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Norbert Csizmadia
05/01/2024 19:38
Since the announcement of the programme, China has made substantial financial investments and plans to make the "New Eurasia" economic area a reality. The New Silk Road aims to rebalance the world economy from the oceans to the land and to restore and rebuild Eurasia's former economic, political and cultural role. In fact, the New Silk Road can be understood as a complex network that can be flexibly extended in time and space. It connects the actors that make up the new phase of globalisation: according to the latest figures, it represents about forty percent of world GDP and about two-thirds of the world's population.
The Belt and Road Initiative is summarised in six points. One concept and initiative. Two wings: the land route and the sea route. Three principles: for the benefit of all, by all, for all. Four key words: macro level (connectivity, strategic synergy, capacity building), collaboration (joint development of markets), operations (business management, market operations, government service) and international standards. Five directions, which are also the five main goals of connectivity: linking politics, infrastructure, trade, finance and people. This is done through six economic corridors.
Global civilisation is being replaced by a new kind of "geocivilisation", which aims to create a harmonious world order based on common interests. It is based on the transposition of the millennia-old Chinese ecological civilisation into the 21st century. It is a long-term era based on sustainable growth: green technologies, green money, ecological thinking and peaceful uplift. One of the foundations of Chinese philosophy is the yin-yang principle. Geopolitics in the 21st century also seeks a balance based on the yin-yang geopolitics of East and West, North and South, hard and soft elements. The winners of long-term cooperation between China and the United States and of harmonious cooperation between centres and peripheries will certainly be the new gateway regions, such as the ASEAN countries of South-East Asia, Central Asia or East-Central Europe, through cooperation between global cities and nation-states, in addition to the centres.
To understand the drivers of this new era, we need to know and apply the three most important keys: complexity, connectivity and sustainability. The Belt and Road Initiative is a major contribution to the creation of a long-term, interconnected, complex and sustainable Eurasian world order.
The author is a geographer and Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Pallas Athene Domus Meriti Foundation and the John von Neumann University Foundation