cooperation on the basis of the three pillars and five priority areas described above. These envisioned projects will “fully utilize the LMC Special Fund set up by China” along “with financial resources inputs from the six countries” as well as “financial institutions such as the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, the Silk Road Fund and the Asian Development Bank” (Lancang–Mekong Cooperation, 2018). To be sure, the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) is a new international financial institution led by China, and the Silk Road Fund is a state-owned investment fund of the Chinese government set up specifically for BRI projects. Moreover, Premier Li Keqiang also announced in Phnom Penh on this occasion that, within the framework of LMC, China will provide an additional loan amount of US$6 billion for various infrastructure and industry cooperation projects (Lifang, 2018). The LMC will thus depend heavily on China’s financial support, not to mention other aspects such as technology and expertise.
Although China’s involvement in the development of the LMC has been largely under the performance of Premier Li Keqiang, we have also witnessed President Xi Jinping’s expression of support on some occasions. For example, during his meeting in Jakarta with Prime Minister Hun Sen of Cambodia in April 2015, Xi specifically mentioned “the countries along the Mekong River” alongside ASEAN as China’s partners for increasing dialogue and cooperation (Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of China, 2017a). And on December 1, 2017, while meeting again with Hun Sen in Beijing, Xi “called for stronger bilateral coordination in multilateral mechanisms such as the United Nations, East Asia Cooperation and Lancang–Mekong Cooperation” (Liangyu, 2017). He also named LMC as a partnership scheme on other diplomatic occasions, including, his talk with Myanmar President U Htin Kyaw in Beijing on April 10, 2017 (Zhangrui, 2017), his meeting with Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha of Thailand in Xiamen on September 4, 2017 (Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of China, 2017b), and his article published in Vietnamese media ahead of his state visit to Vietnam in November 2017 (Xi, 2017c). The LMC was referred to with a strong emphasis in the case of Xi’s state visit to Laos around mid-November 2017. In his signed article published in Lao media prior to the occasion, he metaphorically stresses that “Like the Lancang–Mekong River that runs through our two countries, the common mission and ideals that bind us together have forged a common destiny for us” (Xi, 2017a). And as Laos would co-chair the LMC with China in 2018, Xi affirms that “China will work with Laos to facilitate more cooperation outcomes, …, promote sub-regional development and bring more benefits to the countries and peoples in the region” (Xi, 2017a).
As we have seen, Xi Jinping and other leading people and agencies of China have emphatically reiterated a number of key words in foreign policymaking. These include, among others, non-hegemony, shared future, and strategic partnership. I would like to focus on these crucial elements in relation to the Mekong River basin as a major entity of Mainland ASEAN and China.
It is of note that China is de facto the hydro-hegemon of the Mekong River. The terms and concepts of “hydro-hegemony” and “hydro-hegemon,” are parts of an analytical framework of power positions and situations among riparian countries in trans-boundary river basins. They were employed by Zeitoun and Warner in their studies of the Nile, Jordan, and Tigris, and Euphrates, and were later addressed by Biba in his analysis of China’s politics in the Lancang–Mekong River (Zeitoun & Warner, 2006; Biba, 2018, p. 638). In “international hydro-relations,” the position of hydro-hegemony of a riparian nation is attained if it holds decisive superiority over other co-riparian countries in capability asymmetries consisting of: (1) riparian position (upstream/downstream), (2) dimensions of power (military, economic, ideational), and (3) exploitation potential (infrastructure and technological capacity). Zeitoun and Warner argue that “the nature of interaction over water resources and form of hydro-hegemony established is determined by the hydro-hegemon… and to what extent the benefits derived from the flows will also extend to the weaker co-riparians” (Zeitoun & Warner, 2006, pp. 45–452). Yet, the reality of hegemony and asymmetry needs not produce only adverse repercussions. On the one hand, a hydro-hegemon may act positively, guiding and cooperating with co-riparian states to attain a shared-benefit situation under a lengthy “shadow of the future” among all parties involved. On the other, the hydro-hegemon may behave negatively and turn its position into dominative forms, resulting in intensity of conflicts between itself and other basin states. To be sure, most international hydro-relations and hydro-hegemonic configurations “fall somewhere between the poles of enlightened leadership and oppressive domination” (Zeitoun & Warner, 2006, p. 439).
From the perspective of this framework, China undoubtedly possesses a preponderance of capabilities in all these three aspects when compared relatively with other basin states, and therefore actually assumes a hydro-hegemon position that can determine the nature of interaction in the Lancang–Mekong basin. Evidently, the way China had avoided active roles in other Mekong international mechanisms and established the LMC with China in the driver’s seat can be viewed as signaling the shift towards hydro-hegemonic maneuvering. To what extent this shift and its subsequent processes reflect positive and negative impacts constitute a major issue of uncertainty and controversy among all parties concerned. The Lancang–Mekong River and its extensive basin represent a vital “shared future” among all six LMC member countries. How China treats its “strategic partners” under the LMC scheme inevitably reflects China’s overall diplomatic and policy orientation towards the whole Mainland ASEAN. The declaration and plan of the LMC emphatically link this cooperation framework of “Shared River, Shared Future” to the BRI. It remains to be seen if this LMC initiative, when combined with the BRI, may bring about a shared vision styled after China’s own terminology: “One Belt, One Road, One River.”
2.7.Mainland ASEAN as China’s Supplementary Pathway
While the nascent LMC framework and previous mechanisms are being developed in the midst of uncertain conditions, China has recently embarked on another grand scheme endowed with tremendous potential for further impact on Mainland ASEAN. President Xi Jinping announced on April 13, 2018 that the Central Committee of the CPC had decided to support the mega-project of turning the province and island of Hainan into a free-trade zone and finally a free-trade port system. Although the Hainan free-trade zone and port follow the experience of Hong Kong and Singapore, it will nevertheless be designed and implemented with Chinese characteristics. In addition to large development funding provided by the Chinese state apparatus, investors from all over the world are welcome to join in this grand scheme. This announcement was made at the 30th anniversary of the establishment of Hainan as a special economic zone. The current guideline specifies that the Hainan free-trade port system will be “basically established” by 2025, and it will become “more mature” in 2035 (Lu, 2018b). Note that the timing of 2035 corresponds exactly to the first phase of the basic realization of socialist modernization in the larger national plan.
Xi Jinping’s announcement and the initial details of the plan for the Hainan free-trade zone and port system are crucial in many respects. It is very likely that Hainan will become one of China’s strategic points of contact in the BRI scheme. Moreover, the control of China’s maritime path along the South China Sea will be indispensable. As for Mainland ASEAN countries, the Hainan mega-project may signify that China’s routes of connection between its southern areas and the end of the peninsular at Singapore may vary and contain more options. This can relegate the existing plans via land-based connectivity in Mainland ASEAN such as the high-speed railway links, particularly the one that passes through Thailand, to supplementary pathways. At best, Mainland ASEAN connectivity projects will function as strategic parts of China’s endeavors to avoid the middle-income trap by providing increasing opportunities to generate the supply-side structural reform for regional development in marginal south and southwest provinces. Of course, Mainland ASEAN will always embody major sources of resources, investment opportunities, products for export and import, and venues for the enhancement of Chinese tourist enterprises as well as providing alternatives for migration, work, and residence, either during short-term or long-term periods. Yet, as time passes by, the prospect of Mainland ASEAN being an essential pathway for China’s
