Challenging or endorsing the Belt Road Initiative: has the European Union decided?

Abstract

The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) is an ambitious global connectivity initiative launched by President Xi Jinping in 2013. To date more than one hundred countries have endorsed China’s flagship initiative, despite criticism received from the United States (US). However, the European Union (EU) does not seem to have a clear position towards the BRI. While 14 individual EU member states have already signed bilateral cooperation agreements with China on the BRI, some other member states are not so supportive, such as Germany. This paper investigates whether EU has been able to take common actions towards the BRI. Its hypothesis is that while the EU has been unable to find a common approach towards the BRI through its foreign policy, it has been able to do so through its trade policy with the introduction of the Foreign Direct Investment Screening Regulation (FDISR). In order to examine that, both a qualitative content analysis of EU oficial documents and a literature review of the FDISR are conducted. The results indicate that the hypothesis cannot be rejected and that the EU itself is evolving towards a more protectionist approach in order to deal with growing Chinese influence.