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2072. The Future of Chinese Foreign Economic Policy Will Challenge U.S. Interests, Part 1: The Belt-and-Road Initiative and the Middle Income Trap
- Author:
- Sagatom Saha
- Publication Date:
- 01-2020
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- China Brief
- Institution:
- The Jamestown Foundation
- Abstract:
- Chinese Communist Party (CCP) General Secretary Xi Jinping and other senior CCP leaders have prudently planned for the slowing economic growth that China now faces. CCP officials plan to transition China from its current export-led growth model to one driven by indigenous innovation, and one in which China’s rising global prominence confers to it many of the same advantages traditionally enjoyed by the United States (such as low borrowing costs and influence within international institutions). Although U.S.-China relations have become further fraught amid the trade war, many prominent China hands nevertheless assert that Beijing’s long-term economic plans do not run counter to U.S. strategic interests. [1] However, many of China’s planned foreign economic initiatives—to include the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), global value chain advancement, and renminbi (RMB) internationalization—will come at U.S. expense. Policymakers in both Washington and Beijing should accordingly expect U.S.-China tensions to persist beyond the Trump administration. China’s need for new growth vehicles is twofold: its economic size has not translated into global influence, and its current economic model is losing steam. First, China’s transformation into the world’s second-largest economy has yet to yield equivalent influence in the international system. Beijing’s sway in the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), for example, lag behind China’s status as the largest trade partner and foreign investor for much of the world. The United States, by contrast, has leveraged its economic status to maintain effective control of the Bretton-Woods institutions, to obtain low borrowing costs, and to exercise punishing sanctions programs against unfriendly governments. Second, Chinese growth has seen a secular decline over the last decade (see figure 1). The official projected GDP growth rate for 2020 is 6.1 percent (Xinhua, November 30, 2019), but some Chinese officials have hinted that they expect lower sub-6 percent growth in 2020 (South China Morning Post, November 14, 2019). This is a noteworthy signal, for CCP discourse has previously identified the benchmark of 6 percent GDP growth as necessary to avoid social unrest (China Brief, March 22, 2019).
- Topic:
- Foreign Policy, Economics, International Cooperation, International Trade and Finance, Hegemony, Conflict, and Rivalry
- Political Geography:
- China, Middle East, Asia, North America, and United States of America
2073. Welcome to the Mile End Institute
- Publication Date:
- 09-2020
- Content Type:
- Video
- Institution:
- Mile End Institute, Queen Mary University of London
- Abstract:
- In this video, Professor Tim Bale and Dr. Robert Saunders, who co-direct the Mile End Institute, welcome new QMUL students and highlight what the MEI can offer to those interested in politics, policy and public life.
- Topic:
- Foreign Policy, Politics, Think Tanks, and Public Policy
- Political Geography:
- Global Focus
2074. Addressing Challenges Facing NATO Using Lessons Learned From Canada
- Author:
- Erika Simpson
- Publication Date:
- 09-2020
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- Brown Journal of World Affairs
- Institution:
- Brown Journal of World Affairs
- Abstract:
- THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC IS YET another international crisis that necessitates nations learn more from each other about how to solve challenges faced by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). The 30 allies within NATO value strategic stability, a rules-based system, and trans-Atlanticism. These nations can learn valuable lessons from Canada on how to work together to promote cooperation and policy coordination that protects liberal-democratic internationalism, multilateral institutionalism, and time-tested methods of solid interaction. After the United States stepped back from its long-time role as the leader of the Western world and retreated into isolationism, President-elect Joseph R. Biden’s administration enters office with an approach that is more typical of liberal-internationalism and distinct from the Trump administration’s populist nationalism.1
- Topic:
- Foreign Policy, NATO, Crisis Management, and COVID-19
- Political Geography:
- Canada and North America
2075. China Maritime Report No. 8: Winning Friends and Influencing People: Naval Diplomacy with Chinese Characteristics
- Author:
- Timothy R. Heath
- Publication Date:
- 09-2020
- Content Type:
- Special Report
- Institution:
- China Maritime Studies Institute, U.S. Naval War College
- Abstract:
- In recent years, Chinese leaders have called on the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) to carry out tasks related to naval diplomacy beyond maritime East Asia, in the “far seas.” Designed to directly support broader strategic and foreign policy objectives, the PLAN participates in a range of overtly political naval diplomatic activities, both ashore and at sea, from senior leader engagements to joint exercises with foreign navies. These activities have involved a catalogue of platforms, from surface combatants to hospital ships, and included Chinese naval personnel of all ranks. To date, these acts of naval diplomacy have been generally peaceful and cooperative in nature, owing primarily to the service’s limited power projection capabilities and China’s focus on more pressing security matters closer to home. However, in the future a more blue-water capable PLAN could serve more overtly coercive functions to defend and advance China’s rapidly growing overseas interests when operating abroad.
- Topic:
- Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, Navy, and People's Liberation Army (PLA)
- Political Geography:
- China and Asia
2076. China Maritime Report No. 7: Gwadar: China's Potential Strategic Strongpoint in Pakistan
- Author:
- Isaac B. Kardon, Conor M. Kennedy, and Peter A. Dutton
- Publication Date:
- 08-2020
- Content Type:
- Special Report
- Institution:
- China Maritime Studies Institute, U.S. Naval War College
- Abstract:
- This China Maritime Report on Gwadar is the second in a series of case studies on China’s Indian Ocean “strategic strongpoints” (战略支点). People’s Republic of China (PRC) officials, military officers, and civilian analysts use the strategic strongpoint concept to describe certain strategically valuable foreign ports with terminals and commercial zones owned and operated by Chinese firms.
- Topic:
- International Relations, Foreign Policy, Port, and Commerce
- Political Geography:
- Pakistan, China, and Asia
2077. Foreign Policy in the real world: the Obama years
- Author:
- Joseph Marques
- Publication Date:
- 09-2020
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- Conjuntura Austral: Journal of the Global South
- Institution:
- Conjuntura Austral: Journal of the Global South
- Abstract:
- This review essay examines three books written by senior former Obama administration members - Susan Rice, Samantha Power, and Ben Rhodes. It highlights how the authors manage to present many of the Obama administration's internal debates, as well as reveal the limitations of its foreign policy. RICE, Susan. Tough Love: My Story of the Things Worth Fighting For. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2019, 544p., ISBN: 978-1-50118-997-5. POWER, Samantha. The Education of an Idealist: A Memoir. London: Dey Street Books, 2019, 592p., ISBN: 978-0-06282-069-3. RHODES, Ben. The World as It Is: A Memoir of the Obama White House. New York: Random House, 2018, 428p. ISBN: 978-0-52550-935-6
- Topic:
- Foreign Policy, Book Review, Memoir, and Barack Obama
- Political Geography:
- North America and United States of America
2078. BRAZIL AND ITS REGIONAL PROJECTION: PERSPECTIVES ON HEGEMONY AND REGIONALISM IN SOUTH AMERICA IN THE POST-COLD WAR ERA
- Author:
- Fernando José Ludwig and Ítalo Beltrão Sposito
- Publication Date:
- 04-2020
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- Conjuntura Austral: Journal of the Global South
- Institution:
- Conjuntura Austral: Journal of the Global South
- Abstract:
- story of its foreign policy, also changing its behavior, subsequently, concerning South American regionalism. Its projection is based on the values already found in the international community, and the same happens through the conquest of new attributes and activities within the international system. This insertion is linked to the reconfiguration of the international plan itself after the bipolar conflict. Now, regarding the domestic plan, this projection took place right after the rearrangement of the Brazilian political system, that is, in the process of democratization in Brazil, which is inaugurated with the promulgation of the Federal Constitution of 1988 (BRASIL, 1988).
- Topic:
- Foreign Policy, History, Regionalism, Regional Power, and Post-Cold War
- Political Geography:
- Brazil and South America
2079. Special Envoy Mick Mulvaney: “The U.S. Role in Northern Ireland”
- Author:
- Mick Mulvaney
- Publication Date:
- 12-2020
- Content Type:
- Video
- Institution:
- The Center for the Study of Statesmanship, Catholic University
- Abstract:
- Historically, Northern Ireland has been a place where U.S. diplomatic involvement has been welcomed and fruitful. This special online forum features Special Envoy Mick Mulvaney in discussion with Professor David Walsh of The Catholic University of America. Ambassador Mulvaney discusses his experiences in and outlook for Northern Ireland amid the complexities of Brexit, COVID-19, and a U.S. presidential election. Moderated by CSS’ Justin Logan.
- Topic:
- Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, Brexit, COVID-19, and Presidential Elections
- Political Geography:
- Europe, United States of America, and Northern Ireland
2080. Welcome to the Jungle? Prospects for the International Order After Trump
- Author:
- Robert Kagan and Patrick Porter
- Publication Date:
- 02-2020
- Content Type:
- Video
- Institution:
- The Center for the Study of Statesmanship, Catholic University
- Abstract:
- In his book The Jungle Grows Back, Robert Kagan argues that a foreign policy of restraint would be disastrous for the United States, causing the world to revert to its normal state: a jungle, characterized by poverty, autocracy, interstate competition and even major power war. In The False Promise of Liberal Order, Patrick Porter dismisses nostalgia about the liberal order, observing that the world is too conflicted and dangerous to be ordered liberally, and that striving to convert the world to democracy will destroy it at home. Join us for a discussion of how changing international circumstances shape our view of the past and our preferences for the future of US foreign policy.
- Topic:
- Foreign Policy, Democracy, Liberal Order, and Donald Trump
- Political Geography:
- North America and United States of America