Demystifying the Belt and Road Initiative: China’s domestic and non-strategic policy?

Abstract

The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) is a central policy of the Chinese government. The initiative is directly associated with President Xi Jinping, who first put forward the BRI in Kazakhstan and Indonesia in 2013, initially as One Belt One Road. Different from repetitive literature that concludes the BRI as China's global strategy, this article makes a contribution to argue that the BRI is China's domestic and non-strategic policy. To justify this argument, this article analyses how the BRI has been embedded into aspects of Chinese domestic policy by revealing its nexuses with Chinese domestic economy, politics and ideology. To deepen the understanding of the BRI's connection with the Chinese economy, this article explores the link between the BRI and China's supply-side structural reform. Meanwhile, this research demystifies the BRI as a global strategy and the difference between joining and rejecting the BRI to prove the BRI's non-strategic essence. In the end, this article discusses the BRI's far-reaching geopolitical influence.