Ye Explores Geopolitical Controversies Surrounding BRI

Min Ye, Associate Professor of International Relations at the Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies at Boston University, led a roundtable discussion addressing geopolitical controversies dominating China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) on January 27, 2022.

Hosted by the University of California San Diego, the event explored topics addressed in Chinese Capital Goes Global: The Belt and Road Initiative and Beyond,” a special issue of Cambridge University Press’ Journal of East Asian Studies co-authored by Ye and Weiyi Shi, Assistant Professor of Political Science, UC San Diego. Other speakers included Audrye Wong, Assistant Professor of Political Science and International Relations, University of Southern California, and Stephan Haggard, Professor of Korea – Pacific Studies, UC San Diego.

Geopolitical controversies have dominated the BRI thanks in part to China’s authoritarian system and state-led investment abroad. During this event, Ye and fellow speakers discussed whether government-financed investments follow a market rationale, the framework through which the BRI should be viewed by recipient countries and critics of China, as well as why the BRI has been met with backlash and protests among many recipient countries.

A recording of the roundtable can be viewed below. Ye’s guest-edited issue of the Journal of East Asian Studies can be read on the journal’s website.

Min Ye is the author of Diasporas and Foreign Direct Investment in China and India (Cambridge University Press, 2014), and The Making of Northeast Asia (with Kent Calder, Stanford University Press, 2010). Her most recent book, titled The Belt Road and Beyond: State-Mobilized Globalization in China: 1998–2018 (Cambridge University Press 2020), explores the motivations and strategies behind China’s global economic expansion and considers the implications of the country’s status as a global power on both China and the world. Read more about Ye on her faculty profile