Abstract
The chapter provides a systematic and comprehensive overview of the strategic intentions and design of China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). It looks at how infrastructure development has become the new anchor of geopolitical competition, and how varying motivations are simultaneously driving China’s megaproject of the twenty-first century, which is expected to redefine global infrastructure with Chinese characteristics. The chapter looks at how a combination of proactive industrial policy, the need for domestic economic rebalancing, and strategic interest in establishing footprints across global sea lines of communications is driving the BRI project. The chapter also provides an overview of criticisms and inherent limitations of China’s vision of a sino-centric global economic order.
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Notes
- 1.
Philippine Daily Inquirer (2016).
- 2.
Gooch (2017, 53).
- 3.
Xinhua (2017, May).
- 4.
Aljazeera (2017).
- 5.
For full speech see Xinhua (2017).
- 6.
Stone (2018).
- 7.
For the full speech see CGTN (2017).
- 8.
The Hindu (2017).
- 9.
BBC News (2017).
- 10.
Depending on sources, the figure ranges from as low as $1.3 trillion to $8 trillion. Yet, the $5 seems as a more reasonable upper-limit, since the larger figures have yet to be reflected in China’s own documents and pronouncements.
- 11.
Van der Leer and Yau (2016).
- 12.
Suokas (2018).
- 13.
Wong et al. (2017).
- 14.
Huang (2017).
- 15.
Cai (2017).
- 16.
Ibid.
- 17.
Ibid.
- 18.
Shambaugh (2015).
- 19.
Cai (2017).
- 20.
Ibid.
- 21.
Rauhala (2014).
- 22.
Spegele (2012).
- 23.
Walker and Buck (2007).
- 24.
Sharma (2012, 24).
- 25.
Jacobs (2017).
- 26.
Cai (2017).
- 27.
Ibid.
- 28.
Andreas (2012).
- 29.
Cai (2017).
- 30.
Ibid.
- 31.
Hurley et al. (2018).
- 32.
Appelbaum (2016).
- 33.
Cai (2017).
- 34.
Kaplan (2013).
- 35.
Kennedy (2010).
- 36.
Li (2010).
- 37.
Ibid.
- 38.
Holmes and Yoshihara (2011).
- 39.
Vaitheeswaran (2017).
- 40.
Kennedy (2015).
- 41.
Reuters (2016).
- 42.
Xinhua (2017, October).
- 43.
See full speech here China Daily (2017).
- 44.
Hurley et al. (2018).
- 45.
Chandran (2018).
- 46.
Hurley et al. (2018).
- 47.
Ibid.
- 48.
Chenalley (2017).
- 49.
Reuters (2017).
- 50.
- 51.
Cai (2017).
- 52.
- 53.
- 54.
See full speech at Tillerson (2018).
- 55.
Heydarian (2018a).
- 56.
Ibid.
- 57.
De Vera (2018).
- 58.
Dela Paz (2017).
- 59.
Heydarian (2018a).
- 60.
Heydarian (2017).
- 61.
Koutsoukis and Yap (2018).
- 62.
Heydarian (2018b).
- 63.
Cardenas (2017).
- 64.
Ibid.
- 65.
Ibid., 26.
- 66.
Feigenbaum and Ma (2013).
- 67.
Asian Development Bank (2013).
- 68.
Hurley et al. (2018).
- 69.
Cai (2017).
- 70.
- 71.
Hillman (2018).
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Heydarian, R.J. (2020). The Belt and Road: China as the New Vanguard of Globalization. In: The Indo-Pacific: Trump, China, and the New Struggle for Global Mastery. Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-9799-8_5
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