responsibilities of Europe and China as global players and their willingness to further deepen their comprehensive strategic partnership" (as cited in Schweisgut, 2016a). Jing Men also affirmed that "[t]he EU and China are two of the most important players in the world. Their bilateral relationship and mutual understanding are not only important for themselves in terms of economic growth and social development, but also are influential in world governance" (Men, 2016). Not only European scholars, but also many Chinese experts are very optimistic, indeed they affirm that, despite some concerns and challenges, "China-EU relations are now running smoothly" (Li, Zhao, Zhang, Cao,
& Zhang, 2016:35). The ambassador of the PRC to Italy Li Ruiyu also congratulates Beijing and Brussels for their efforts committed in the last 40 years towards deepening the partnership, through a broad cooperation, and in pursuing the objective of common development: while China has always supported the European integration, the EU has helped and encouraged the "Middle Country" to implement various reforms (Li R. , 2015). Moreover, some Chinese politicians and scholars, such as Feng Zhongping, Huang Jing and the Foreign Minister Wang Yi have insisted on the numerous successes that the two powers managed to achieve within their partnership (Feng &
Huang, 2015; Wang, 2016b).
On the other hand, there are also numerous negative reports, according to which the relations between Europe and China are strained because of a series of internal and external reasons.
The period from 2003 to 2005 "was a golden age" for the partnership, or as the then president of the European Commission Romano Prodi declared about China-EU relations: "if it is not a marriage, it
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41 is at least a very serious engagement" (as cited in Men, 2008:6). However, after 2005 the situation got worse. The setback was caused by some misperceptions and different view points on issues such as the human rights, by concerns that Chinese companies were involved in unfair trade practices, but also caused by the Chinese disappointment over the embargo on weapons sales imposed in 1989 by the EU and its denial to grant the Market Economic Status to the PRC at the WTO (Shi, 2012;
Casarini, 2013). In such situation, both sides risk considering each other as threats, as has happened on the European side, with the emergence of assertiveness and theories such as the "China Threat Theory" (Fox & Godement, 2009; Shi, 2012; Feng & Huang, 2015; Zhao, 2016). However, there is also the tendency in China of feeling not being perceived as a real strategic partner (Shi, 2012).
Nevertheless, the most remarkable factors of the slowdown in the implementation of the strategic partnership are the contrasting political values and conceptions of political order (Pan, 2012; Shi, 2012; Trigkas, 2013; Maher, 2016; Men, 2016), and especially the lack of coherence and unity in the European response to China and its initiatives, AIIB and OBOR in particular. This attitude has been firmly criticized by a large number of scholars and politicians from different backgrounds, such as Shi Zhiqin (2012), Charles Grant and Katinka Barysch (2011), Anastas Vangeli (2015), Jonathan D. Pollack and Philippe Le Corre (2015), Kerry Brown (2015), Richard Maher (2016), Romano Prodi (2015), Tim Summers (2015), as well as Stefano Palmieri and Marco Celi (2016).
All the authors agree on the idea that as consequence of all the member states' different national interests in the game, the European lack of unity as well as of a coherent and comprehensive response to Chinese politics, has brought to a excessive slow pace in the decision making process in Brussels and it has created obstacles to the deepening of the economic and political relations. This situation is disappointing for Beijing and disadvantageous for European interests. On the other hand, in these circumstances China has the opportunity to exploit the national differences and competitions. For this reason the PRC has often focused on the bilateral relations with individual countries, creating particular partnerships and frameworks, namely the 16+1 initiative with the Central-Eastern European countries. However, it has also been able to make each country feel as it
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42 was the most important one giving appealing names to their relationship such as: a "close and enduring comprehensive strategic partnership" with France; an "all-round strategic partnership" for Germany, its biggest partner in the continent; an "open and practical comprehensive cooperative partnership" for the Netherlands, and finally; an "all-round friendly cooperative partnership" with Belgium (Fox & Godement, 2009; Shi, 2012; McDonnel, 2014; Feng & Huang, 2015; Pollack & Le Corre, 2015; Prodi, 2015; Summers, 2015; Vangeli, 2015; Maher, 2016). The totality of the scholars suggest that Europe needs to create a "new conceptual framework towards Beijing to facilitate cooperation" (Maher, 2016:959), which means that an "enhanced cooperation among EU member states" is required "to better ensure they speak with one voice" (Pollack & Le Corre, 2015). To achieve this objective it is necessary to give priority to better consultation and communication among European capitals, "to avoid strategic common interests to being sacrificed to short-term national gain" (Summers, 2015). Beijing policies also need to change, because "China's relations with Europe need to become more European and less bilateral" (Vangeli, 2015).