Opinion | Why Global South continues to embrace BRI
By Tom Fowdy
As the upcoming "Belt and Road Forum" looms, China recently released a new white paper titled: "The Belt and Road Initiative: A Key Pillar of the Global Community of Shared Future". The paper effectively marks ten years since Xi Jinping proposed the megaproject and the "community of a shared future" concept in 2013, as well as marking the upcoming Belt and Road forum, whereby dignitaries from all over the world will attend. Although Western representatives are likely to shun it in the name of opposing China, one can anticipate that many delegates from the Middle East will certainly be present as they seek new investment for their respective countries.
There are many misconceptions about what the BRI actually is, and what its goals are. Unsurprisingly, the mega infrastructure project has been vilified in the mainstream media, where it is depicted solely as a Chinese power project that seeks to exploit poorer nations with "debt traps" which gives it geopolitical leverage. Never in any instance does such coverage, which also enjoys depicting the BRI as a failure concurrently, give credit to many large-scale infrastructure projects China has pulled off across multiple continents, be it entire railways, ports, airports, sea ports, energy infrastructure and so on. This sensationalist narrative is of course, deliberately misleading and unhelpful.
To understand the BRI, first one must understand China's foreign policy goals in light of the "non-aligned movement" and its sense of "solidarity" with the countries termed as "the global south." In the Maoist era, China actively set itself apart from the Soviet Union and Western blocs under the name of the "three worlds theory." If the first world is the West, the second world is the USSR and its allies, and the third world is the term used to describe the states of the Middle East, Latin America, Africa and Asia that did not formally align and were instead "squashed between them." Although the term "third world" has become pejorative in the Western mindset referring to poor countries, more accurately it is used to describe the states who became independent from Western colonialism in the 1950s, 60s and 70s.
Navigating the global power blocs, China placed emphasis in forming relations with these countries built on a shared historical and social experience of enduring Western colonialism and exploitation. In doing so, China formed historic friendships with countries in Africa, South Asia, Latin America and the Middle East which were built not on the principles of an alliance, but the idea of national sovereignty, independence and therefore a route for development. Although the Mao era is long over, these principles continue to be an important foundation of China's worldview and its approach to the global south, which underpin the thinking of the Belt and Road Initiative.
As such, China sees the BRI as a means of solidarity and development assistance to the countries of the global south wherein it offers it resources and experiences to help countries escape what it claims is the fundamental inequality of the global economic system created and thus dominated by the west. China of course also sees the BRI and its results as important to keeping its own growth going by integrating its trade and economic future with these countries. For example, China may offer BRI projects in exchange for maintaining an import market for its own products, whilst in exchange offering its own market for the goods of the country it's dealing with, promising lucrative gains from trade with China. Beijing describes this as "win-win" cooperation.
For example, in 2021 China built the "China-Laos Railway" through the landlocked country of Laos in Southeast Asia, which is poor due to its geographic isolation. The railway, a BRI project, connects the country to China which subsequently allows its products to be exported accordingly, therefore offering it growth opportunities. There are many other BRI opportunities doing just that. In doing so, China has framed the BRI as a "new silk road" and here the Middle East and Central Asia have become a pivotal and strategic region serving as a gateway to Europe, allowing them to become a mediator of trade and investment. This has been strongly embraced by many regional countries, irrespective of what political camp they may belong to.
More importantly, China increasingly sees the BRI as a means of "rescuing globalization" amidst attempts to reverse it by the United States and its allies, and therefore serves as an important diplomatic tool in the midst of attempts to isolate it, framing a more optimistic, positive and open approach to the future. While the US emphasizes so-called "de-risking" and "de-coupling" which in practice seek to close off markets and investment to sustain America's economic privileges in specific areas, China on the other hand is emphasizing economic openness, integration, and increased trade and depicts the global future as one of interdependency.
It recognizes in doing so that the states of the global south are its greatest partners in keeping the multilateral trading system open and beneficial, and therefore strives to pivot to these countries as sources of its future growth rather than relying on the West.
The author is a well-seasoned writer and analyst with a large portfolio related to China topics, especially in the field of politics, international relations and more. He graduated with an Msc. in Chinese Studies from Oxford University in 2018.
The views do not necessarily reflect those of DotDotNews.
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