Unpacking China’s Belt and Road Initiative

The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), inaugurated in 2013, has become a signature foreign policy framework of the Xi Jinping era. China has pledged $1 trillion dollars for infrastructure projects in the Asia-Pacific,  and BRI projects touch over 60 percent of the world’s population based on the countries where the investment occurs. However, the BRI has also become the subject of skepticism as to its goals and impact on overseas development. This skepticism and suspicion has intensified during a period of heightened distrust and tension between the U.S. and China. Dr. Cohen will unpack what the BRI is, including its mission, its history, and some of the common perceptions and misunderstandings about the program, and key issues and developments policymakers and businesses should be tracking.

This is a joint event between the Washington State China Relations Council and the US Heartland China Association.

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Speaker

Dr. Spencer Cohen is a professional economics consultant based in Seattle, WA. For more than seven years, he has served as senior economist for Community Attributes Inc., a Seattle-based consulting firm, where he supervises and leads projects on international trade policy, economic impact analysis, and regional economic forecasting. He is a frequent speaker on the U.S.-China trade war, China’s growth model, the Pacific Northwest economy, and economic impacts of Covid-19. Spencer has a B.A. in mathematics and history from the University of Connecticut, a M.A. in China studies from University of Washington, and a Ph.D. in economic geography, also from the University of Washington, where his research focused on China’s economic growth model through the lens of local government finance and land issues. Spencer has advanced fluency in Mandarin Chinese, having lived and studied in China and conducted doctoral research there. Spencer is currently a World Affairs Council fellow.