CHINA’S foreign policy has taken a new turn in recent history. In the 1980s, China shifted its foreign policy from alliances, revolution and conflict to independence and peaceful cooperation. In the 1990s, China moved to multilateralism with ASEAN countries and established a new type of partnership with Russia and other major powers. Recently, China has announced three major Initiatives: Global Development Initiative (GDI), Global Security Initiative (GSI) and Global Civilization Imitative (GCI). These initiatives reflects President Xi’s focus on humanism , cooperation , oneness , integrity , justice, self-discipline and self-reliance
The GSI views security through the lens of accepted inclusivity, collaboration and maintainable security and pursues the objective of building a secure community and to provide a new avenue for security that prefers dialogue over confrontation; cooperation over alliance and win-win over zero-sum game. GSI promotes the vision that diversity must be celebrated and protected as diversity paves the way for dialogue .
The GDI that was proposed by Xi during his address at 76th UN General Assembly focuses on expedited ways to achieve the UN 2030 Agenda for achieving Sustainable development Goals (SDGs). So far, GDI is well received across all domains as this Initiative directly addresses the severity of the challenges and changes faced by the world today.
First, the first big challenge faced by the world is the Covid-19 pandemic and its impact on the global economy. The Pandemic’s negative economic impact had surpassed those of the 2008, global financial crisis. It has further increased global inequality as different strategies adopted by the states to combat this menace gave rise to unequal betterment results which further enlarged the gap among the countries.
Climate change is the second challenge faced by the world today. Earth today faces three ecological and environmental crises i.e. climate change, loss of biodiversity and pollution. The Green Revolution is the way out of it. Nature must be respected and the process of transition towards green and sustainable development must be accelerated. Nature and acceleration towards green transition of production and lifestyle will make Sustainable development possible.
On the other hand, one of the major changes in the world today includes the digital revolution. During the Covid-19, the digital economy played a principal role in manufacturing and services. For global trade, digital trade is now an important driver. In 2020, global internet traffic increased 15.9 times more as compared to decades ago.
The changing geo-political and geo-economic landscape is also one of the major changes in the world. The global economic center is shifting to the global south from the global north. The regional structure of trade and investment is undergoing significant adjustment. The emergence of G-20, BRICS, and many sub-regional and regional cooperation bodies are playing a prime role in global governance. Conflicts like the Russia-Ukraine war are posing a significant threat to the global economy as there is disruption of supply chains and inflation worldwide.
Against this backdrop, GDI addresses the most urgent challenges in global development. GDI has built a platform for cooperation in eight priority areas of development and provides a platform for sharing knowledge and experience in this regard. It focuses on (a) Reducing poverty (b) Covid-19 (c) Food Security (d) Vaccines (e) Financing for Development (f) Green development (g) Climate change (i) Digital economy (j) Industrialization (k) Connectivity. GDI further aims to” translate consensus on global development into doable actions for international collaboration”. GDI will align itself with existing mechanisms of the agenda 2063 of African Union (AU) and recommit SDGs. It will synergize with the UN, APEC, G-20, BRICS, and SCO to re-enforce effective actions on all 17 SDGs.
The implementation of SDGs is facing multiple challenges including the outbreak of Covid-19, deterioration of global food security due to regional conflicts, climate change, extreme weather, economic slowdown, the global vaccination gap as the need for revaccination is growing as new variants of Covid emerged, slow transition to green and low carbon development as higher developed index countries emit more carbon per capita as a result of industrialization, due to which it is difficult for them to switch towards green development while the industrial structure transformation in developing countries remains low and increase in the global digital divide and finance gap.
GDI is an effort to solve these issues by promoting cooperation and trying to implement the proposed solutions in multiple domains. So far, GDI has vehement international support as the GDI group of friends reaches 50 countries. Moreover, GDI is welcomed by the ASEAN forum and AU. Initiatives like GDI work with the existing mechanisms for the development of the world, especially for the developing countries that lack development and face enormous challenges for the implementation of the 2030 Agenda. So far GDI has achieved numerous diplomatic and political successes, however, long-term success can be ensured by continuous efforts and sheer resolve for attaining the SDGs 2030 Agenda by various states across the globe.
—The writer is associated with the Institute of Strategic Studies Islamabad ISSI.
