Comprehensive Sustainability of Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) Projects
A special issue of Sustainability (ISSN 2071-1050). This special issue belongs to the section "Social Ecology and Sustainability".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 July 2023) | Viewed by 567
Special Issue Editor
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
It will soon be ten years since President Xi Jinping first announced the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI一带一路). The BRI supports the expansion of Chinese enterprises abroad to, among other things, facilitate industrial upgrading at home, paving the way for Chinese outward foreign direct investment (FDI), increase exports and the spread of Chinese technical standards, and advance the internationalization of the Chinese currency and soft power projection. Host/participant countries generally welcome the BRI due to their needs for capital, infrastructure, and technology transfer. For host governments, Chinese-provided infrastructure can be a crucial tool for economic development and the advancement of diverse sectoral, employment, and governance goals. Aside from this, the BRI can affect natural and social spaces in dramatic environment and social ways because it typically involves large-scale infrastructure projects that cut across different regions, states, and regions within states. Another issue with respect to the BRI’s effects on sustainability is that local communities tend to occupy a less empowered position to negotiate issues related to livelihoods, equity of access to resources, and economic opportunities, with other stakeholders such as the host/participant government and Chinese companies.
This Special Issue delves into the comprehensive sustainability of Chinese BRI projects and does so by adopting the Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) framework. This framework calls upon researchers to assessing how China’s BRI affect host/participant countries and their communities in the environment, social and economic dimensions. To ensure greater focus, we especially invite research that probes specific issues lying at the nexus of the various dimensions of sustainability. The three nexuses are:
- Socio-environmental nexus: The sustainable management of natural resources, access to basic services, and prevention of conflicts and disasters
- Economy–environment nexus: Resource efficiency, sustainable growth, and decent green jobs
- Socio-economic nexus: equality and inclusive prosperity, sustainable consumption and production, sustainable cities.
With the goal of advancing sustainability in the BRI, we encourage papers that explain why BRI projects are contributing (or are failing to contribute) to the three main sustainability dimensions, especially those at the nexus of the various dimensions of sustainability. We further encourage papers that, relatedly, study if BRI projects are (are not) advancing sustainable development goals (SDGs) and what could be done to ensure better alignment between BRI projects and SDGs. As illustrations, papers might investigate:
- How Chinese invested hydropower BRI projects contribute to SDG 7 (Affordable and Clean Energy) and SDG 9 (Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure) in the host locale.
- How Chinese built infrastructure in cities in BRI host/participant countries contributes towards SDG 11 (Sustainable Cities and Communities).
- If Chinese projects contribute to greater gender equality and better economic opportunities for the local communities (SDG 1: No Poverty and goal 17: partnerships for the goal).
We look forward to receiving your contributions.
Prof. Dr. May Tan-Mullins
Guest Editor
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Keywords
- Belt and Road Initiative (BRI)
- Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
- green development
- Chinese investment
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