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哥伦比亚大学国际直接投资展望中文版都可以在我们的网站查看:
http://ccsi.columbia.edu/publications/columbia-fdi-perspectives.
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*Columbia FDI Perspectives*
Perspectives on topical foreign direct investment issues
No. 289  October 19, 2020
Editor-in-Chief: Karl P. Sauvant ([log in to unmask])
Managing Editor: Riccardo Loschi ([log in to unmask])
*Outward FDI under China’s Belt and Road Initiative: Between regulation and
adaption*
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* <#m_-6388700767612384652__edn1>
by
Maria Adele Carrai** <#m_-6388700767612384652__edn2>

In 2013, President Xi Jinping launched his signature foreign policy, the Belt
and Road Initiative
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(BRI), to foster international connectivity and cooperation through
infrastructure investments. Many question the BRI’s real meaning, scope and
global effects. Some lament its unclear nature, for there is still no
authoritative list of BRI investment projects and no clear regulatory
framework for FDI in this area. Other have considered the Initiative as
destabilizing for the international liberal order and good governance
standards and fear China’s weaponizing investment is challenging the
currently open but mostly fragmented FDI regime.

Has the BRI created a new regulatory framework for China’s outward FDI?
What are its characteristics, and is it challenging the current
international economic order? To ascertain whether critics of the BRI are
correct, one must look at China’s BRI policy papers, outward FDI
guidelines, recent bilateral investment treaties (BITs), free trade
agreements (FTAs), and practice.

The official five objectives of the BRI
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are: enhancing policy coordination; improving infrastructure connectivity
through six international corridors; reinforcing trade and investment
cooperation, especially in the industrial sector; moving forward with
financial integration; and supporting people-to-people collaboration.
Following China’s “Going out Policy” and the BRI, the country’s outward FDI
surpassed FDI inflows for the first time in 2015, reaching its peak in
2016. Although an overarching law governing overseas commercial and
assistance activity is lacking, the government has issued hundreds of
directives and regulations since 2013 regulating outward FDI to fit Chinese
development and industrial policies and encouraging China’s state-owned
enterprises (SOEs) and private companies to respect local customs, honor
social responsibilities and uphold environmental and labor
protections. The *Guidelines
for Enterprise Compliance Management of Overseas Operations* (2018)
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for example, encourage Chinese investors abroad (including BRI investors)
to comply with domestic rules and self-disciplinary regulations, Chinese
and host country laws and international treaties. The China State
Council’s *Opinions
on Further Guiding and Regulating Outbound Investment* (2017)
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delineates how outbound investment should align with the BRI. From the
perspective of China’s inward and outward investment regimes, the
classification of projects into “encouraged,” “restricted” and “prohibited”
categories provides some coherence to China’s policies toward FDI in the
BRI area.[1] <#m_-6388700767612384652__edn3> Both documents do not
contradict the essence and use a similar language of the OECD’s *Policy
Framework for Investment*
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and the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises
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.

If Chinese regulations and guidelines on outward FDI are increasingly in
line with international standards and best practices, one major issue is
the Chinese central government’s lack of control over its economic actors
abroad and the voluntary nature of most of the guidelines.[2]
<#m_-6388700767612384652__edn4> Chinese SOEs and policy banks at the
forefront of the BRI appear to be more aware of, and adaptive to, host
country regulations and laws than the guidelines of their home country
government.[3] <#m_-6388700767612384652__edn5> Moreover, given the
structural differences of BRI countries, Chinese outward FDI has different
objectives. The legal framework varies from memoranda of understanding and
partnerships with BRI countries in support of the Initiative to legally
binding BITs and FTAs. China’s BITs with the global north increasingly
include more comprehensive investor-state dispute-settlement provisions,
national treatment and more expansive sets of disciplines; meanwhile, most
BITs with the global south have not changed since the 1990s, and their
supplementation with BRI memoranda of understanding and partnerships might
suggest a government-led interventionist approach to investment protection
in some sectors.[4] <#m_-6388700767612384652__edn6>

The BRI may be unclear, and China—like most other countries—does not have
detailed regulations for outbound investment. However, the Initiative is
already impacting FDI regulations, rerouting economic and shifting funds
between sectors and countries
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and filling the imaginary of development with new ideas that prioritize
development rights and infrastructure. While it is likely that China will
increasingly use several legal instruments to protect its investment abroad
and does not seem to challenge the international economic order, a
homogenous regulatory pattern for BRI investment is unlikely. China is
pragmatic and adaptive in dealing with BRI host countries’ disparate
interests and legal systems. Given its “sovereignty first” policy, China
has so far abstained from seeking to transform the legal and governance
system of host countries. In this sense, host countries have an opportunity
to shape the Initiative. Those with weak legal institutions or lacking
experience in certain BRI sectors, such as infrastructure, should share
their knowledge through the creation of common platforms or rely on
initiatives such as the Blue Dot Network
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.

------------------------------
* <#m_-6388700767612384652__ednref1> *The Columbia FDI Perspectives are a
forum for public debate. The views expressed by the author(s) do not
reflect the opinions of CCSI or Columbia University or our partners and
supporters. Columbia FDI Perspectives (ISSN 2158-3579) is a peer-reviewed
series.*
** <#m_-6388700767612384652__ednref2> Maria Adele Carrai ([log in to unmask])
is an Assistant Professor of Global China Studies at New York University
Shanghai and an Associate Research Scholar at the Weatherhead East Asian
Institute of Columbia University. The author wishes to thank Vivienne Bath,
Axel Berger and Leonard Cheng for their valuable peer reviews.
[1] <#m_-6388700767612384652__ednref3> Although the new China FDI Law
replaces the Foreign Investment Guidance Catalogues (that divided FDI into
encouraged, restricted and prohibited) with a negative list, the latter is
the mirror image of the Foreign Investment Guidance Catalogue. See, Foreign
Investment Law of the People's Republic of China (2020)
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.
[2] <#m_-6388700767612384652__ednref4> William J. Norris, *Chinese Economic
Statecraft: Commercial Actors, Grand Strategy, and State Control *(Ithaca:
Cornell University Press, 2016).
[3] <#m_-6388700767612384652__ednref5> Xiaoxue Weng and Lila Buckley,
eds., *Chinese
Businesses in Africa. Perspectives on Corporate Social Responsibility and
the Role of Chinese Government Policies* (London: IIED, 2016), p. 13.
<https://columbia.us6.list-manage.com/track/click?u=ab15cc1d53&id=89b0c56cd7&e=5eb397be70>
[4] <#m_-6388700767612384652__ednref6> Julien Chaisse and Jędrzej Górski, *The
Belt and Road Initiative: Law, Economics and Politics* (Leiden: Brill,
2018), chaps. 9–12.
*The material in this Perspective may be reprinted if accompanied by the
following acknowledgment: “Maria Adele Carrai, ‘Outward FDI under China’s
Belt and Road Initiative: Between regulation and adaption,’ Columbia FDI
Perspectives, No. 289, October 19, 2020. Reprinted with permission from the
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment (**www.ccsi.columbia.edu*
<https://columbia.us6.list-manage.com/track/click?u=ab15cc1d53&id=93492301a6&e=5eb397be70>*).”
A copy should kindly be sent to the Columbia Center on Sustainable
Investment at **[log in to unmask]* <[log in to unmask]>*.*

For further information, including information regarding submission to the
*Perspectives*, please contact: Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment,
Riccardo Loschi, [log in to unmask]

*Most recent Columbia FDI Perspectives*
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   - No. 288, Ivan Anton Nimac, ‘COVID-19 and FDI: How should governments
   respond?,’ October 5, 2020
   - No. 287, Florence Dafe and Zoe Williams, ‘Explaining the rise of
   third-party funding in investment arbitration,’ September 21, 2020
   - No. 286, George A. Bermann, N. Jansen Calamita, Manjiao Chi, and Karl
   P. Sauvant, ‘Insulating a WTO Investment Facilitation Framework from ISDS,’
   September 7, 2020

*All previous FDI Perspectives are available at *
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*. *

*Other relevant CCSI news and announcements*

   - CCSI announces a *call for papers* for the 2020 edition of
   the Yearbook on International Investment Law and Policy. Original
   contributions to be considered for publication in the Yearbook will be
   accepted on a rolling basis until *February 28, 2021.* More information
   can be found here
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   .
   - *On* *Oct 28, 2020*, CCSI, NRGI and the SDG Academy will co-host
   "Tackling Extractive Sector Corruption in Unstable Times: A Conversation
   Between Leila Kazemi and Alexandra Gillies." Please see our website
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   for more information and to register for this online event.
   - CCSI and partners call for ISDS moratorium during COVID-19 crisis and
   response
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Karl P. Sauvant, Ph.D.
Resident Senior Fellow
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
Columbia Law School - Earth Institute
Ph: (212) 854-0689
Fax: (212) 854-7946
*Copyright © 2020 Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment (CCSI), All
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*Resident Senior Fellow*
*Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment*
Columbia Law School - The Earth Institute, Columbia University
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"Insulating a WTO Investment Facilitation Framework from ISDS", "A G20
Facility to Rekindle FDI Flows", "Enabling the Full Participation of
Developing Countries in Negotiating a WTO Investment Facilitation
Framework", "Concrete Measures for a Framework on Investment Facilitation
for Development", "Making FDI more Sustainable", "Facilitating Sustainable
FDI by...", "An International Framework to Discipline Outward FDI
Incentives?", "The Case for an Advisory Centre on International Investment
Law", "An Advisory Centre on International Investment Law: Key Features",
 "Incentivizing Sustainable FDI: The Authorized Sustainable Investor", "The
Potential Value-added of a Multilateral Framework on Investment
Facilitation for Development",  "International Investment Facilitation: By
Whom and for What?", "Towards an Investment Facilitation Framework: Why?
What? When?" are available at https://ssrn.com/author=2461782 .

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