Beijing's initiatives to revise the global order
Tracking global support of the Global Development Initiative and Global Security Initiative
Introduction
Researchers from the Atlantic Council's Global China Hub sought to determine the initial levels of support that China's newest initiatives - the Global Development Initiative (GDI) and Global Security Initiative (GSI) - receive globally. The researchers also sought to determine how many countries that partner with China on its Belt and Road Initiative have also provided rhetorical support to GDI and GSI.
Methodology
Measuring global support for GDI and GSI was conducted largely by reviewing press releases from numerous governments and from press releases by China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The Global China Hub researchers found that varying levels of support ranged from "Silent" to "Supports" to "Highly Supports".
Unlike China's Belt and Road Initiative, which typically involves an official signing ceremony where China and another country sign a bilateral Memorandum of Understanding, neither the GDI nor GSI do not yet have formalized mechanisms to officially bring them on as members of these initiatives. Support for the GDI and GSI has largely been relegated to rhetorical statements by governments seeking to appease Beijing. However, in some cases, it can be difficult to define a country's true position on these initiatives due to their silence on the issue out of a desire to not antagonize Chinese or Western partners. Thus, countries that have not provided an official public comment on GDI or GSI were labeled as "silent."
As GDI and GSI are still nascent, having only been first proposed in 2021 and 2022, respectively, many countries understandably are hesitant to immediately sign onto or vocally reject them. Whether a country "supports" or "highly supports" one or both of the initiatives was determined by the researchers based on the level of enthusiasm given in those statements. For example, whether or not a country participated in the United Nations working group known as the "Group of Friends of Global Development Initiative" served as a strong indicator that a country supports GDI at a greater level than another country where only an offhand, but positive, statement was made about it.