Yang Nan: How do you look at the "Rebuild a Better World" initiative launched by the United States?
Author: Yang Nan is an assistant researcher at the Institute of American Studies, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences
Source: World Knowledge, No. 14, 2021; World Knowledge
WeChat platform editor: Zhou Yue
On June 13, at the closing ceremony of the G7 Summit in Cornwall, ENGLAND, an initiative called "Build Back Better World" (B3W) was written into a joint statement. This is a "global infrastructure plan" that is expected to be costly, proposed by US President Biden, although the core goal of "assisting middle- and low-income countries to build infrastructure" is publicly declared, the strategic logic and intention behind it are "clear". As soon as the initiative was launched, it was interpreted by public opinion as a "Western solution" to deal with China's "Belt and Road" initiative.
On June 13, 2021, the last day of the G7 summit in Cornwall, UK, US President Joe Biden attended a press conference.
The US version of the "Belt and Road"?
During the Trump administration, the United States gradually upgraded its resistance to China's "Belt and Road" initiative as a "strategic priority". However, the "Belt and Road" has been implemented for nearly eight years with China's advantages in capital, equipment, technology and market, and the number of cooperative members has reached more than 100 countries, and it has been widely influenced and recognized around the world. The US strategic community is inconsistent about whether it can successfully hedge the "Belt and Road". After 2018, Trump changed his "disdainful" attitude toward overseas infrastructure, promoted and signed the "Make Good Use of Investment to Guide Development Act" (BUILD Law), integrated multiple forces within the US administration to create the Us International Development Finance Corporation (IDFC), and raised $60 billion to provide development financing for infrastructure projects in low- and middle-income countries. In 2019, the Trump administration, in collaboration with Japan and Australia, launched the "Blue Dot Network" program in an attempt to recruit member states with "Michelin-style restaurant-style standards" and jointly carry out a "standard battle" for china's infrastructure project evaluation and certification.
Since Biden was elected, he has conveyed a diplomatic concept different from the Trump administration, but he has chosen to "take over the baton" in the fight against the "Belt and Road". On March 26, 2021, Biden called British Prime Minister Johnson and proposed for the first time that a "democracy" should lead a global infrastructure plan. A month later, Biden expressed the same will when he met with Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga. On June 5, on the eve of his departure for Europe, Biden made it clear in the Washington Post that he would extend the "domestic priority" of strengthening infrastructure to the world. Reuters quoted a "key member" of the Biden administration as saying that the administration will go further in the "competition for competition' sake" suppression strategy under Trump, using allies to show the world a set of "alternatives" to weaken China's global influence through the "Belt and Road" initiative. The B3W initiative officially sounded the "departure number" of the Biden administration's implementation of the US version of the global infrastructure plan.
The G7 joint statement further elaborated on what the White House called a "bold new global infrastructure initiative." Although the description of this "manual" is macroscopic and vague in general, the words reveal the overall consideration of the Biden administration's "borrowing + transcendence" of China.
In terms of philosophy, the B3W first emphasized the "Values-Driven" partnership, which made this initiative, which at the public level, has made it a clear ideological brand from the beginning. At the same time, B3W uses "Good Governance" and "High Standard" as its code of conduct, in an attempt to demonstrate the fairness of project benefits, the superiority of quality and the sustainability of cooperation. The initiative also incorporates "Climate-Friendly" into principles, saying it will strictly adhere to the Paris Climate Agreement.
In terms of projects, B3W is clearly aware of the great advantages that the Belt and Road Initiative has achieved in the construction of facilities such as ports, highways, airports and dams around the world, and remains silent about whether it will continue to invest in these traditional projects. At the same time, B3W is trying to take a different approach, focusing on four "high-quality areas" of climate change, health and safety, digital technologies, and gender equality, and to foster concrete collaborative projects through so-called "Strong Strategic Partnerships." This not only responds to the objective needs of the world's underdeveloped regions in the "post-epidemic era", but also highly fits the biden administration's overall strategic thinking of "uniting Europe and China".
In terms of financing, the B3W hinted that it would choose a combination of private financing, public financing, and loans and subsidies to meet the specific needs of infrastructure construction, and said it would work to expand "usable development financing tools". In this context, B3W may turn to "embracing" the private sector and the financing schemes of the International Development Finance Corporation. The plan also emphasizes the "catalyst" role of international financial institutions, meaning that the United States and its allies will "intercept water" from multilateral institutions including the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank, the International Monetary Fund, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, and the European Investment Bank.
On June 24, 2021, a 12-story residential building in Miami, Florida, united states collapsed, and the scene was tragic, once again highlighting the urgency of infrastructure renewal in the United States.
"Rebuilding" belongs to America's "Better World"
In 2018, the Global Infrastructure Center (GIH), a subsidiary of the Group of Twenty (G20), proposed in its Global Infrastructure Development Outlook report that global infrastructure investment would increase to $94 trillion by 2040, an average annual growth rate of $3.7 trillion. According to the Asian Development Bank, developing asia alone will need $26 trillion in infrastructure investment by 2030. The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated this investment need. In the context of the global "infrastructure deficit", major countries have an obligation to take the lead in building these public goods that will help boost regional recovery and divert global capital, and given the complementarity of industrial structures and capabilities, it should be a "not bad and necessary choice" for countries to resort to cooperation and coordination around this issue to achieve win-win results.
However, the content of the B3W is closely linked to competing issues such as ideology, standards, trade, and security, which is not only politically significant, but also always "implies" the "dominant position" of the United States in advancing the initiative. So, how do we understand the strategic logic behind the Biden administration's push for B3W?
The B3W is a continuation of the Biden administration's slogan of "Rebuilding The Good." In Biden's concept of "middle-class diplomacy," strengthening domestic construction is the "starting point" of foreign policy, while the prosperity, unity, and security of the American middle class are the goals of foreign policy. Charles Koopkin, a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, describes this line of thinking as "connecting domestic priorities with overseas goals." From the "Build Back Better" proposed at the time of the election to the "Build Back Better World" this time, from the "American employment plan" of $2.25 trillion at home to the infrastructure initiative of 40 trillion US dollars to the international community, Biden has tirelessly "docked" domestic governance with international governance, trying to "dance long sleeves" between "altruism" and "self-interest". From this point of view, the so-called "good world" means more "America's world."
The B3W is also the backbone of the Biden administration's "Repair Alliance" mission. Under the guidance of Trump's "America First" concept, the United States has withdrawn from many international mechanisms and bilateral treaties, relinquished its dominance over international rules in some areas, and its relations with its allies have also been undermined. The Biden administration, which values alliance strategy, has taken a number of initiatives in the first 100 days of its administration to try to revive alliances. Against this backdrop, the Biden administration sees the trip to Europe and the G7 summit as an important stage for the "post-Trump era" to restart U.S.-EU relations. To this end, it is urgent to propose a series of specific plans and substantive measures as a "glue" to repair alliances. If the New Atlantic Charter, which was first signed by the United States and Britain during Biden's visit to London, covers economic development and security cooperation as an example of "reshaping the alliance", then the introduction of the B3W is to lay the foundation for the Biden administration to "restructure the multilateral alliance".
The B3W is a projection of the Biden administration's competitive strategy toward China. Under the premise of continuing the comprehensive control of China during the Trump era, Biden and his team intend to refine the path of competition, so they immediately launched a review of China policy after entering the White House. Although the results have not yet been made public, it is presumed that overseas infrastructure has gradually risen to become a priority area for the US strategic community to seek competition with China. As the U.S. government's first systematic blueprint for containing the "Belt and Road", B3W will extend its arm span to Latin America, the Caribbean, Africa and the Indo-Pacific and other areas where "Chinese influence" is more concentrated on the basis of integrating various existing programs, including the "Blue Dot Network" plan, while focusing on the advantages of the United States, and ultimately countering or even "squeezing out" China's corresponding existence.
It is easier said than done, and it is difficult to land on the ground
The United States and the G7 have proposed a B3W plan as an "alternative option" to the "Belt and Road" initiative for the world, with strong competition and obvious offensive posture. But in contrast to the initiative itself, the B3W lacks operational content and is more like a "macro blueprint" than a specific "action guide". As the professional analysis website Silk Road Briefing commented: B3W alone, the initiative of "most marketing remarks and less substance", is difficult to shake the strategic chips accumulated by the "step by step" of the "Belt and Road" initiative.
The first is to focus on funds, can financing be in place? The B3W said it would "tightly control" the source of funding, viewing "like-minded partners" such as the G7, the private sector and major stakeholders as the only legitimate "injectors". From the perspective of national actors, the initiative ignores the fact that G7 countries' debt levels have continued to soar in recent years. From the perspective of non-State actors, balancing trade secrets in the private sector with transparency of sources of funding has become a challenging, even difficult, task. Robert Daly, director of the Kissinger Institute for U.S.-China Studies at the Woodrow Wilson Center, wonders, "Is this infrastructure model investing new money and expanding new capabilities in the region, or is it realizing and repackaging existing resources?" ”
The second is to focus on allies, can the action be monolithic? One of the premises of the B3W is that the G7 upholds the same concept of China and can resort to concerted action driven by a unified strategy. This has aroused great doubt from all walks of life. We have already seen protests from the Biden administration's recent cancellation of the Keystone XL pipeline project, which carries oil from Canada to the United States, and that Germany, the G7's largest economy, attaches great importance to its trade relations with China, seeing China as the most important overseas market for its auto industry. A June 14 editorial in the Wall Street Journal noted that some European leaders are reluctant to risk "ending cooperation" with China on issues such as climate change, trade and finance to cater to the yet-to-be-formed B3W initiative.
The third is to focus on the path, can the model "penetrate the hearts of the people"? On June 28, U.S. Secretary of State Blinken met with Italian Foreign Minister Dima. Asked at a news conference about the relationship between the Belt and Road Initiative and the B3W Initiative, Blinken said investment in infrastructure in low- and middle-income countries around the world is necessary, but that the race must be "a race to the top not a race to the bottom." Blinken's implication is that the funding received by the B3W initiative will be "conditional on" by human rights, climate change, corruption, and domestic laws and regulations. Why does the United States confidently believe that low- and middle-income countries will choose to abandon the Belt and Road Initiative, which has a streamlined process and unconditional additions, and instead choose financing schemes that affect their internal affairs and have "intrusive" preconditions to cooperate?
Overall, the B3W proposal sends a clear signal that the United States and the West want to compete with China in the field of global infrastructure construction, and the two sides will set off a protracted battle for layout and investment. However, global infrastructure is, after all, an international agenda and an ambitious area that all countries highly agree on, and no major country can lead it alone. The proposed B3W by the United States and the West does not deny the possibility of future coordination with the "Belt and Road" initiative, and may even fill the "capacity gap" of the Chinese side to some extent. In the long run, China should be able to turn competition into a driving force, and work with countries along the Route and relevant international organizations to continuously enrich and improve the construction of the "Belt and Road" step by step, and enrich its "digital road" and green infrastructure. At the same time, all parties need to jump out of the vicious competitive thinking, not give up the possibility of third-party cooperation between China and the United States, China and the West in the field of global infrastructure, and promote the formation of the actual effect of giving full play to their respective advantages to jointly revitalize global infrastructure.
Think tank of the digital economy
Political Science and International Relations Forum
In order to better serve the construction of digital China, serve the construction of the "Belt and Road", and strengthen theoretical exchanges and practical exchanges in the process of digital economy construction. Experts and scholars from China's digital economy and the "Belt and Road" construction have established a digital economy think tank to contribute to the construction of digital China. Wei Jianguo, former vice minister of the Ministry of Commerce, served as honorary president, and well-known young scholars Huang Rihan and Chu Yin led the way. The Political Science and International Relations Forum is a dedicated platform under the umbrella of the Digital Economy Think Tank.