Belt and Road Initiative: The New Silk Road for the New Chinese Era Analysis of the Initiative and its delicate role in a global pandemic.

Abstract

The “Belt and Road Initiative” (BRI), a Chinese initiative with the goal to achieve multilateral cooperation, integration and commercial and international development. The Initiative will involve not only China, but also the rest of Asia, Europe, Africa and the Middle East with the formation of a colossal network of commercial relationships capable of helping the single national economies and hinder the populist and protectionist trends that had gained more and more support in the last few years.

This dissertation will analyse and explain what this initiative represents and how it will affect the future of international relationships between Eurasia’s superpowers. First by providing a framework of the protagonist of the initiative, exposing the context in which the BRI was formulated and then promoted. Then it will be covered the BRI itself, how it is structured, who will it involve and the goals and aim of it. The magnitude of its importance is extremely high both by the global benefit that it will bring to the involved or affected economies and for the window of opportunity that this interconnection will provide to China. It will also be considered the recent outburst of Covid-19, the global pandemic started at Wuhan and how the Chinese government have dealt with the crisis and how different countries’ perspective on China has been affected. After a focus of JG Europe, who has a role in the initiative, forecasts will be made on the future of China.