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Digital Infrastructures Along the New Silk Road: A Mixed-methods Exploration of China's Digital Investments in Its Borderland Regions

Project description

China’s internet ambitions

The ‘Digital Silk Road’ is a part of the Chinese Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) that focuses specifically on investments in digital technologies, e-commerce and infrastructure in countries along a loosely reimagined Silk Road, the ancient trade route that connected China to Europe. This program is seen as having the potential to create a China-led internet, characterized by state control, national boundaries, and national governance over what began as a borderless new space and is now dominated mostly by market forces. The EU-funded DIGISILK project will map the Digital Silk Road in China, Kazakhstan, Cambodia, and Myanmar, to understand the values and politics linked to this emerging second internet, thus contributing to the wider debate on values, ethics, and technology.

Objective

As part of its Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), China has recently launched the “Digital Silk Road” program, focused on investments in digital technologies and infrastructure in countries that are part of its loosely reimagined Silk Road. This program is seen as having the potential to create a second, China-led internet, which splits from the US-centered one and is ruled by a different set of priorities and values. Are the Digital Silk Road and the global expansion of Chinese tech companies prefiguring a future with two internets: an existing one that is US-led and founded on market-driven ideology, and a new, alternative one that is China-led and characterized by state control, national boundaries, and national governance over what began as a borderless new space? What values and politics are built into the various components of the Digital Silk Road, and is - or how is - the internet they are creating fundamentally different from the current one?

The project will employ qualitative and ethnographic methods, digital methods, and document analysis to understand the emergence of the Digital Silk Road from the ground-up and from the comparative perspective of business, governments, and ordinary people in four countries: China, where Digital Silk Road policies, finances, devices, online platforms and apps originate; Kazakhstan, a key player in Central Asia; Myanmar, whose economic dependence on China is the cause of considerable ambivalence; and Cambodia, that under Prime Minister Hun Sen has been one of the most enthusiastic supporters of Chinese investments.

The project aims at illuminating the deployment of the Digital Silk Road to see what this second internet might consist of; seeks to understand what values and politics are embedded in it; and explores how they are received and negotiated in the countries concerned, thus contributing to the wider debate on values, ethics, and technology.

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Topic(s)

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ERC-STG - Starting Grant

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Call for proposal

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(opens in new window) ERC-2019-STG

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Host institution

KING'S COLLEGE LONDON
Net EU contribution

Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.

€ 1 499 236,00
Address
STRAND
WC2R 2LS London
United Kingdom

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Region
London Inner London — West Westminster
Activity type
Higher or Secondary Education Establishments
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Total cost

The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.

€ 1 499 236,00

Beneficiaries (1)

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