The World According to China. Elizabeth C. Economy

The World According to China - Elizabeth C. Economy


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debates within and outside China over its sustainability, and reveals the differential impacts of Belt and Road across a range of countries. It concludes that while the BRI, more than any other initiative, has helped China realize its ambitions for a reordered world, its continued success may be derailed by discontent within host countries over Beijing’s weak governance practices and low environmental and labor standards. In addition, the spread of Chinese political, economic, and military influence via the BRI has heightened the global influence competition with other advanced economies.

      Chapter 5 examines China’s effort to lead the world’s technological transformation over the 21st century. It finds that its strategic playbook has experienced mixed success. Its governance model has yielded significant gains in Chinese domestic technological capabilities and has enabled Beijing to take a commanding lead in developing the technological infrastructure for a significant number of developing economies through the Digital Silk Road and to reinforce its technological priorities in international standard setting bodies. Beijing’s relationship with advanced market democracies in Europe, North America, and Asia, however, has encountered increasing difficulty. The growing CCP control over the private sector has contributed to Chinese technology companies’ exclusion from some of these countries’ markets. Moreover, the linkages between Chinese technology companies and the Chinese military or surveillance activities, particularly in Xinjiang, have resulted in US sanctions to deprive these companies of necessary technology. In addition, CCP financial and other support for international scientific talent through its Thousand Talents Plan has triggered concerns over spying and intellectual property (IP) theft, contributing to a significant political backlash in the United States and elsewhere.

      The final chapter offers thoughts on how the United States and the rest of the world should respond to China’s strategic ambitions. It argues that neither the traditional US policy of “constructive engagement” nor the more recent Trump administration approach of “compete, counter, and contain,” is adequate to meet the challenge. The US strategy, along with that of its allies and partners, must account for Xi Jinping’s unique policy playbook as well as to assert a positive and proactive vision of the world’s future and their place within it. Given China’s global reach and impact, moreover, the United States and traditional allies and partners must expand the tent to engage the rest of the world in this vision. While there is broad scope for cooperation between China and the United States on global challenges such as climate change, this is unlikely to alter the contest underway between two distinct sets of values and world visions.

      The findings from these chapters reveal how Xi Jinping uses the various elements of his unique foreign policy playbook to realize his strategic ambitions. Taken together, they also suggest several broader conclusions.

      Second, while China is not exporting communism, it is exporting elements of its authoritarian political model. In the same way that it controls speech domestically, Beijing seeks to limit the ability of international actors to speak freely about China. Traditionally, Beijing has concentrated on ensuring that other countries acknowledge its sovereignty claims, using the leverage of its market or access to the country to coerce them to do so or to punish them if they do not. Chinese red lines are proliferating, however. China initiated a boycott against Australian exports in response to Canberra’s call for a COVID-19 inquiry; it also expelled three Wall Street Journal reporters in response to an article that referred to China as the “sick man of Asia.” Virtually any issue can now be labeled a threat to Chinese sovereignty or social stability. China also exports its model more directly via the BRI. It trains officials in some BRI countries on how to censor the internet, control civil society, and build a robust single-party state. It also transfers its development model through the BRI in the form of debt-induced infrastructure development with weak transparency, labor, environmental, and legal standards. Finally, Chinese officials use their leadership positions within the UN and other international institutions to shape the values and norms of those bodies in ways that align with China’s political interests: for example, by preventing Uyghur Muslim dissidents from speaking before UN bodies and by advancing Chinese technology norms, such as a state-controlled internet in global standard setting bodies.

      Increasingly, however, China’s state-centered model has limited the credibility and attraction of many of its initiatives. Private Chinese technology companies such as Huawei and ByteDance face growing constraints in accessing global markets. Countries are increasingly rejecting Chinese investments over concerns that they are part of a CCP-directed strategy to support its military expansion. Chinese cultural initiatives such as Confucius Institutes (CIs) have also diminished in popularity because they are perceived to be agents of Chinese propaganda. In addition, the predilection of some Chinese officials who serve in UN bodies to act in the interest of China as opposed to the broader mission of the UN has provoked efforts by other countries to push back against Chinese initiatives and support alternative candidates


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