The Characteristics and Value of Theoretical Research on the Belt and Road Initiative

In his keynote speech at the opening ceremony of the Third Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation, President Xi Jinping pointed out: “Over the past ten years, we have stayed true to our original aspiration and joined hands to advance Belt and Road international cooperation from scratch, achieving vigorous growth and fruitful results.” As a widely welcomed international public good and platform for international cooperation, the Belt and Road Initiative has become a vivid practice of China’s efforts to build a community with a shared future for mankind. Alongside the practical process of the Belt and Road Initiative, relevant theoretical research has continuously deepened and yielded rich results. Theoretical research on the Belt and Road Initiative provides theoretical support, intellectual support, and discursive support for converging consensus among all parties, pooling strength from all sides, and advancing practical work, holding significant theoretical meaning and practical value.

习近平主席在第三届“一带一路”国际合作高峰论坛开幕式上的主旨演讲中指出：“10年来，我们坚守初心、携手同行，推动‘一带一路’国际合作从无到有，蓬勃发展，取得丰硕成果。”作为广受欢迎的国际公共产品和国际合作平台，共建“一带一路”已成为中国推动构建人类命运共同体的生动实践。伴随着共建“一带一路”的实践进程，相关理论研究不断深入，取得丰富成果。共建“一带一路”理论研究为汇聚各方共识、凝聚各方力量、推动实际工作提供了理论支撑、智力支撑、话语支撑，具有重要理论意义和实践价值。

Development Process and Basic Connotations

发展历程及基本内涵

From completing the overall layout of a “broad-brush sketch” to drawing a meticulous and detailed “fine brushwork,” the Belt and Road Initiative has achieved solid and substantial accomplishments. Theoretical research on the Belt and Road Initiative has accompanied its practical process. Looking back at the course of theoretical research on the Belt and Road Initiative over the past ten years, it has roughly gone through two stages.

从完成总体布局的“大写意”到绘制精谨细腻的“工笔画”，共建“一带一路”取得实打实、沉甸甸的成就。共建“一带一路”理论研究与其实践进程相伴相生。回顾10年来共建“一带一路”理论研究走过的历程，大致经历了两个阶段。

In the first stage, the rapid development of the Belt and Road Initiative drove the swift expansion of related theoretical research. In the autumn of 2013, President Xi Jinping proposed the Belt and Road Initiative. With the joint efforts of all parties, the Belt and Road Initiative grew from nothing, expanded from points to broader areas, underwent the process of laying foundations and erecting pillars and beams, and evolved from a Chinese initiative into an international consensus, achieving major breakthroughs. During this period, academic research on the Belt and Road Initiative mainly focused on issues such as its conceptual definition, essential attributes, reasons for its rise, strategic policies, operational mechanisms, cooperation models, development momentum, and risks and challenges, while also exploring deeper-level issues of the theoretical system of the Belt and Road Initiative. Theoretical research on the Belt and Road Initiative exhibited the characteristic of emerging from multiple points simultaneously, becoming a phenomenon-level research topic. In the second stage, high-quality Belt and Road cooperation drove related theoretical research to become more comprehensive and in-depth. In 2018, at the symposium marking the fifth anniversary of the Belt and Road Initiative, General Secretary Xi Jinping emphasized: “We must make further progress, building on the momentum of healthy and sound development, to promote the transformation of the Belt and Road Initiative toward high-quality development. This is the basic requirement for advancing the Belt and Road Initiative in the next phase.” In recent years, the Belt and Road Initiative has steadily advanced in the direction of high-quality development. Academic research on the Belt and Road Initiative has become more diverse, multidimensional, comprehensive, and holistic. In addition to focusing on issues such as the deepening development of the Belt and Road Initiative, policy improvement, cooperation effectiveness, risk response, and industrial security, scholarly exploration of its development laws has also become more in-depth and systematic. As the Belt and Road Initiative moves into its next decade, related theoretical research is bound to achieve even more fruitful results.

第一阶段，共建“一带一路”快速发展带动相关理论研究迅速展开。2013年秋天，习近平主席提出共建“一带一路”倡议。在各方共同努力下，共建“一带一路”从无到有、由点及面，经历夯基垒台、立柱架梁，从中国倡议发展为国际共识，取得重大突破。这一期间，学界对共建“一带一路”的研究主要集中于其概念定义、本质属性、兴起原因、战略政策、运行机制、合作模式、发展动力、风险挑战等问题，并对共建“一带一路”理论体系的较深层次问题有所探讨。共建“一带一路”理论研究呈现多点齐发的特点，成为现象级研究课题。第二阶段，高质量共建“一带一路”带动相关理论研究更加全面深入。2018年，习近平总书记在推进“一带一路”建设工作5周年座谈会上强调：“我们要百尺竿头、更进一步，在保持健康良性发展势头的基础上，推动共建‘一带一路’向高质量发展转变，这是下一阶段推进共建‘一带一路’工作的基本要求。”近年来，共建“一带一路”朝着高质量发展的方向坚定前行。学界对共建“一带一路”的理论研究更加多元立体、综合全面。除了关注共建“一带一路”的深化发展、政策完善、合作成效、风险应对、产业安全等问题外，对其发展规律的学理探讨也更加深入系统。随着共建“一带一路”走向下一个十年，相关理论研究必将取得更丰硕成果。

General Secretary Xi Jinping emphasized: “Strengthen academic research, theoretical support, and discourse system construction for the Belt and Road Initiative” and “deeply explain the concepts, principles, and methods of the Belt and Road Initiative, jointly telling the story of the Belt and Road Initiative well.” Generally speaking, theoretical research on the Belt and Road Initiative must continuously deepen the understanding of the laws governing the Belt and Road Initiative and serve the specific practices of the Belt and Road Initiative. Currently, the basic connotations of this theoretical research can be understood and grasped from the following aspects: First, academic mission. This theoretical research is dedicated to providing a coherent and logically rigorous theoretical framework and knowledge system for the Belt and Road Initiative, focusing on practice as its foundation, exploring and summarizing its development laws, basic experiences, and reference significance. Second, theoretical paradigm. This theoretical research is conducted under the scientific guidance of Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, against the backdrop of changes unseen in a century, and at the critical stage of the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation. It takes the Belt and Road Initiative as its research object, employing systematic thinking and interdisciplinary methods to carry out original theoretical exploration and the construction of an independent knowledge system. Third, main concepts. The concepts primarily focused on and utilized in this research include: extensive consultation, joint contribution, and shared benefits; openness, green development, and clean governance; high standards, benefiting people’s livelihoods, and sustainability; policy coordination, facilities connectivity, unimpeded trade, financial integration, and people-to-people bonds; international cooperation platforms, international public goods; bilateral cooperation, trilateral cooperation, multilateral cooperation; the Silk Road, the Silk Road spirit, and so on. These encompass the principles, concepts, goals, cooperation content, positioning, cooperation methods, and cultural identity of the Belt and Road Initiative. Fourth, disciplinary symbiosis. The Belt and Road Initiative is a systematic project, and its theoretical research possesses an interdisciplinary nature that integrates humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences, promoting the integrated development of related disciplines.

习近平总书记强调：“加强‘一带一路’建设学术研究、理论支撑、话语体系建设”“深入阐释共建‘一带一路’的理念、原则、方式等，共同讲好共建‘一带一路’故事”。总的来讲，共建“一带一路”理论研究要不断深化对共建“一带一路”的规律性认识，服务共建“一带一路”具体实践。当前，可以从以下几个方面来认识和把握这一理论研究的基本内涵：一是学术使命。这一理论研究致力于为共建“一带一路”提供相互贯通、逻辑周延的理论框架、知识体系，注重以实践为基础，探索总结其发展规律、基本经验和借鉴意义。二是理论范式。这一理论研究是在习近平新时代中国特色社会主义思想的科学指导下，在世界百年未有之大变局的背景下，在中华民族伟大复兴的关键阶段，以共建“一带一路”为研究对象，运用系统思维和跨学科方法，进行原创性的理论探索和自主知识体系构建。三是主要概念。这一研究主要关注和运用的概念有：共商共建共享，开放、绿色、廉洁，高标准、惠民生、可持续，政策沟通、设施联通、贸易畅通、资金融通、民心相通，国际合作平台、国际公共产品，双边合作、三方合作、多边合作，丝绸之路、丝路精神，等等，包括共建“一带一路”的原则、理念、目标、合作内容、定位、合作方式、文化认同等。四是学科共生。共建“一带一路”是一项系统工程，其理论研究具有融合人文社会科学与自然科学等多学科的跨学科性，促进各相关学科融通发展。

Research Characteristics and Qualities

研究特点与品格

Through accumulation and sedimentation, theoretical research on the Belt and Road Initiative has exhibited distinct characteristics and qualities.

经过积累沉淀，共建“一带一路”理论研究展现出鲜明的特点与品格。

Unity of knowledge and action. Theoretical research on the Belt and Road Initiative is based on practice and serves practice, embodying the characteristic of the unity of knowledge and action. The role of theory ultimately lies in answering practical questions and guiding practical development. The vast practice of the Belt and Road Initiative has raised a large number of urgent questions requiring answers. The more thorough the theoretical research on these questions, the more our exploration in practice will conform to objective laws, and the more forward-looking, proactive, and effective it will be, helping to form mature cooperation models and governance mechanisms. Over the years, builders and researchers of the Belt and Road Initiative have worked closely together, forming a positive cycle of applying knowledge to practice and using practice to promote learning. For example, relevant ministries, local governments, enterprises and institutions, and social organizations regularly release research topics related to the Belt and Road Initiative, putting forward practical needs and strengthening intellectual support. In this process, a large number of Chinese think tanks have participated deeply, providing a wealth of research results and policy recommendations to promote policy coordination, facilities connectivity, unimpeded trade, financial integration, and people-to-people bonds among Belt and Road countries. For instance, a batch of basic and applied research results has been widely applied in cooperation in fields such as highways, railways, ports, aviation, aerospace, oil and gas pipelines, electricity, and network communications, effectively advancing facilities connectivity. Another example is that some scholars have conducted relatively in-depth research and case summaries on youth international exchange and cooperation under the Belt and Road Initiative, boosting people-to-people bonds. Some foreign scholars also believe that theoretical research on the Belt and Road Initiative is a body of knowledge continuously refined in practice.

知行合一。共建“一带一路”理论研究基于实践并服务实践，具有知行合一的特点。理论的作用归根到底要体现在回答实践问题、引领实践发展上。共建“一带一路”的宏阔实践提出了大量急需解答的问题，对这些问题的理论研究越透彻，我们在实践中的探索就越符合客观规律，就更具前瞻性、主动性、实效性，有助于形成成熟的合作模式、治理机制。这些年来，共建“一带一路”的建设者和研究者紧密合作，形成学以致用、用以促学的正向循环。如相关部委、地方政府、企事业单位、社会组织等，定期发布有关“一带一路”研究课题，提出实际需求，强化智力支持。在此过程中，我国一大批智库深度参与，为促进共建“一带一路”国家的政策沟通、设施联通、贸易畅通、资金融通、民心相通提供了大量研究成果及对策建议。比如，一批基础研究和应用研究成果，被广泛应用于公路、铁路、港口、航空、航天、油气管道、电力、网络通信等领域的合作中，有力推进了设施联通。再如，一些学者对共建“一带一路”的青年国际交流合作进行了较为深入研究和案例总结，助推民心相通。一些国外学者也认为，共建“一带一路”理论研究是在实践中不断完善的学问。

Global vision. As an international public good and platform for international cooperation that China provides to the world, the fundamental starting point and ultimate goal of the Belt and Road Initiative is to explore new ways for neighbors and distant friends to develop together and to open up a “road to happiness” that benefits all countries and the world. This demonstrates China’s global vision and sense of responsibility as a major country. With a public spirit, one stands firm; with many walking together, one goes far. Over the past ten years, China has signed over 230 Belt and Road cooperation documents with more than 150 countries and over 30 international organizations, and the Belt and Road Initiative has been repeatedly included in multilateral cooperation mechanisms such as the United Nations. Many studies focus on the opportunities the Belt and Road Initiative brings for the common development of all countries, continuously providing theoretical support and intellectual support for the Belt and Road Initiative. For example, some studies regard the Belt and Road Initiative as a Chinese solution for a new type of economic globalization. Drawing on the experiences and lessons of past economic globalization, and combining China’s advantages in promoting global connectivity with the actual needs of developing countries, they propose the concept of inclusive economic globalization. Some studies suggest that current world modernization needs to transform from the modernization of individual nation-states to modernization aimed at pursuing the common interests of all humanity, and that the Belt and Road Initiative boosts the modernization process of developing countries. By exploring new areas and models of cooperation, it helps developing countries break through development bottlenecks and promotes cross-continental collaborative efforts to enter a new era.

天下情怀。作为中国向世界提供的国际公共产品和国际合作平台，共建“一带一路”的根本出发点和落脚点是探索远亲近邻共同发展的新办法，开拓造福各国、惠及世界的“幸福路”。这彰显了中国的天下情怀和大国担当。公心则立，众行则远。10年来，我国已与150多个国家、30多个国际组织签署230多份共建“一带一路”合作文件，共建“一带一路”多次写入联合国等多边合作机制文件中。不少研究聚焦“一带一路”为各国共同发展带来的机遇，不断为共建“一带一路”提供理论支撑和智力支持。比如，有研究将共建“一带一路”视为新型经济全球化的中国方案，在吸取过去经济全球化经验教训基础上，结合中国在推进全球互联互通上的优势以及发展中国家实际需求，提出包容性经济全球化理念。有研究提出，当前世界现代化需要从个别民族国家的现代化转变为以谋求全人类共同利益为目标的现代化，共建“一带一路”助推发展中国家的现代化进程。通过探索新的合作领域和发展模式，助力发展中国家突破发展瓶颈，促进跨大洲协力合作进入新时代。

Open and inclusive. President Xi Jinping pointed out: “The Belt and Road Initiative emphasizes that many hands make light work and mutual help leads to long-term progress. It advocates that one should not only live well oneself but also enable others to live well. It practices connectivity, mutual benefit, and mutual gain, and seeks common development and win-win cooperation. It does not engage in ideological confrontation, geopolitical games, or bloc political confrontation. It opposes unilateral sanctions, economic coercion, and decoupling and severing supply chains.” China has always adhered to the principle of extensive consultation, joint contribution, and shared benefits, and has firmly advanced this open and inclusive process of common development. The Belt and Road Initiative has demonstrated greater resilience and greater value amid trials of wind and waves. Domestic researchers adhere to a long-term perspective on the Belt and Road Initiative, maintaining firm confidence and patience, and continuously analyze and assess the international situation and security environment facing the initiative, providing intellectual support for improving planning and decision-making levels, enhancing the effectiveness of people’s livelihood construction, and avoiding security risks in practice. Adhering to harmony without uniformity, they strengthen international cooperation research on the Belt and Road Initiative, actively promote international dialogue and exchange, advance various forms of Chinese-foreign interdisciplinary research on the initiative, tap into humanistic resources such as Silk Road memory, Silk Road spirit, and Silk Road civilization, enhance people-to-people bonds among participating countries by cultivating Silk Road memory and deepening Silk Road emotions, strive to build an open and inclusive Belt and Road academic community, consolidate the joint efforts of participating countries, and tell the story of the Belt and Road Initiative well.

开放包容。习近平主席指出：“共建‘一带一路’注重的是众人拾柴火焰高、互帮互助走得远，崇尚的是自己过得好、也让别人过得好，践行的是互联互通、互利互惠，谋求的是共同发展、合作共赢。不搞意识形态对立，不搞地缘政治博弈，也不搞集团政治对抗，反对单边制裁，反对经济胁迫，也反对‘脱钩断链’。”中国始终坚持共商共建共享的原则，坚定推进这一开放包容的共同发展进程，共建“一带一路”在风浪考验中彰显出更强韧性和更大价值。国内研究者坚持以长期视角看共建“一带一路”，坚定信心、保持耐心，对共建“一带一路”面临的国际形势和安全环境持续进行分析研判，为在实践中提高规划决策水平、提升民生建设成效、规避安全风险等提供智力支持。坚持和而不同，加强共建“一带一路”国际合作研究，积极推进国际对话与交流，推进中外各种形式的共建“一带一路”跨学科研究，挖掘丝路记忆、丝路精神、丝路文明等人文资源，在厚植丝路记忆、密切丝路情感中增进共建国家民心相通，努力打造开放包容的共建“一带一路”学术共同体，凝聚共建国家合力，讲好共建“一带一路”故事。

Value of theoretical innovation

理论创新价值

In the history of human thought, once an important new concept takes shape, it often exerts a powerful stimulating and driving effect, pushing people to achieve new elevations in their observation and research on related issues, and advancing the associated accumulation of knowledge and quality of research to a new height. The Belt and Road Initiative is precisely such a concept. Theoretical research on the Belt and Road Initiative has, from one important aspect, promoted the construction of China’s independent knowledge system, and has also contributed corresponding international public knowledge products to the world.

在人类思想史上，一个重要的新概念形成后，往往具有强大的刺激、带动作用，推动人们对相关问题的观察和研究实现新的提升，并将与之相关的知识积累和研究质量推进到一个新的高度。共建“一带一路”就是这样的概念。共建“一带一路”理论研究，从一个重要方面促进了我国自主知识体系的建构，也向世界贡献了相应的国际公共知识产品。

Contemporary China is advancing Chinese-path modernization, the most grand and unique practical innovation in human history, and the Belt and Road Initiative is an important component of this practical innovation. The practical exploration of promoting common development among participating countries has spurred innovation in theories of international economy, international relations, and international development. In terms of international economic theory, the Belt and Road Initiative promotes the establishment of an inclusive and shared new international economic system, and promotes diversified, autonomous, balanced, and sustainable development among participating countries. This is an innovation and transcendence of the traditional “center-periphery” pattern. In terms of international relations theory, China advocates building a new type of international relations centered on win-win cooperation, following equality, pursuing mutual benefit, attaching no political conditions, fully respecting the differences of each country, and jointly exploring cooperation models suitable for each country’s national conditions. This is an innovation and transcendence of traditional international relations theory. In terms of international development theory, the Belt and Road Initiative takes infrastructure connectivity and other areas as construction priorities, advances a large number of landmark projects and “small yet beautiful” projects that benefit people’s livelihoods, focuses on providing sustainable public goods for global development, explores new models of international development cooperation, and enriches international development theory. Based on long-term, large-scale, and cross-field international cooperation practice, theoretical research on the Belt and Road Initiative sorts out and summarizes innovative experiences from practice, strives to elevate experience into theory, reveals the Chinese path, Chinese governance, and Chinese rationale contained therein, and contributes to constructing China’s independent knowledge system.

当代中国正在推进中国式现代化这一人类历史上最为宏大而独特的实践创新，共建“一带一路”是这一实践创新的重要组成部分。推动共建国家共同发展的实践探索，促进了对国际经济、国际关系、国际发展等理论的创新。在国际经济理论方面，共建“一带一路”推动建立包容共享的国际经济新体系，推动实现共建国家多元、自主、平衡、可持续的发展，这是对传统“中心—外围”格局的创新和超越；在国际关系理论方面，中国倡导构建以合作共赢为核心的新型国际关系，遵循平等，追求互利，不附加任何政治条件，充分尊重各国差异，共同探索适合各国国情的合作模式，这是对传统国际关系理论的创新和超越；在国际发展理论方面，共建“一带一路”将基础设施互联互通等作为建设重点，推进一大批标志性项目和惠民生的“小而美”项目，注重为全球发展提供可持续的公共产品，探索国际发展合作的新模式，丰富了国际发展理论。立足长时段、大规模、跨领域的国际合作实践，共建“一带一路”理论研究梳理总结实践中的创新经验，努力把经验提升为理论，展现蕴含其中的中国之路、中国之治、中国之理，为建构中国自主的知识体系作出贡献。

The Belt and Road Initiative has shaped people’s new cognition and imagination of the world, created new concepts and paradigms for international interaction, and the important concepts it embodies, such as the global governance outlook, the correct outlook on righteousness and benefit, the security outlook, the development outlook, the cooperation outlook, and the ecological outlook, are becoming globally recognized public knowledge products. Over the past decade, an increasing number of departments, organizations, think tanks, and scholars have conducted in-depth research on these concepts, continuously enriching and improving the public knowledge products of the Belt and Road Initiative, providing countermeasure suggestions and injecting intellectual impetus for solving global challenges such as the increasingly severe peace deficit, development deficit, security deficit, and governance deficit.

共建“一带一路”塑造了人们对世界的新认知新想象，开创了国际交往的新理念新范式，所蕴含的全球治理观、正确义利观、安全观、发展观、合作观、生态观等重要理念，正在成为全球普遍认可的公共知识产品。10年来，越来越多的部门、组织、智库、学者深入研究这些理念，不断丰富完善共建“一带一路”的公共知识产品，为破解和平赤字、发展赤字、安全赤字、治理赤字日益加重的全球性难题提供对策建议，注入思想动力。

Online editor: Zhang Fujun

网络编辑：张福军