Building a ‘community of common destiny’? Contested geopolitical imaginations of China’s Belt and Road Initiative in Central Asia

In recent years Central Asia has slipped from the focus of Belt and Road Initiative’s policymakers and commentators. This paper seeks to return attention to Central Asia and ask what geographical proximity to China means for how this initiative is received on the ground in Central Asia, and for broader understandings of the geopolitical imaginations underpinning the BRI. By turning attention to the often-overlooked concept of ‘community of common destiny’, this paper thereby seeks to contribute to more granular and grounded understandings of a rising China and the impacts that China’s ‘coming out’ is having on its neighbouring states.