The European Union increasingly sees itself in direct competition with China for global influence. The EU’s launch of the Global Gateway initiative in 2021 is widely viewed as a response to China’s flagship global development programme, the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).
However, as Western aid recedes with the United States winding down USAID and Europe shifting funds from development to defence, China is rapidly filling the donor vacuum with evolving, alternative development models. Moving away from large, state-led lending, Beijing is now focusing more on commercially oriented infrastructure financing and blended-finance models, outpacing the early rollout of the Global Gateway.
This Deep Dive examines China’s growing influence in development financing, political-party engagement, media development, and digital technology cooperation. It invites European policymakers and the democracy-support community to reflect on what this means for Europe’s role as a democracy-supporting development partner. How can Europe best balance its competition with China?
Authors
This publication was produced in collaboration with Political Parties of Finland for Democracy – Demo Finland. It is financially supported by the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland (MFA). Its contents do not necessarily represent the views of the MFA.
