At the end of the 2010s, Martin Jacques predicted China would “rule the world” and the “end of the Western world” (2009). Elsewhere I argued that Jacques's claim about a new world order is materializing (Leoni 2021: ch. 4). Yet, it is too soon to confirm Jacques's claims, especially about China ruling the world. About a decade ago, David Shambaugh disagreed with Jacques because “China has an increasingly broad ‘footprint’ across the globe, but it is not particularly deep” (2013: 5–6). Apart from some important exceptions, China's economic presence in other countries is not enough to provide Beijing with structural political leverage, unlike that of the US, which has become hegemonic through the dollar. On the other hand, the PRC can damage certain industries in other countries and indirectly exert pressure on governments; furthermore, while China's economic expansion remains superficial it is growing fast as the eurozone struggles to emerge from more than a decade of financial austerity. This has led both China hawks and the media to suggest that the PRC is committed to a sort of neocolonialism through investments and acquisition of foreign assets. There certainly is an element of truth in this, as I explore below, but one has to consider both sides of the coin. This chapter argues that while China has eroded the West's productive power in some areas, its success remains limited and uneven. This argument balances some of the claims set out in Chapter 2, but also making the reader reflect on the complexity of China's rise to great power. Here and in the following chapter, it is shown that ultimately, operating in a LIO is no picnic, that is, it offers challenges and not just success. This is even more the case at a time when the West has started to see the drawbacks, in addition to the benefits, of interacting with China.

THE BELT AND ROAD INITIATIVE AND OVERSEAS INTERESTS: CHINA GOES GLOBAL?

Since 1978 the PRC has used its foreign policy to protect its path towards development from both external interferences and military invasions.