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Backed by massive financial investments coming from the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and the Silk Road Fund, "the Silk Road Economic Belt", first announced on the occasion of a visit in Kazakhstan six months after Xi Jinping became China's President, and "the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road" are symbols of 21st century China and constitute for the Eurasian actors a historical opportunity.
Some observers can point out that Beijing's renewed focus on the Eurasian continent can be seen, in geopolitical terms, as an answer to the U.S. pivot to Asia initiated by the Obama administration, however, the New Silk Road should not be interpreted as a tactical scheme to counter other forces, it simply complements "a new type of major-power relationship" which characterizes the China/U.S. bilateral relations.
The People's Republic of China, soon the world's largest economy, is aware that with power comes responsibility -- and vice versa. In a sense, the New Silk Road can be understood as a Marshall Plan with Chinese characteristics, it reassures the Middle Country's neighbors, contributes to their growth and places them in a system designed by Beijing.
Fully embraced by the European Union and other Eurasian actors, the New Silk Road will take 65 percent of the world population toward an unprecedented level of cohesiveness and prosperity.
Following the "China Dream" mainly articulated for the Chinese people, Xi Jinping proposes a humanistic vision of progress which goes beyond national interests, based on China's own experience of material development and inspired by the Chinese sense of universalism, Da Tong, or Grand Harmony, the New Silk Road is "Eurasia's Dream", a dream we can pursue together.
David Gosset is director of the Academia Sinica Europaea at China Europe International Business School (CEIBS), Shanghai, Beijing & Accra, and founder of the Euro-China Forum.
Fully embraced by the European Union and other Eurasian actors, the New Silk Road will take 65 percent of the world population toward an unprecedented level of cohesiveness and prosperity.