Tim Summers

China’s ‘New Silk Roads’: sub-national regions and networks of global political economy

Abstract This paper argues that the Chinese government’s ‘belt and road’ initiative – the Silk Roads vision of land and maritime logistics and communications networks connecting Asia, Europe and Africa – has its roots in sub-national ideas and practices, and that it reflects their elevation to the national level more than the creation of substantially new policy content. Further, the spatial paradigms inherent in the Silk Roads vision reveal the reproduction of capitalist developmental ideas expressed particularly in the form of networks, which themselves have become a feature of contemporary global political economy. In other words, the Silk Roads vision is more of a ‘spatial fix’ than a geopolitical manoeuvre.

(Re)positioning Yunnan: region and nation in contemporary provincial narratives

This paper identifies imaginings since the early 1990s to reposition Yunnan from a peripheral province in the PRC to the centre of various regional constructs which involve territories across the PRCs borders, primarily in what are now known as southeast and south Asia. These narratives, which change over time and between actors, are justified using Yunnans past linkages with territories along the ‘southern silk road’ and through a naturalized presentation of its geographical location and characteristics, are based on the premise of good neighbourly relations, and are driven by imperatives of development. They find practical expression in provincial engagement with regional institutions, and in infrastructure and other programmes. However, the imaginings to reposition the province which these narratives spell out are at the same time constrained by the demands of territorial integrity and national security: a desire not to compromise Yunnans national belonging. The paper concludes by commenting on implications for understanding ‘Chinas borderlands’ and their global interactions.

British Policy toward Hong Kong and its Political Reform

Twenty years after the return of Hong Kong from British to Chinese sovereignty in 1997, this paper examines the UK’s policy toward Hong Kong over the last decade, with a particular focus on its approach toward the ongoing and intensifying political and constitutional debates in Hong Kong, which have partial origins in the British colonial legacy. The paper argues that the UK has been attempting a delicate balancing act in relation to Hong Kong between a number of factors: the growing importance of relations with China as a whole, the particular opportunities offered by UK–Hong Kong links, the changing and more contested political landscape in Hong Kong, the occasional intervention of British politics, and the agreements on Hong Kong’s future to which the UK was party in the 1980s. These reflect tensions between pragmatism and idealism, and in conclusion, the paper discusses what the case of Hong Kong says more broadly about the making of British foreign policy.

Discourses and institutions in China’s maritime disputes:

This article examines discourses around China’s maritime disputes. It adopts an English School approach to international order, making use of institutions governing relations between states which are themselves discursive in nature. The article argues that discourse is a particularly important factor in maritime disputes given the ambiguities resulting from historical and ongoing changes in conceptions of maritime space and sovereignty. Further, although these changes have led the institution of international law to play a growing role in questions of maritime sovereignty and jurisdiction, the article argues that the application of these legal frameworks is itself partly discursive and creates ambiguities which inform maritime disputes between key states in East Asia. The article then considers an example of discursive contestation by examining the use of freedom of navigation in the positions taken and practised by the United States and their role in US–China maritime dynamics. It concludes by suggesting that contested discourses around maritime disputes in East Asia are best understood as part of an ongoing and dynamic process of the renegotiation of regional and international order in East Asia.

Society and politics in China today

Chinas social and economic transformations, and their growing global impact, have prompted a plethora of books. This review article examines five recent books in Politys China today series as a basis for discussion about society and politics in China. The series is structured around applying different themes or concepts to China, and these five look at consumption, social welfare, class, ethnicity, and the nature, role and performance of the Communist Party and state. The books provide well-researched and balanced accounts of developments in China, especially since the era of ‘reform and opening up’ began in 1978. The article argues that important themes of the books—the growing discourse of consumption, the depoliticization of class as socio-economic strata, the Party-state as a pragmatic provider of citizen services, and the role of the private sector in the provision of social welfare—are all features of the current phase of a globalized capitalist modernity, and concludes that while the country wants to be seen as different, the accounts of politics and society in this series suggests that China today offers more of an alternative within that modernity than an alternative to it.

Rebalancing towards a Sustainable Future: China’s Twelfth Five-Year Programme

This chapter seeks to analyse and assess some of the major opportunities and challenges in China’s Twelfth Five-Year Programme for Social and Economic Development (hereafter 12FYP).1 The main economic thrust of the 12FYP is one of sustainable, balanced and innovative development; its principal social thrust is that the government should enhance its support for ‘livelihoods’ (minsheng) in order to create a ‘moderately well-off’ (xiaokang) society by 2020.2