A quick search for “Belt and Road Initiative projects” draws many results, from infrastructure and construction such as railroads, ports and hydropower stations, to consumer goods such as smartphones and household appliances. There are even songs about it.
Chinese officials say Belt and Road has, over the past decade, drawn investments of nearly $1 trillion, launched more than 3,000 cooperation projects, created 420,000 jobs in countries along the route and lifted nearly 40 million people out of poverty.
For the latest news & views from every corner of the world, Worldcrunch Today is the only truly international newsletter. Sign up here.
Yet this data lacks sources and details, leaving researchers at a loss. For example, maps of the route published by official Chinese sources (CCTV and Xinhua News Agency) are not identical, with Kenya being included in the latter. Another example is the number of business investments that began before 2013, when the initiative was launched, but have since been labeled as Belt and Road projects.
Beijing has never clearly defined the initiative’s boundaries. There is no budgetary institution or coordinating department, and a lack of evaluation mechanisms. It was not until 2019 that China’s National Development and Reform Commission set up the Belt and Road Construction Promotion Center, and it was only made public in 2022.
The related budgets are departmental budgets, not all project budgets. Even in the “Belt and Road Network,” the data of individual projects cannot be seen, instead of the overall import and export volume.
Ambiguity is being used to deceive. On one hand, local governments and Chinese companies hope to use the name “Belt and Road” to show that they have the support of the central government or are loyal to Beijing’s interests. On the other hand, the government acquiesces to these abuses and expects to make Belt and Road look like a grandiose project.
Real footprint v. political influence
The 2023 edition of the official book Xi Jinping on the Belt and Road described the initiative as “a major practice to build a community of human destiny.”
This initially commercial project has become part of an ideological construct. Yet the “practice” is so vague, it is difficult to assess in concrete terms. In his book One Belt, One Road, Chinese Power Meets The World, Harvard Kennedy School research fellow Eyck Freymann writes that “infrastructure projects are much less integrated than is often reported. In fact, the actual footprint of Belt and Road is less important to the Chinese government than the political influence gained in the process.”
China has been trying to create an image of openness, inclusiveness and mutual benefit for potential partners
Chinese media initially used the term “strategy” to describe Belt and Road but have since been asked to change it to “initiative”, underscoring the importance of English-language communications abroad.
Outside academic papers and commentaries often see Belt and Road as a brand name that helps Chinese companies get loans, China build its national image and leaders build their influence.
The history of the “initiative”
First called “One Belt, One Road,” the initiative was announced during President Xi Jinping’s 2013 visit to Kazakhstan and Indonesia in an attempt to “break the bottleneck of connectivity in Asia” by linking the Eurasian trade network through airports, seaports and railroads. Following the example of the ancient Silk Road trade route, “One Belt” is the land-based Silk Road Economic Belt, while “One Road” is the “Maritime Silk Road” for seaports. The project soon expanded to include power plants, mines, data centers and 5G networks, and added new routes to West Africa and Latin America. Now fully incorporated in Beijing’s messaging, other versions of the route, including a Health Silk Road (widely used in mask and vaccine diplomacy during the COVID pandemic) and a Green Silk Road, have also been announced.
Since 2013, 151 countries, mainly in Asia and Africa, have signed the Belt and Road Memorandum of Understanding with China. In December 2023, it was disclosed that Italy, which joined in 2019, would not renew the agreement. Chinese official media have remained silent on the matter, however. Italy’s exports to China had increased by 3.4 billion euros since joining, while China’s exports to Italy increased by 25.8 billion euros over the same period.
Many countries receiving Chinese financing under the initiative are now facing serious debt distress. According to the AidData institute, less than 5% of China’s overseas lending went to support struggling borrowers in 2010, and by 2022, the share of bailout loans rose to 60%.
The research Rhodium Group found that China’s foreign lending peaked in 2016 and has been declining since. Following Xi’s 2018 announcement that the overall layout had been completed, the investments have been greatly reduced, favoring only “small and beautiful” projects.
A total of 28 Chinese outbound loans have been tracked in 2020 and 2021, totaling .5 billion. That is less than one-eighth of what it was in 2016 and the lowest since 2008, according to the China Overseas Development Finance database at Boston University’s Global Development Policy Center.
The projects supported by financing have also become concentrated; loans in 2021 involved only two sectors, public administration and transportation. The latter only included only one project: a highway in Bangladesh, which started long before the COVID pandemic.
Seeking a positive image
As it builds the Belt and Road brand image, China has been trying to create an image of openness, inclusiveness and mutual benefit for potential partners and people abroad.
Ahead of the 2017 Belt and Road International Summit, a set of reporting guidelines for journalists circulated on WeChat. These included not publishing maps without government authorization, replacing the aggressive term “strategy” with the softer term “initiative,” and not overly describing the Belt and Road as a means of exporting China’s excess capacity. The guidelines also ask journalists to emphasize Belt and Road’s benefits for countries along the route.
Chinese official media began using English to publicize the initiative in 2015, and CGTN, China Daily and New China TV (Xinhua News Agency) have since posted some 65 Belt and Road videos on their YouTube accounts. These promotional materials often use children or young people as protagonists to show the initiative’s harmlessness and openness, while elements such as singing and the Olympics are used to emphasize community.
Some researchers have suggested that, unlike China’s usual narrative, the Belt and Road campaign seeks to build an image of a country that is confident in moving forward and willing to share its wealth. Scholars note that China Daily’s “Bedtime Stories” series and CGTN’s 2017 “New ‘Belt and Road’ Ads” use blonde children of foreign descent as protagonists in an attempt to downplay the Chinese threat and to hide Beijing’s role. However, the video’s commercial contracts and political slogans obstruct this illusion.
Music is also commonly used. CGTN invited a Laotian singer to write a song explaining the Belt and Road Initiative, while Xinhua News Agency presented the Belt and Road projects in different countries in its “Belt and Road Global Singing” music video. An episode of CCTV’s English-language Understanding Xi Jinping’s Path stated, “The Belt and Road Initiative is like different countries singing together”.
The primary goal of Chinese economic nationalism is to satisfy its citizens at home
Harvard Kennedy School research fellow Eyck Freymann argues that despite China’s continued claims that Belt and Road is a multilateral agreement, no independent interaction between two Belt and Road countries that does not include China has been shown in outreach materials.
The foreign, English-language propaganda of China’s official media may not be having the desired effect. According to a 2017 Xinhua News Agency survey, only 50% of international media outlets used more than 10 Xinhua press releases per month, and the reasons for not using them included “too much propaganda”, “poor narrative skills” and “not much information.” That same year, a CNN survey found that although 63% of African respondents saw the positive impact of China, “the language between China and Africa is just money.”
Indebted to China
Domestic Belt and Road propaganda is almost ubiquitous, and is found in history books, official media editorials and social media. In 2017, China’s education ministry released new history textbooks in which the Silk Road was taken out as a separate course title, shaping the trade routes strategically for Han Wudi, adding more patriotic comments, and even lengthening specific routes of the ancient Silk Road.
Eyck Freymann argues this was a move to justify China’s overseas investments through history and to increase the personal cult of Xi Jinping by juxtaposing his historical status with that of Han Wudi. Scholars have found that the primary goal of Chinese economic nationalism is “not to conquer the outside world, but to satisfy its citizens at home.”
It’s become a symbol of China’s power, as well as Xi’s personal badge of honor.
Belt and Road seems to have become a symbol of the “Chinese dream” and China’s power, as well as Xi’s personal badge of honor. But while Xi proposed Belt and Road, the term “New Silk Road” did not come from China; it first appeared in diplomatic vocabulary in Kyrgyzstan in 1998.
In early 2023, Honduras, which had become friendly with Taiwan, ended diplomatic relations with Taiwan and their bilateral free trade agreement. At the same time, Honduras joined China’s Belt and Road agreement and issued a sovereignty statement saying, “Taiwan is an inseparable part of Chinese territory.”
A number of countries, including Panama (2018), the Dominican Republic (2018), Solomon Islands (2019), Kiribati (2020) and Nicaragua (2022), have also severed diplomatic relations with Taiwan as a result of signing on to the Belt and Road intiative.
In 2022, China launched the Group of Friends of the Global Development Initiative (GDI), which has around 70 member states and is backed by the UN, which is seen as an attempt by China to develop its international power.
The list of GDI members is not publicly available, but the Financial Times was able to locate 20 of them, and found that, between 2013 and 2020, they voted with China at the UN General Assembly at least 75% of the time. They are all Belt and Road signatories and have large foreign debts to China.
“Small but beautiful”
The Council on Foreign Relations, an American think tank that has tracked the surge in China’s foreign debt since 2013, found that some countries’ debt to China exceeded 20% of their GDP. Laos’s debt amounted to 84% of its GDP. Scholars at the Atlantic Council’s Global China Hub argue that building a Chinese-led international order with Belt and Road and GDI will not be easy; it could win votes at the UN but not real influence in international diplomacy. While China’s economic initiatives may be attractive, the political ramifications may not advance smoothly.
The AidData institute found that, as of 2021, 35% of Belt and Road infrastructure projects involve corruption, excessive debt and/or labor exploitation. Public and media support for China has generally declined since 2020, even in low- and middle-income countries that used to generally have similar attitudes and trade with China. The report argues that while the decline in Belt and Road countries has been relatively mild, the overall deterioration in public and media sentiment has forced political elites to distance themselves from China for fear of their votes.
Bao Shujun, a researcher and director of China’s National Development and Reform Commission, told People’s Daily that the Belt and Road has made five achievements in the past 10 years in terms of connecting facilities and communicating policies, but “small but beautiful” projects will become a “priority”.
Constrained by the ever-growing and overdue foreign debt, as well as China’s domestic economic contraction, “small and beautiful” has become the key for future Belt and Road projects and its direction.
Scholars say that despite the mixed outlook, the Belt and Road Initiative shows little sign of receding. Trade with China remains an important factor in Southeast Asia. Belt and Road developments will depend not only on Beijing’s actions but also on alternative trade cooperation programs proposed by other countries in Southeast Asia, as well as the United States.
