The geopolitics of knowledge communities: Situating Chinese and foreign studies of the Green Belt and Road Initiative

Abstract

Geographers are paying increasing attention to the geopolitics of knowledge production. China has attracted particular interest given the state’s professed goal of becoming a scientific power. Little research, however, has attended to the politics of scientific research relating to the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). Instead, a focus on the discourses and environmental impacts of infrastructure projects is paramount. Understanding the situated nature of research on the BRI, particularly within the environmental sciences, is crucial considering the Chinese state’s ambitions to become a global scientific power and a leader in green energy and climate change. We carry out a systematic review of 537 publications in Chinese and English on the Green BRI, an ostensibly more environmentally-friendly version of the initiative. We find four main research themes across the entire corpus: 1) environmental impact assessments; 2) empirical analysis of non-state actors involved in Green BRI governance; 3) identification of overseas commercial opportunities for China’s green industries; and 4) detection of policy alignment of the Chinese initiative with the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals. For each theme, we articulate the main cleavages separating the Chinese and foreign corpuses and critique the geopolitics and subjectivities embedded in environmental studies of the BRI. The two corpuses agree on: 1) the need for a greener BRI; 2) the need for more diversified governance that engages actors beyond the state; and 3) the ability for host country context and capacity to influence the BRI’s implementation. The corpuses disagree regarding: 1) the severity of the initiative’s potential impacts; 2) investors’ and non-profit organizations’ intentions and appropriate roles; and 3) whether China should export its norms and standards or instead adopt international ones. We attribute these cleavages to divergent implicit geopolitics embedded within the Chinese and foreign knowledge communities, which reflects broader interstate power competition. This research underscores how knowledge production is geopolitically situated even within environmental studies, which are often viewed as objective. At a time of heightening international tension, this article urges consideration of how emerging geopolitical ideas and narratives affect the practices and policies of science in rising powers.