The “Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road”, initially known as the “One Belt, One Road” (OBOR) Initiative but later renamed the
“Belt and Road Initiative” (BRI) in official English-language materials, is a Chinese megaproject that promotes “the connectivity of Asian, European and African continents and their adjacent seas”, thus widely understood as creating an international infrastructure network leading in and out of China. It was first unveiled on September 13, 2013, in a speech by Chinese President Xi Jinping delivered at Nazarbayev University in Astana, the capital of Kazakhstan, whereupon Xi disclosed his plans to establish a Silk Road Economic Belt that would retrace the steps of the ancient Silk Road from China through Central Asia and into Europe (Tang D. , 2013). This announcement was followed
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afterwards by another speech to the Indonesian Parliament in which he proposed the Maritime Silk Road, which would link Chinese and Southeast Asian economies to those of South Asia, East Africa, and Europe through a maritime route that runs through the Indian Ocean, the Red Sea, and the Mediterranean Sea (Wu & Zhang, 2013). The two are thus collectively referred to as the “Belt” and “Road”, and the entire initiative seems to have positioned itself as the centerpiece of Xi’s foreign policy agenda. According to the
“Vision and Actions on Jointly Building Silk Road Economic Belt and 21st Century Maritime Silk Road” document, jointly published by the National Development and Reform Commission, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and the Ministry of Commerce in March 2015, the framework of the BRI is based on six economic corridors. The New Eurasian Land Bridge, the Mongolia-Russia Economic Corridor, and the China-Central Asia-West Asia Economic Corridor are associated with the Silk Road Economic Belt, whereas the Bangladesh-India-Myanmar Economic Corridor and the China-Indochina Peninsula Economic Corridor are associated with the Maritime Silk Road; the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor is associated with both (National Development and Reform Commission, 2015).
Officially, the BRI is an altruistic initiative seeking win-win solutions for an increasingly interconnected Eurasian continent, a natural response to an increasingly multipolar and globalized international system, meant to enhance cooperation and relationships with China’s neighbors and beyond (National Development and Reform Commission, 2015). However, literature and research on the BRI suggest several ways in which the initiative ultimately addresses several issues the PRC faces and serves the
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Chinese national interest. The question is not which of these dimensions are more valid than the others, as they are all likely valid; rather, the question is which of these goals are more immediately relevant to the policies of the fifth-generation leadership. As the BRI is suggested to be a multi-faceted strategy, these goals are not necessarily mutually exclusive, and can, in fact, achieve multiple goals in tandem. Simon Shen compared the BRI to the Marshall Plan to outline the possible motivations of the fifth-generation leadership in pushing for this initiative: Boosting exports, exporting currency, countering a rival in the form of the United States, fostering strategic divisions, and siphoning away diplomatic support (Shen, 2016). Thus, broadly speaking, these proposed goals can be categorized into four categories that actually experience significant overlap in the proposed goals of the BRI: Socioeconomic, security, diplomatic, and geopolitical. To ascertain the true motivations of the fifth-generation leadership, the hypothetical primary goal would need to fulfill the following three criteria:
1. Achieve or avoid a result conducive or disastrous, respectively, to Chinese socioeconomic, security, diplomatic, and/or geopolitical interests;
2. Relate to symptoms or signs that such is an issue that can only be addressed and/or become a threat to Chinese interests within the immediate future, such as within the tenure of the Xi administration;
3. Be goals that the fifth-generation leadership can directly address or resolve with tangible results, likely within the tenure of the Xi administration.
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(Rudolf, Infographic/China Mapping Silk Road Initiative, 2015)
In terms of the socioeconomic dimension, it is commonly agreed that the BRI is influenced by trade concerns relating to overproduction in areas such as steel, and that the creation of infrastructure networks to facilitate interregional trade is motivated by the need to find new markets by which to export Chinese overproduction (Kennedy & Parker, Building China’s "One Belt, One Road", 2015). This is particularly pertinent in no small part because China’s economic development has been predicated on a significant amount of credit and investment into the manufacturing industry and real estate, a situation similar to the prelude of the collapse of the Japanese asset bubble, thus motivating China to avoid this particular fate (Yurichuk, 2011). The initiative is thus potentially a tool in the transformation of the Chinese economy from investment-driven to
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driven and from export-driven to service-driven, thus creating a more sustainable growth pattern that addresses the complications that have accumulated from decades of China’s meteoric economic growth (Huang Y. , 2015).
In relation to these issues, it is perhaps unsurprising to note that aside from their endpoints, the Silk Road Economic Belt and the Maritime Silk Road intersect once at the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor. Research argues that this is not a coincidence, as a major component of the BRI is to turn China’s western and central provinces, relatively poor compared to the economically robust coastal regions to the east, into major trade regions, thus compensating for the imbalance in development and wealth distribution amongst China’s territories (Kennedy & Parker, Building China’s "One Belt, One Road", 2015). This is particularly relevant in terms of maintaining social stability in these restive provinces resentful of Beijing’s rule.
In terms of security and in relation to the economic disparity experienced in western China, there is the issue of national security and human security, as the PRC continues to wrestle with unrest amongst the Tibetan population but in particular Uyghur population in Xinjiang Province, and Beijing is believed to be attempting to allay Uyghur grievances with robust economic growth and higher standards of living through the economic revitalization of the region, as opposed to addressing cultural and religious issues that tie into Islamic extremism (Bhattacharji, 2012). Denying Xinjiang to Islamic extremism is of particular importance to China if it is to expand its influence through the BRI, not only for the sake of national security, but also because the majority of states in
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the regions part of the BRI, including Central Asia, East Africa, and the Middle East, have Islamic majorities, some of which have voiced dissatisfaction with how the PRC has handled the Xinjiang issue (Chen, 2015).
However, the most significant component of Chinese security issues relating to the BRI is that of energy security, which concerns matters of import, securing resources necessary for Chinese economic growth, particularly in energy. The Indian Ocean comprises of eighty percent of the world’s seaborne oil trade (U.S. Energy Information Administration, 2014). Russia is attempting to build new pipelines to China to sell gas and oil through its Power of Siberia network as the Russian economy continues to struggle (Cohen, 2015). And Central Asia is a potential exporter of gas, gold, minerals, oil, rare earths, and uranium to China (Pannier, 2015). The BRI is also projected to address the two largest bottlenecks in the oil trade, the Strait of Hormuz and the Malacca Strait, which comprise of forty percent and thirty percent of the world’s seaborne oil trade respectively (U.S. Energy Information Administration, 2014). Pipelines and infrastructure networks running into the Persian Gulf from China via Pakistan and/or Central Asia under the Silk Road Economic Belt would address the Strait of Hormuz, whereas the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) that connects the Pakistani port city of Gwadar with the Chinese city of Kashgar in Xinjiang Province would provide an overland alternative to the Malacca Strait. These alternatives would provide China extra options in the event of international crises that see these chokepoints under constraint for whatever reason (Ramachandran, 2015).
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In terms of diplomacy, another common argument is that a major component of the BRI is a soft power campaign that can be considered an extension of the “China’s peaceful development” policy implemented by the Hu Jintao administration and the fourth generation PRC leadership in 2003. Aside from trying to portray China’s development as non-threatening, the BRI is also framed as a platform in which China trades low-conditional investments for diplomatic goodwill, as seen by the eagerness of the PRC and the Chinese media to frame such cooperative ventures under the BRI as
“win-win” or “mutually beneficial” (Xie, Wang, He, & Yuan, 世界如何共贏?中國正在 破題 (Shijieruhegongying Zhongguozhenzaipoti, How Can the World Be Win-Win?
China is Answering the Question), 2014). By taking a “business is business” approach to international investments, China has created a different image for itself relative to the U.S.
and Russia, where the former often grants investments based on human rights performance whereas the latter does so with geostrategic concerns (Clarke, 2015). These low-condition high-interest Chinese loans are thus considered valuable for funding national infrastructure megaprojects, particularly in Central Asian, South Asian, and East African states, where corruption makes it difficult for the government to remain accountable in accepting these loans, and thus comes fraught with its risks (The Economist Intelligence Unit, 2015). Of all the states in Central Asia, South Asia, and East Africa, Bhutan is considered by Transparency International as the least corrupt with an index value of 65 (out of 100, where a higher score represents lower perceptions of corruption), but the second least corrupt state of India falls sharply to 38, and the remaining states in these three regions struggle to rise past 30 (Transparency International, 2016). This permits the fostering of closer ties with states in the region, and is also argued
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to be an attempt by Beijing to redirect attention from ongoing political and diplomatic disputes that China has with neighboring states, such as with India, Japan, and Vietnam, particularly in regards to maritime claims in the East and South China Seas; closer economic ties and inter-reliance on Chinese trade is thus a possible solution that Beijing seeks to blunt these political disputes (Yale, 2015).
In terms of geopolitics, the hard power dimension must also be surveyed. With the Maritime Silk Road seen in the light of the maritime disputes in the East and South China Seas, as well as the Sino-Indian rivalry, there are geostrategic components to consider. Fears persist that the Chinese artificial islands in the East and South China Seas, and Chinese investments in ports in the Indian Ocean may be militarized. Key to this perspective, in relation to Chinese energy security concerns, is the “String of Pearls”
theory, which suggests that Chinese engagements with foreign ports in the Indian Ocean, while seemingly commercial in nature, could eventually be used for military purposes by the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) for the purposes of power projection into the Indian Ocean, with the String of Pearls being used to “strangle” regional rival India with a containment strategy (Marantidou, 2014). China has rejected this theory, insisting that Chinese engagement in the Indian Ocean is not directed against any state, and the Maritime Silk Road may partially be an attempt to replace the narrative of the String of Pearls (Zhou, 2014). However, PLAN vessels docked in the ostensibly commercial Colombo International Container Terminal in Sri Lanka in September and October of 2014, and the PLAN announced plans in November 2015 to establish a naval base in
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Djibouti, thus fueling concerns of a military dimension to the Maritime Silk Road, which has in turn exacerbated Indian concern and cynicism towards the BRI (Aneja, 2014).
Finally, China is attempting to establish institutions such as the AIIB, the Free Trade Area of the Asia-Pacific (FTAAP), and the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), which are not only tied into the BRI, but also considered to be counterweights against equivalents such as the Asian Development Bank (ADB) and the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), which are dominated by the U.S. or its allies (Cossa &
Glosserman, 2014). This argument is consistent with some of the rhetoric that the Xi administration has used, such as the insistence that Asian matters should be left for Asians to resolve, thus implying that the U.S. should not interfere with what China regards as its sphere of influence (Blanchard, With one eye on Washington, China plots its own Asia 'pivot', 2014). This is especially pertinent since Chinese domestic literature regard American influence in the Asia-Pacific with scorn, characterizing American involvement in the region as the assumption that they are the “natural leader” of Asia, and similarly lambasts non-Chinese-led institutions such as the ADB as lacking in comprehensive utility (Wang M. , 2015). Such further complicates the circumstances in the Asia-Pacific region in no small part because some Asia-Pacific states look for increased U.S. involvement to counteract against China, provide regional security, resolve disputes over maritime claims and resources, and guarantee their own national interests (Lyon, 2015). Within domestic literature, this is particularly necessary in significant part because of the previous “rebalance to Asia” policy under the Obama administration; although it is questionable as to whether the Trump administration will
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continue to pursue this policy, they are ultimately considered as symptoms of a rival American presence in the Asia-Pacific, forcing China to seek safer geopolitical options in every direction but eastwards (Li & Li, 2015). Furthermore, it speaks to China’s desire to reshape the international system from one dominated primarily by the U.S. to a multipolar system in which China has a more significant say, although domestic literature empathetically rejects the idea of a Chinese-led international system (Wang M. , 2015).
There is thus the argument that the BRI is a component of a wider strategy by China to replace the U.S. as the dominant power in the Asia-Pacific or at least to reduce U.S. influence in the Asia-Pacific through the use of multipolar institutions not dominated by the U.S. (Churchman, 2015). It can thus be said that China is creating a separate economic order through trade infrastructure that it can assert influence through, much in the manner that the U.S. and its allies exert influence and control international trade through the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the Bretton Woods system;
similarly, it represents a contingency plan to progressively minimize Chinese dependence on an international trade system historically led by the U.S. Even if foreign states taking part in the BRI do not share China’s vision for a different future political landscape, it at least recognizes that China is providing a great deal of funding and investments to accommodate their own domestic infrastructural and economic agendas (Parameswaran, 2017). In this vein, China seems to be attempting to closer ties with the Moscow-led Eurasian Economic Union (EEU), even as Russia’s floundering ruble, threatened by Western sanctions in response to Russian involvement in the Ukranian Civil War, makes gas and oil sales to China a priority, which in turn decreases its ability to stop China from
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expanding its influence into Central Asia, long considered by Russia as within its sphere of influence (Gabuev, 2015).
Potential Belt and Road Initiative Goals Geopolitical
Circumvent regional disputes
Response to U.S. policy towards Asia Realignment of influence Wealth distribution to inland regions
It bears repeating that the above suggestions for Chinese motivations behind the BRI are not mutually exclusive, and much in the literature about the BRI suggests that these goals are being pursued in tandem with each other. The question the thesis seeks to ask instead is which of the proposed motivation is most important and pertinent to the Chinese fifth-generation leadership under the Xi administration. As an administration of significant political power not seen since the Deng Xiaoping era, the Xi administration potentially retains a unified comprehensive vision and policy set to address Chinese concerns, as opposed to a variety of smaller policies born from consensus-based decision-making. This is especially relevant since the BRI is acknowledged to possess components that address Chinese domestic concerns, such as domestic industrial overproduction and wealth inequality. And to ascertain these concerns, it also becomes vital to examine Xi Jinping’s domestic, wide-encompassing policy: The Chinese Dream.
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