CHINA’S Digital Silk Road (DSR) is a crucial part of China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). It aims to enhance digital connectivity in BRI countries by improving their technology infrastructure. Chinese officials endorsed the DSR concept in 2015, gaining further prominence during the second Belt and Road Forum in 2019. Its main areas of focus are: Expanding wireless phone networks, enhancing surveillance technology, improving undersea communication links and Enhancing satellite communication and data transmission. It has a global impact because China has signed DSR agreements with at least sixteen countries, benefiting developing nations by filling critical infrastructure gaps. However, like the other aspects of the BRI, China’s detractors raise concerns about Beijing exporting its model of technology-enabled authoritarianism through the DSR. In effect, the DSR has significant implications for global economics, politics and security, but let us briefly address the question whether it is a boon or bane?
The major boons are: The DSR enhances digital connectivity, benefiting countries by improving technology infrastructure, expanding wireless networks and enhancing surveillance capabilities. Developing nations receive critical investment, filling infrastructure gaps and promoting growth. The DSR fosters global interconnectivity, facilitating trade, communication and collaboration. The main areas of concern arise from the usual train of thought of the Occident i.e. whipping China without delving deeper into the merits of this mega project. They cite the oft repeated clichés: China’s authoritarian influence, creating debt dependency and heightening security risks. The proof of the pudding is in the eating. Historically, since late 2013, China’s BRI has put the country in a leading global role in economic development. Starting with only nine countries, BRI has captured the attention of both developed and developing nations. This momentum rapidly accelerated, resulting in a total of 148 countries signing memorandums of understanding (MoUs) with China. As an integral component of BRI, China initiated the DSR in 2015. This sets itself apart from the BRI not only in its thematic emphasis but also in terms of the involved Chinese stakeholders, contract types and geographical scope. Today, through the DSR, China has invested in its partner nations along certain critical fronts including digital infrastructure (both hard and soft infrastructures), major smart city projects, financial technology and their own local supply chain.
The Adelphi series book “The Digital Silk Road: China’s Technological Rise and the Geopolitics of Cyberspace” edited by David Gordon and Meia Nouwens sheds more light on the subject. It discloses that DSR is a significant initiative with far-reaching consequences for China’s global relations and technological growth. However, its nature and implications are often misunderstood. It concurs that the DSR, part of the BRI, encompasses various commercial and diplomatic activities related to China’s cyber interests. It warns that while Chinese tech companies are becoming competitive globally, concerns arise from the potential use of these firms by Beijing to reshape the global digital landscape. The book evaluates the DSR’s impact on economics, security, governance and technological dependence, emphasising the need for China to balance intervention with innovation to achieve great-power status.
This Adelphi book gathers leading experts on China, geo-economics and digital technology to evaluate the DSR’s impacts so far and the possible consequences of its future evolution. Concerns about China’s ambitions to return to the global centre stage as a great power have recently begun to focus on the Digital Silk Road, an umbrella term for various activities – commercial and diplomatic – of interest to the Chinese government in the cyber realm. At the heart of such concerns is not that Chinese technology companies are becoming globally competitive, but rather that Beijing could use them to ‘rewire’ the global digital architecture, from physical cables to code. Dominance by Chinese technology could shift global norms from a free cyber common to competing systems of cyber sovereignty or cyber freedom. The Adelphi book mentioned earlier, brings together eight experts to examine the development of the DSR; explore its impact on economics, security and governance in recipient countries; and assess its broader impact on patterns of economic and technological dependence, on the emerging rules and norms of tech globalisation and on global geopolitics and great-power relations.
Beijing has grasped the opportunity to leverage the entrepreneurial strengths of its private tech sector to gain prominence in the world’s digital ecosystem. But the more interventionist Beijing becomes, the more Chinese firms will be seen as instruments of the state and the greater the pushback against Chinese technology and the DSR, which merits closer examination. To achieve great-power status and global centrality, Beijing might ultimately need to change tack. How it innovates in further rolling out Chinese tech across the world and what the DSR will then look like, will have far-reaching impacts on global economics, politics and security.
Commenting on the book, Rana Mitter, Professor of the History and Politics of Modern China, University of Oxford, states: “China’s role in cyberspace is one of the most important international issues of the 2020s and 2030s. This book provides a deeply expert, sober and thoughtful interpretation of this issue and will be essential reading for policymakers.” Looking closer to home, China’s DSR has significant implications for Pakistan for fostering economic growth, technological advancement and digital connectivity. Some key aspects include: “E-Commerce Boost” between China and Pakistan since Chinese products are popular in Pakistan and platforms like EZTRADER have attracted thousands of local retailers, facilitating direct trade with Chinese manufacturers and suppliers.
“Infrastructure Projects” in the realm of which, China has launched flagship projects like the PEACE (Pakistan East Africa Connecting Europe) and CPFOP (China Pakistan Fiber Optic Project) under the DSR. These projects enhance telecommunications infrastructure, connectivity and data exchange between the two countries. “Digital Divide Reduction” in which, the DSR provides an opportunity for Pakistan to close the digital divide. By leveraging Chinese expertise and technology, Pakistan can accelerate its digital transformation and benefit from the booming digital trade. Thus, the DSR strengthens economic ties, facilitates digital trade and contributes to Pakistan’s technological development. Ultimately, how China rolls out its tech and shapes the DSR will determine global economics, politics and security.
—The writer, Retired Group Captain of PAF, is author of several books on China.
