Chinese perspectives on the Belt and Road Initiative

China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) is a call for an open and inclusive model of sustainable international economic, political and cultural cooperation and development under the guiding principles of the peaceful coexistence of sovereign states, achieved through multiple types of increased connectivity and financed by new multilateral financial instruments. This article outlines the evolution of the BRI, its relationship to changing conditions in China and the world, and the ideas and thinking that underly it as expressed in official documents and speeches by President Xi Jinping. The relationships between individual and collective interests, the Silk Road Spirit and Chinese concepts of harmony and different but equal in a Community of Shared Future and mutual benefit are examined, along with some of the political and economic challenges associated with the coexistence of competing values and social models.