The Belt and Road Podcast

Bowen Gu joins Juliet and Erik on the podcast to talk about environmental justice and China's coal investments in Indonesia, with a focus on Gu's recent paper: Black gold and green BRI: A grounded analysis of Chinese investment in coal-fired power plants in Indonesia (2024).Bowen Gu is a PhD student at the Institute of Environmental Science and Technology, Autonomous University of Barcelona (ICTA-UAB). Her research looks into coal-related environmental justice movements in China and broader regions under the Belt and Road Initiative. Recommendations: Erik:Terror Capitalism: Uyghur Dispossession and Masculinity in a Chinese City by Darren Byler (2022)The symphonies of Glenn Branca (especially no.10)Bowen:Land, Water, Air, and Freedom: The Making of World Movements for Environmental Justice by Joan Martínez-Alier (2023)Album of Indonesian music (name tk)Juliet:The Railpolitik: Leadership and Agency in Sino-African Infrastructure Development by Yuan Wang (2023)

Professor Omolade Adunbi joins Juliet and Erik on the podcast to talk about China's free trade zones in Nigeria. Adunbi is the Director of the African Studies Center, Professor of Anthropology and Afroamerican and African Studies, Professor of Law, and Faculty Associate in the Program in the Environment at the University of Michigan. His research explores issues related to governance, infrastructures of extraction, environmental politics and rights, power, violence, culture, transnational institutions, multinational corporations, and the postcolonial state.Recommendations:Omolade:Music of Fela KutiPower, Knowledge, Land: Contested Ontologies of Land and its Governance in Africa by Laura German (2022)Erik:Episode of the Sinica Podcast: Robert Daly of the Kissinger Institute on the morality of U.S. China policyLaufey's music, specifically her new album BewitchedJuliet:Cooperating for the Climate: Learning from International Partnerships in China's Clean Energy Sector by Joanna Lewis (2023)

Juliet, Erik, and guest Tim Ruhlig discuss technical standards, China’s growth in technical industries and its increasing influence in leading and setting standards, and the new geopolitics of technical standardization and interdependence.Tim Ruhlig is a senior fellow at the German Council on Foreign Relations, where he researches Europe-China relations, German-China relations, Hong Kong politics, and Chinese foreign industrial policy, He is the founder of the Digital Power China (DPC) Research Consortium, which brings together European engineers and Chinese scholars to carry out policy-relevant research on the PRC’s growing digital technology footprint and its implications for Europe.Recommendations:Tim: The Emperor’s New Road: China and the Project of the Century, Jonathan Hillman (2020)U.S.-Taiwan Relations: Will China's Challenge Lead to a Crisis? Bonnie Glaser, Ryan Hass, Richard Bush (2023)Film: “To Life” Zhang Yi Mou (1994)Wildland: The Making of America's Fury, Evan Osnos (2021)Erik: "Barbie Heimer"—Barbie (2023) and Oppenheimer (2023) movies on the same day (recommendation is Barbie is the better movie)Juliet:“Even China Isn’t Convinced It Can Replace the U.S.” Jessia Chen Weiss (2023)

Before the shovels hit the dirt, before a developer gets construction permits, before an MOU is signed, there exists a huge process of project feasibility, planning, and pre-approval. That process is incredibly complex and costly, but a new Multilateral Cooperation Center for Development Finance (MCDF) has been established to help. Shuang Liu joins Juliet and Erik on this episode to discuss how this might help kick start and expand the pipeline of more sustainable projects, and her broader goals in working at the World Resources Institute.Shuang Liu is the China Finance Director and Acting Director at the Sustainable Finance Center at the World Resources Institute. She leads the Center's work on China finance and the Belt and Road Initiative, and works with governments, private financial institutions, NGOs, and other partners to enhance the regulatory framework and provide enabling conditions to shift China's investment to sustainable finance. She holds a master's degree in environmental and resource economics from University College London and a bachelor's in economics from Peking University.Her article on the Panda Paw Dragon Claw blog is entitled, "Can a Chinese-led multilateral initiative help unlock more sustainable infrastructure in the Global South?"Recommendations:Shuang:An Odyssey: A Father, a Son, and an Epic by Daniel Mendelsohn (2018)Juliet:Try to bike more in the summer, or pick up any activity that is good for both yourself and the planet!Erik:Outsourcing Repression episode of the Pekingology podcast with Lynette H. Ong and host Jude Blanchette Outsourcing Repression: Everyday State Power in Contemporary China by Lynette H. Ong (2022)

Juliet chats with Laetitia Tran Ngoc about the state of China-Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) relations, the way people in the DRC view China and the U.S., outside interest in critical minerals mining in the DRC, and the domestic situation of the DRC that acts as a destabilizing factor to it all.  Her article in South China Morning Post is here: "Mineral-rich central Africa become focal point in US-China tug of war"Laetitia Tran Ngoc is a freelance journalist and consultant specializing in government communications, with extensive experience in advising diplomatic institutions in their strategic relationship with the European Union.  Her writing focuses on central and east Africa and China-Africa relations. She previously worked as a research officer at the Embassy of Ethiopia in Brussels and at the Taipei Representative Office to the EU and Belgium. She has master’s degrees in International Relations and Chinese Language and Culture from the Free University of Brussels. Recommendations:Laetitia:Sur les ailes du dragon: Voyages entre l'Afrique et la Chine (On the Wings of the Dragon) by Lieve Joris (2014)Juliet:The Conservation Revolution: Radical Ideas for Saving Nature Beyond the Anthropocene by Bram Büscher and Robert Fletcher (2020)Fighting Fire and Fascism in the American West in Dissent Magazine, by Patrick Bigger and Sara Nelson (2023)Thanks as always for excellent editing by Taili Ni!

Alessandro (Ale) Rippa joins Juliet and Erik on the podcast to talk about how he uses China's borderlands as a starting point to understand the Chinese state, global engagements like the Belt and Road Initiative, and Chinese development. They discuss Ale's experiences working in China's border regions in Xinjiang and Yunnan, how borders are zones of connection and disconnection, China's historical support for the Communist Party of Burma, and much more. Alessandro Rippa is associate professor at the University of Oslo's Department of Social Anthropology. His research centers on China's borderlands as lenses for studying infrastructure, global circulations, and the environment. He is PI of a new ERC Starting Grant project entitled, "Amber Worlds: A Geological Anthropology for the Anthropocene". Featured work: "Imagined borderlands: Terrain, technology and trade in the making and managing of the China-Myanmar border." 2022. Singapore Journal of Tropical Geography ."Borderland Infrastructures: Trade, Development, and Control in Western China." Recommendations:Ale:Infrastructure and the Remaking of Asia edited by Max Hirsh and Till Mostowlansky (2023)Keep an eye out for the upcoming special issue of The China Quarterly on Chinese infrastructureErik:Scribd.com for eBooks and audiobooksWordslut: A Feminist Guide to Taking Back the English Language by Amanda Montell (2020)Cultish: The Language of Fanaticism by Amanda Montell (2021)Juliet:Fractured China: How State Transformation is Shaping China's Rise by Lee Jones and Shahar Hameiri (2021)Sinica Podcast: Sinica at the Association for Asian Studies Conference, Boston 2023: Capsule interviews

May Farid and Hui Li drop by the podcast to talk about INGOs, or international non-governmental organizations, and specifically how their relationship with China is shifting as China goes global.  The conversation focuses on their article "International NGOs as intermediaries in China's 'going out' strategy."  May Farid is a political scientist studying civil society, policy and development in contemporary China and beyond. She is a visiting scholar at Stanford University's Center on China's Economy and Institutions and a Lecturer at the University of Hong Kong. She holds a doctorate from the University of Oxford and has worked extensively in the NGO sector in China, as well as a researcher with China's leading policy think tank.Hui Li is an Assistant Professor at the University of Hong Kong. Her research focuses on public and nonprofit management, organization theory, and civic engagement. In collaboration with a team of researchers, she studies NGOs and environmental governance in authoritarian China. In addition, she works closely with colleagues from the Civic Engagement Initiative at USC and studies neighborhood councils and civic engagement in Los Angeles.Recommendations:Hui: Activists beyond Borders: Advocacy Networks in International Politics by Margaret E. Keck and Kathryn Sikkink May:Principled instrumentalism: a theory of transnational NGO behaviour by George E. Mitchell and Hans Peter SchmitzBeyond the Boomerang: From Transnational Advocacy Networks to Transcalar Advocacy in International Politics edited by Christopher L. Pallas and Elizabeth A. Bloodgood Leutert, Wendy, Elizabeth Plantan and Austin Strange. "Puzzling Partnerships: Overseas Infrastructure Development by Chinese State-Owned Enterprises and Humanitarian Organizations". 2022.Erik:Two albums by Lingua IgnotaSinner Get Ready CaligulaRRR film Juliet:Follow Yige Dong, assistant professor of global gender and sexuality studies at the University at BuffaloDong, Yige. The Dilemma of Foxconn Moms: Social Reproduction and the Rise of 'Gig Manufacturing' in China. 2022.

Juliet is joined by friends and fellow researchers Jesse Rodenbiker and Tyler Harlan to discuss their recent experiences at the COP15 of the Conference on Biological Diversity, China's growing environmental leadership, and China's domestic environmental policies and their impact on BRI initiatives and overseas engagements. Jesse starts off the conversation with some background on China's approach to environmental governance - based on his articles "Making Ecology Developmental: China's Environmental Sciences and Green Modernization in Global Context,"  "Green silk roads, partner state development, and environmental governance," and his upcoming book "Ecological States: Politics of Science and Nature in Urbanizing China." Jesse Rodenbiker is an Associate Research Scholar at Princeton University with the Center on Contemporary China and an Assistant Teaching Professor of Geography at Rutgers University. He is also currently a fellow of the American Council of Learned Societies, and a China Fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. He is a human-environment geographer and interdisciplinary social scientist focusing on environmental governance, urbanization, and social inequality in China and globally.Tyler Harlan is an Assistant Professor of Urban and Environmental Studies at Loyola Marymount University. His research focuses on the political economy and uneven socio-environmental impacts of China's green development transformation and the implications of this transformation for other industrializing countries. Juliet Lu is an Assistant Professor at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver in the Department of Forest Resources Management and the School of Public Policy & Global Affairs.  Recommendations:Jesse:Maoism: A Global History by Julia LovellRosewood by Annah Lake Zhu Tyler:Certifying China by Yixian SunChina and the global politics of nature-based solutions in Environmental Science & Policy  (2022) by Jeffrey Qi (former BRI Pod episode!) and Peter DauvergneChina's rising influence on climate governance: Forging a path for the global South in Global Environmental Change (2022) by Jeffrey Qi and Peter DauvergneJuliet:Check out the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD) (where Jeffrey Qi incidentally works ;) for interesting analysis on the Convention on Biological Diversity and China. 

Kyle Chan visits the Belt and Road Podcast to talk about state capacity in railway bureaucracies in China and India, his research collected while riding trains through the two countries, the incredibly mundane naming of Chinese companies, and much more. This episode discusses Kyle's research published in two articles:  Inside China's state-owned enterprises: Managed competition through a multi-level structure (2022) and The organizational roots of state capacity: Comparing railway bureaucracies in China and India (2022).Kyle Chan is a PhD student in sociology at Princeton University, where his research focuses on bureaucracy and infrastructure development in China and India. He spent two years doing fieldwork in both countries looking at railway development, including that of China's high-speed rail system.Recommendations:Kyle:The Chinese Mayor (2015 documentary)Powerless (2014 documentary)Erik:Rühlig, Tim. Chinese Influence through technical standardization power (2022).Tár (2022 film)Juliet:High Stakes: China's Leadership in Global Biodiversity Governance by Jesse Rodenbiker in the New Security Beat.Coverage of the Convention on Biological Diversity in China Dialogue

Juliet and Erik are joined by Maria Repnikova to talk about her book, "Chinese soft power," Confucius Institutes, China's love for spectacle, and of course, how all this and more applies to the Belt and Road. What is soft power? How is China doing when it comes to soft power projection around the world? Listen to find out!Maria Repnikova is the Director of the Center for Global Information Studies and an Assistant Professor in Global Communication at Georgia State University. She is a scholar of global communication, with a comparative focus on China and Russia. Her research examines the processes of political resistance and persuasion in illiberal political contexts, drawing on ethnographic research in the field. Dr. Repnikova holds a doctorate from the University of Oxford, where she was a Rhodes Scholar. She speaks fluent Mandarin, Russian and Spanish. Her book, Media Politics in China: Improvising Power under Authoritarianism examines participatory communications channels under an authoritarian regime through the relationship between China's critical journalists and the one-party state in the past decade. Recommendations:Maria:Baykurt, Burcu and Victoria de Grazia (ed.) Soft-Power Internationalism: Competing for Cultural Influence in the 21st-Century Global Order (2021).Erik:Pekingology Podcast from the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) with Jude Blanchette, specifically these two episodes:Terror Capitalism with Darren Byler Localized Bargaining with Xiao MaThe Rehearsal, Nathan Fielder's new docu-comedy series on HBOJuliet:Qi, Jeffrey and Peter Dauvergne. China and the global politics of nature-based solutions. Environmental Science and Policy (2022).*Bonus: The Belt and Road Sing Along Music Video*

Keren Zhu talked with us about her research on the socioeconomic impacts of the Belt and Road, specifically with regard to Kenya's Standard Gauge Railway (SGR). She provides background and analysis on the SGR,  she and Eric discuss their personal experiences riding the railway, and more! Much of the conversation centers around Keren's recent work with co-authors Ben Mwangi and Lynn Hu, published in the article Socioeconomic impact of China's infrastructure-led growth model in Africa: A case study of the Kenyan Standard Gauge Railway (2022). We also draw on her piece, "Addressing the Impact Evaluation Gaps in Belt and Road Initiative Projects in Africa."Keren Zhu is a Global China Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Boston University Global Development Policy Center. She holds a Ph.D. in Policy Analysis from the Pardee RAND Graduate School, and an M.Sc. in Social Anthropology from the University of Oxford. Her research focuses on the BRI, global infrastructure, international development, and program evaluation. Recommendations:Erik:Chess.comHeathcliff comics by George GatelyKeren:Modernizing America's Electricity Infrastructure by Mason Willrich (2017)Pairing Shakespeare with contemporary issues and authors (Keren's current pairing: Shakespeare's Othello with Born in Blackness by Howard French)Juliet:Try to drive your car less and learn to embrace the pace change that brings you!

Jeffrey Qi discusses China's growing role in high-level, high-stakes global climate governance. We discuss research Jeffrey conducted as a master's student in political science at the University of British Columbia and the resulting article he wrote with his advisor Peter Dauvergne, China's rising influence on climate governance: Forging a path for the global South (2021), which can be found here.Jeffrey Qi is a policy analyst at the International Institute for Sustainable Development's Resilience Program (IISD). Based in Vancouver, he provides research, project management, and communication support with a focus on national adaptation planning (NAP) processes, ecosystem-based adaptation, and multilateral agreements. He works on supporting developing countries’ national adaptation planning processes and the implementation of the Paris Agreement and the UN Convention on Biological Diversity. Recommendations:Jeffrey:China's Environmental Foreign Relations by Heidi Wang-Kaeding (2021)Analysis: Nine key moments that changed China's mind about climate change by Jianqiang Liu from Carbon Brief (2021)Competing narratives of nature-based solutions: Leveraging the power of nature or dangerous distraction? by Marina Stavroula Melanidis and Shannon Hagerman (2022)Erik:If you get the chance to go on a safari, take it!Same goes for the Chinese-built SGR railway in KenyaJuliet:Travelling with Big Brother: A Reporter's Junket in China by Solomon Elusoji (2019)

Erik is joined by Winslow Robertson and Owakhela Kankhwende to discuss their chapter of the book From Trump to Biden and Beyond: Reimagining U.S.-China Relations, entitled "U.S. Strategy Vis-À-Vis China's Presence in the African Continent: Description and Prescription". Winslow Robertson is a PhD student at IESE Business School at the University of Navarra, where he focuses on Chinese provincial SOEs and the Belt and Road. He is also the founder of Cowries and Rice, a Sino-Africa management consultancy.Owakhela Kankhwende is a recent graduate with a MAS in business analytics from Fordham University's Gabelli School of Business. He has been a research analyst at Pivotal Advisors, and is currently a data analyst at Insider.Recommendations:Owakhela:The Wretched of the Earth by Frantz Fanon (1961)UnLearn: 101 Simple Truths for a Better Life by Humble the Poet (2019)Winslow:From Politics to Business: How a state-led fund is investing in Africa? The case of the China-Africa Development Fund by Hangwei Li (2020)The Long Game: China's Grand Strategy to Displace American Order by Rush Doshi (2021)The Dragon Prince series on Netflix (2018-19)Erik:I Want You Back film (2022)Promises album by Floating Points, Pharoah Sanders, and the London Symphony Orchestra (2021)

Juliet and Erik are joined by Agnieszka Joniak-Lüthi and Zarina Urmanbetova of Roadwork Asia to discuss China's road infrastructure projects in Central Asia and their research at Roadwork Asia, including their article on infrastructural connections across the Toghuz-Toro district of central Kyrgystan Welcome and Unwelcome Connections: Travelling Post-Soviet Roads in Kyrgyzstan.Agnieszka Joniak-Lüthi is a professor of social anthropology at the University of Fribourg and head of the ROADWORK project. She focuses on China and the Sino-Central Asian borderlands. Her recent research explores the nexus of transport infrastructure, settler colonialism, and processes of state territorialization in northwest China. She has also expanded her research into infrastructure maintenance and how temporalities of materials, investment, discourses, government agendas, ecosystems, and humans affect the social life of infrastructure in the Sino-Central Asian borderlands.Zarina Urmanbetova is a social anthropologist from Kyrgyzstan. She has worked on projects for UN Women Kyrgyzstan, Urban Initiatives, the Research Institute of Islamic Studies in Bishkek, and the Analytical Center Polis Asia. She holds a BA from the Kyrgyz-Turkish Manas University and a MA in social anthropology from Hacettepe University in Turkey. At ROADWORK, she focuses on the social and cultural life of roads in central Kyrgyzstan. Recommendations:Agnieszka Roadsides,  an open-access journal designated to be a forum devoted to exploring the social, cultural, and political life of infrastructureBelt & Road in Global Perspective, a project of the Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy at the University of TorontoZarina14 Peaks: Nothing is Impossible documentary on NetflixErikBish Bosch album by Scott WalkerJulietHow Sand Mining Threatens a Way of Life in Southeast Asia. National Geographic. Photos & reporting by Sim Chi Yin, writing by Vince Beiser. March 2018.Satellites Spy on Sand Mining in the Mekong by Alka Tripathy-Lang, Dec 2021. The Messy Business of Sand Mining Explained. Marco Hernandez, Simon Scarr, Katie Daigle. Feb 2021. 

Margaret Myers returns to The Belt and Road Podcast to speak with Erik about the role and development of China's international insurance sector in Latin America and the Caribbean.  The conversation is based on her January 2022 report from The Dialogue entitled Going Out, Guaranteed: Chinese Insurers in Latin America. Margaret Myers is the director of the Asia & Latin America Program at the Inter-American Dialogue. She created the Dialogue's China and Latin America Working Group in 2011, as well as the China-Latin America Finance Database in cooperation with the Global China Initiative at Boston University's Global Development Policy Center. She has previously worked as a Latin America analyst and China analyst for the U.S. Department of Defense.Recommendations:MargaretAlbright, Zara C., Rebecca Ray, Yudong (Nathan) Liu (2022), China-Latin America and the Caribbean Economic Bulletin, 2022 Edition ErikRichard Simmons  'Sweatin' to the Oldies' Workout VideoA special thanks to Taili Ni for editing this episode! 

On this episode, Juliet and Erik speak to Dr. Ammar Malik about AidData’s Global Chinese Development Finance Dataset, Version 2.0.  This dataset provides the most comprehensive data on China’s overseas development finance activities, covering projects over 18 commitment years (2000-2017). They discuss the trends and findings from the dataset, break down China’s overseas loans and the concept of ‘hidden debt’, explore potential future applications of the data, and more. Dr. Ammar Malik is a senior research scientist at AidData, a research lab at William & Mary where he leads the Chinese Development Finance Program. He holds a Ph.D. in Public Policy from George Mason University, an M.A. in Public Affairs from Sciences Po Paris, an M.A. in Public Policy from the National University of Singapore, and a B.Sc. in Economics and Mathematics from the Lahore University of Management Sciences.  Read more of Dr. Malik’s work:Malik, et al. (2021), Banking on the Belt and Road: Insights from a new global dataset of 13,427 Chinese development projects Find Mandarin Chinese versions of the report’s executive summary here and the main report hereMalik, Ammar and Bradley Parks (2021), Hidden debt exposure to China: What is it, where is it, and should we be concerned? RecommendationsAmmarBluhm, et al (2020), Connective Financing: Chinese Infrastructure Projects and the Diffusion of Economic Activity in Developing Countries  ErikMargaret Myers, Going Out Guaranteed: Chinese Insurers and Latin AmericaHow To with John Wilson on HBOJuliet (via Jack Zinda’s recommendation)R, Gabriel and Jeremy Wallace (2022). Political Science, Authoritarianism, and Climate Change: Can the Climate Crisis Undermine Democratic Legitimacy? In response to: Mittiga, Ross (2021). Political Legitimacy, Authoritarianism, and Climate Change. Cambridge University Press.~Thanks to Taili Ni, the newest member of the Belt and Road Podcast team as of March 2022, who edited this episode and wrote the show notes!~

Just across the Xinjiang border, China is investing in a range of sectors. Infrastructure and road construction are booming as in many other places, but cotton investments dominate and are seen as a distinct type. Cotton is considered a strategic crop both to China and Tajikistan and is embedded in a range of elite networks and state power. Cotton Diplomacy is one of many things we cover in this episode, listen in!Read more of Dr. Hofman's work: Chinese Cotton Diplomacy in Tajikistan: Greasing the Ties by Reviving the Cotton EconomyIn the Interstices of Patriarchal Order: Spaces of Female Agency in Chinese-Tajik Labour EncountersTowards a geography of window dressing and benign neglect: The state, donors and elites in Tajikistan's trajectories of post-Soviet agrarian changeRecommendationsIrnaThe People's MapHost an event bringing together all the podcast interviewees!ErikEmbrace home design DIY!Listen to MeatLoaf Bat Outta Hell 2 album especiallyJulietThe Big Payback: The History of the Business of Hip-Hop (2010) The Power and Business of Hip-Hop: A Reading List on an American Art Form. Stories of hi-hop’s genius, influence, struggle, and enduranceOvercoming Challenges to the Research Environment in China, Harvard Fairbank Center with YuenYuen Ang, Liz Perry, Denise Ho and Rob Weller (Summary)This Tik Tok that Erik sent me making fun of podcast hosts that do recommendations at the end lol

On episode 51, Juliet and Erik welcome back Dr. Hong Zhang to discuss the history, interests, corporate structures and agency of International Chinese infrastructure contractors. Discussion is based on Hong Zhang's May 2021 working paper for SAIS-China Africa Research Initiative entitled: Chinese International Contractors in Africa: Structure and Agency.   Hong Zhang is a Postdoctoral Fellow at Johns Hopkins University's SIAS-CARI and a 2021-22 China and the World Program Fellow at Columbia University. She received her PhD in Public Policy from the Schar School of Policy and Government at George Mason University in 2021. She is one of the best thinkers and writers on all things Belt and Road and we were lucky to have her back on the show! Here are this episode's recommendations!Erik:1. Benedetta, dir. Paul Verhoeven2. Encanto, dir. Jared Bush, Byron Howard, and Charise Castro Smith (+ the Pixar short that plays at the beginning!)Hong Zhang:1. "Archaeologies of the Belt and Road Initiative," Made in China Journal2. James Reilly, Orchestration: China's Economic Statecraft Across Asia and Europe, Oxford University Press3. Lina Benabdallah, Shaping the Future of Power: Knowledge Production and Network-Building in China-Africa  Relations, University of Michigan PressJuliet:1. 狗熊有话说 Bear Talk podcast2. Sustainable Asia  podcast

Juliet and Erik celebrate their 50th episode by discussing their first co-authored article "Beyond Competition: Why the BRI and the B3W Can’t and Shouldn’t Be Considered Rivals" (Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung)On June 12, 2021, US President Biden along with the leaders of the Group of Seven (G7) launched their own “positive alternative” to the BRI - the Build Back Better for the World (B3W) multilateral infrastructure investment initiative.  Juliet and Erik make the case that framing the two initiatives as competing alternatives is deceptive as on one hand, they are not comparable in many important ways, and that they each face the same challenges that all infrastructure initiatives face, regardless of the implementing country(ies). Importantly, they also see that the focus on US-China competition distracts from the important role of host countries in directing how infrastructure investments unfold on the ground and that the focus on the geopolitics surrounding the two initiatives misrepresents their stakes for local communities and environments that are to be affected by these projects, the workers that will build them, and the people they will connect.Recommendations: Erik1. I think you should leave with Tim Robinson 2. Party like it's 2003! Put away any screen that is connected to the internet and enjoy your evenings with friends in family in an analog world Juliet 1.  Last week tonight with John Oliver's analysis of the current state of Taiwan 

On this episode Erik speaks with returning guest Dr. Alvin Camba about his latest research paper "How Chinese firms approach investment risk: strong leaders, cancellation, and pushback" (link to paper)This groundbreaking research uses hundreds of in-depth interviews with top officials from China, Chinese SOEs, state-owned banks as well as Philippine and Indonesian political and economic elite to get a glimpse at how Chinese firms view the strength of a foreign leader, how that affects their investment decisions and how miscalculating strength can lead to undesirable outcomes for Chinese investors and/or State.Alvin Camba is an assistant professor at the Josef Korbel School of International Studies at the University of Denver. He received his PhD in Sociology from Johns Hopkins University and is also a non-resident fellow at the Climate Policy Lab at the Fletcher School at Tufts University. Recommendations Alvin: 1. How Duterte Strong-Armed Chinese Dam-builders but weakened Philippine Institutions2. How China Lends: A Rare look into 100 debt contracts with foreign governments.  Anna Gelpern, Sebastian Horn, Scott Morris, Brad Parks, Christopher Trebesch at AIDDATAErik:1. Get a treadmill desk! 2. The nihilistic electronic noise music of Pharmakon - specifically recommending the song No Natural Order