The arrival of faster wireless networks, ubiquitous sensors, smarter software, and new methods for delivering connectivity are reshaping cities and societies.
Over the next 15 years, more hard infrastructure is projected to be built around the world than currently exists. As our infrastructure is transformed, so will be the economies it fuels, the regions it connects, and the global commons it underpins. These trends are too powerful and potentially beneficial for the United States to stop, and too consequential to ignore.
Southeast Asia is home to many of China’s most high-profile Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) projects, including Kyakpyu port in Myanmar, a high-speed railway in northern Laos, and now-stalled rail and pipeline projects in Malaysia. While these physical infrastructure projects have attracted widespread attention, China’s involvement in the region’s digital infrastructure has been far less examined despite holding the potential to have even greater strategic importance in the coming years.
The world requires an interconnection agenda that focuses on multilateral institution-building and frames power trade as a tool for states to shore up grid systems in the renewables age.
It is clear that China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) carries important implications not only for the world’s water resources, but also for politics in BRI countries. One of the worst outcomes would be for it to exacerbate the growing number of local conflicts over shared, and often shrinking, water resources.
Launched in 2013, China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) strives to improve infrastructure, trade, financial integration, and people-to-people bonds across more than 80 countries. Its digital dimensions are far-reaching, including fiber optic cables, 5G networks, satellites, and devices that connect to these systems. On February 5th, the CSIS Reconnecting Asia Project hosted a discussion about these developments and their implications for U.S. economic and strategic interests.