The relationality of geopolitical codes: the example of the Belt and Road Initiative

Abstract

ABSTRACT The concept of the geopolitical code is a useful tool to understand the multi-faceted nature of a country’s foreign policy, the way in which global patterns of geopolitics are an aggregation of geopolitical codes, and moments of geopolitical transition from one pattern of codes to another. We address the nature of geopolitical codes through the lens of instrumental and associative power, and the geography of its modalities. Especially, we consider the combined logics of power expressed as economic networks and territorial sovereignty. To illustrate our argument, we briefly consider a number of regional responses to China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). The geopolitical codes of Russia, India, Japan, the European Union, and the United States are discussed. By considering the process of the relationality of geopolitical codes constructed in response to the BRI we see an intensification in relations and an increasing scope that suggests the BRI is driving an ongoing geopolitical transition that will usher in a new geopolitical world order.