Why did China establish the Asian Infrastructure and Investment Bank (AIIB)?

China’s rise came with relatively modest objectives compared to their weight; they have not been trying to rule the Asia-Pacific let alone the world. Recently, however, Beijing has started to more pro-actively claim their space in the international community, best exemplified by their establishment of the Asian Infrastructure and Investment Bank (AIIB) in 2013. This multilateral development bank is part of China’s “great power diplomacy“ efforts launched by Xi Jinping, a bank of which the ideological and political motivations remain unclear and are speculated upon among media and within academic circles. Hence this paper’s focus on the question “why did China establish the AIIB and what motivations have informed its creation?”. Using the Neo-Gramscian critical theory of hegemony for international relations, this paper focuses on ideas and ideological narratives that could have potentially informed the motivations behind the creation of the AIIB. The paper is a response to the...Show moreChina’s rise came with relatively modest objectives compared to their weight; they have not been trying to rule the Asia-Pacific let alone the world. Recently, however, Beijing has started to more pro-actively claim their space in the international community, best exemplified by their establishment of the Asian Infrastructure and Investment Bank (AIIB) in 2013. This multilateral development bank is part of China’s “great power diplomacy“ efforts launched by Xi Jinping, a bank of which the ideological and political motivations remain unclear and are speculated upon among media and within academic circles. Hence this paper’s focus on the question “why did China establish the AIIB and what motivations have informed its creation?”. Using the Neo-Gramscian critical theory of hegemony for international relations, this paper focuses on ideas and ideological narratives that could have potentially informed the motivations behind the creation of the AIIB. The paper is a response to the predominantly realist and liberal institutionalist literature on China’s rise, and aims to go beyond the self-affirming nature of state-centric analysis. The literature review is structured around three central topics: China’s rise and internationalization, its engagement with institutions and multilateralism, and the establishment of the AIIB. Following the literature review, the case study investigates a possible interrelation between China’s historical political traditions, Xi’s recent ambitions in global governance, and the motivations behind the creation of the AIIB. The paper argues that the creation of the AIIB is informed by a number of motivations that are beyond its official narrative, namely that the bank 1) redistributes the industrial overcapacity of China’s core industries; 2) helps maintain economic growth by opening up new markets, or as an 3) alternative institution in response to a failing global governance system. Most importantly, 4) the AIIB is argued to potentially function as a transnational mechanism to extend China’s domestic social relations in the form of ideas, norms, and values on a diplomatic, economic, and cultural level through project engagement in member states. The AIIB’s motivations are therefore not merely informed by economic or institutional motives, but also by socially informed ideological debates that find their basis on all levels of Chinese society.Show less

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Why did China establish the Asian Infrastructure and Investment Bank (AIIB)?