Fragmented Governance in the Belt and Road Initiative: Aligning Policy With <scp>SDGs</scp> 8 and 9

ABSTRACT This study investigates how fragmented governance shapes the Belt and Road Initiative's (BRI) contributions to Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 8 and 9. Although the BRI's stated objectives align with the SDG agenda, empirical evidence from EU countries reveals that institutional fragmentation and policy misalignment can significantly hinder sustainable development outcomes. Employing a mixed‐methods approach, the study applies Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) to a corpus of 321 BRI‐related policy documents to extract thematic patterns and assess their semantic alignment with SDG 8 and 9 keyword frameworks. It then analyzes governance fragmentation at the domestic level, EU‐member states level, and China‐EU level, complemented by case studies of Italy, Poland, Croatia, and Slovenia to explore how different levels of fragmentation impede BRI project implementation and weaken SDG progress. The findings reveal three key insights: (1) BRI‐related discourse demonstrates moderate alignment with SDGs 8 and 9 in terms of policy narratives; (2) governance fragmentation in EU countries is multi‐dimensional and structurally embedded; and (3) fragmentation undermines BRI project continuity and its developmental impact. This research proposes a three‐pronged policy framework comprising politically neutral commitment mechanisms, EU‐compatible regulatory alignment guidelines, and adaptive pathways for SDG compliance—designed to strengthen institutional coherence and enhance the sustainability of cross‐border BRI cooperation.