When President Xi Jinping unveiled China's ambitious Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) in 2013, it was widely hailed as a visionary blueprint for transforming global infrastructure and trade through enhanced connectivity. BRI promised over $1 trillion in Chinese investment across a modern "Silk Road" spanning Asia, Africa, and even Europe through a network of ports, rails, roads, pipelines and power projects (Chatzky and McBride, 2020). Developing countries lined up eagerly for the chance to spur economic growth and development through BRI's cheap financing and flashy showcase projects.
From 2013 to 2016, the prevailing view was optimism about China's benevolent intentions and capacity to deliver win-win outcomes for itself and the BRI host nations desperate for investment in roads, power plants and transport hubs.
However, in just a few short years, the reputation of BRI has curdled considerably. As Connolly (2019) summarizes, "From being seen as a cost-effective and speedy connectivity panacea, the BRI concept is now perceived in many countries as expensive, environmentally hazardous, and—worst of all—the pathway for a form of Chinese colonialism."
India was one of the first countries to express alarm about developing nations becoming overly indebted to China through BRI projects. As early as 2017, Indian officials warned about unsustainable loans, lack of transparency, and loss of sovereignty for BRI participants. This stemmed from India's general wariness of any major Chinese geopolitical expansion. Specifically, New Delhi pointed to cases like Sri Lanka ceding control of the strategic Hambantota port to China in 2017 after failing to repay debts. It raised concerns about similar leverage China could gain over other countries. India's critique centered on BRI’s potential to tap into recipients’ natural resources and policymaking if debts were not repaid on time. The Indian officials cautioned about hidden costs and contracts favoring Chinese firms rather than developing local skills and capacity. India's rhetoric aimed to encourage more transparency and accountability in BRI lending and contracts. While national interest trumped given Indian tensions with China, her early alarm bells have proven prescient as more countries now echo similar criticisms of BRI’s opacity and debt burdens. India saw the long-term risks even as many initially embraced Xi’s grand vision.
In this post we trace BRI's dramatic reputational decline. We identify the tipping points that eroded confidence in China's professed vision of collective prosperity through enhanced trade and infrastructure. To assess BRI's decaying reputation, we examine China's bilateral BRI partnerships and lending practices in three regions: Southeast Asia, East Africa, and Europe. Our focus on these regions is due to the high concentration of BRI projects and Chinese capital flows there. In particular, Malaysia, Indonesia, Kenya, Italy and Greece exemplify the shifting cost-benefit calculations and increasing skepticism amongst BRI participants.
Existing scholarship highlights several factors driving the souring of global perceptions on BRI. One major theme is debtor distress. Hameiri and Jones (2021) detail how reliance on Chinese loans for BRI projects has fueled corruption, debt crises and loss of sovereignty among participating nations. They argue that China leverages such economic dependence for its geopolitical advantage. Scholars like Kuo and Kurlantzick (2021) point to China's lack of adherence to international transparency and sustainability standards in its overseas development financing and contracts as undermining its credibility.
Other experts emphasize how China's own muscular foreign policy has stoked anxieties about BRI's real intent. Fraser (2022) contends that China's "sharp power" activities, from military expansion to coercive diplomacy, have fueled suspicions about its infrastructure empire-building. Similarly, Clarke (2020) theorizes that perceptions of Chinese revisionism in global order undermine trust in BRI as a benign development initiative. Finally, scholars like Dreher et al. (2021) quantitatively estimate that debt problems, corruption, and environmental risks have substantially lowered BRI's appeal.
BRI Skepticism in Southeast Asia
Southeast Asia provides a microcosm of BRI's declining appeal, with Malaysia and Indonesia exemplifying the misgivings. Under former Prime Minister Najib Razak, Malaysia enthusiastically embraced BRI, signing $34 billion worth of rail, pipeline and other mega-projects (Hong and Melvin, 2021). However, Malaysia's new government led by Mahathir Mohamad suspended or cancelled many of these projects in 2018 over allegations of inflated costs, corruption, and lopsided deals favoring Chinese firms. As noted by Chin (2021), Malaysia pushed back strongly against an asymmetrical relationship emerging under BRI.
Specifically, Malaysia jettisoned the $20 billion East Coast Rail Link and two China-backed pipeline projects worth $2.3 billion (Hong and Melvin, 2021). Mahathir warned against a "new version of colonialism" (Panda, 2019). His finance minister criticized the unfavorable loan terms, high interest rates, lack of transparency, and reliance on imported Chinese materials and workers rather than developing local human capital and supply chains (Chin, 2021). Malaysia even reopened negotiations on remaining BRI projects to reduce costs and improve national benefit-sharing.
Neighboring Indonesia echoes similar concerns about over-reliance on Chinese capital. While welcoming billions in BRI investments, President Joko Widodo insists on using Indonesian labor, resources, and manufacturing, stating plainly "We don't want this country controlled by other countries because of debt" (Laksmana, 2021). Indonesia convinced China to downsize its planned $6 billion Jakarta-Bandung high-speed rail project to $4 billion to exert more domestic control (Laksmana, 2021). Beijing did agree to educate Indonesian engineers and use local workers to build political goodwill. But frustrations persist over China's lending practices. Its preference for government-backed loans over public-private partnerships has fueled Indonesia's external debt, nearing $4 billion owed to China (Laksmana, 2021). Both Malaysia and Indonesia grew disillusioned by unbalanced BRI deals tipping economic leverage toward China.
Debt Crises and Dependency in Africa
Similar concerns around debt traps, lack of transparency, and China's undue political sway grip African partners. BRI's flagship project on the continent is Kenya's $3.2 billion Mombasa-Nairobi Standard Gauge Railway (SGR), financed by China's Exim Bank. But operating losses of $1 million per month proved financially unsustainable for Kenya (Kuo and Kuo, 2021). Her inability to repay loans has fueled fears that key assets like Mombasa port could be seized, as occurred in Sri Lanka's Hambantota case. Though the port was recently renegotiated, Kenya's experiences showcase the risk of hemorrhaging money on underutilized, overpriced infrastructure.
Beyond Kenya, Djibouti, Ethiopia, and Zambia rank among the continent's most dangerously indebted to China, with billions owed for ports, airports, dams and mining (Hornby and Politi, 2021). As Chinese loans consume ever larger shares of national budgets, concerns proliferate that Beijing could leverage debt to control strategic assets or influence policies, as argued by scholars like Chatzky and McBride (2020). Debt restructuring talks have provided temporary relief, but unease persists over debtor-creditor power dynamics.
Furthermore, a lack of transparency compounds misgivings. Research by SAIS China Africa Research Initiative reveals many key BRI contract details are shrouded in opacity, contrary to China's claims (Hornby and Politi, 2021). Environmental and social safeguards are another worry, given practices like importing Chinese workers rather than employing locals. African enthusiasm has chilled as BRI deals are perceived as self-serving China's interests more than advancing mutual prosperity and sustainable capacity building.
Eroding Support in Europe
Europe represents the western frontier of BRI, but enthusiasm here has also eroded amid charges of opaque contracts and Chinese leverage. A pivotal case is Italy's withdrawal from BRI in 2020 under Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte. In signing BRI cooperation agreements in 2019, Italy broke ranks as the first G7 member to officially join. The deal promised $2.8 billion in Chinese investment to upgrade Italian ports and transport networks, making Italy a strategic European hub (Fracasso, 2020). But Italy soured on BRI as scrutiny of such deals intensified across the European Union. The new Italian government cited unfair competition, lack of transparency, and security risks in cancelling its BRI commitments (Fracasso, 2020). Particularly contentious was China's early pandemic "mask diplomacy" outreach in Italy, seen as exploiting the crisis for geopolitical profit. Italy prioritized relationships with Brussels and Washington over ties to Beijing. Its experience with unfulfilled promises and backlash over close China ties helped curb BRI's momentum across Europe. Italy's withdrawal in 2020 marked a high-profile turning point.
Elsewhere in Europe, Greece exemplifies festering doubts. While not formally part of BRI, Chinese investment in Greek ports and shipping exceeded $1 billion by 2016 (Chaziza, 2021). However, promised waves of additional Chinese investment have not materialized as Greece hoped. Its Piraeus port remains underutilized while saddled with burdensome loan repayments to China's COSCO (Chaziza, 2021). Greece's frustrations mirror a wider European wariness of China's strategic infrastructure plays. Though cash-strapped nations still seek Chinese capital, they approach BRI with increasing caution.
Conclusion
In synthesizing these analyses, we conclude that unrepayable debts, self-serving contracts, lack of transparency, and China's superpower ambitions fundamentally corroded global confidence in BRI's advertised win-win proposition. In Southeast Asia, Africa, Europe, and beyond, the appealing luster of China's Belt and Road Initiative has rapidly dulled. Unrepayable debts, opaque contracts, white elephant projects, and China's own brazen geopolitical actions have fueled skepticism. Malaysia, Indonesia, Italy and Kenya showcase the shifting cost-benefit calculations around BRI participation, as initial hopes morphed into disillusion. While national interest inevitably colors criticism, the concerns expressed by so many key BRI partners cannot simply be dismissed as jealousy or slander. They demand substantive redress.
With its grand vision under fire, China faces immense reputational challenges ahead though no massive overhaul of BRI itself appears imminent given its centrality to Xi Jinping's foreign policy doctrine. The souring mood across the world, however, may curdle into wholesale rejection of China's signature gambit for global leadership.
References
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