The Geopolitics of Public Health and China’s Digital Silk Road in Asia

Abstract

During this era of COVID-19, cooperation along the digital Belt and Road has been explored less than Beijing’s mask and vaccine diplomacy. China’s international engagement has certainly been reoriented to pandemic control and global health governance, particularly through digital technologies. To account for these developments, this article argues that digital health is emerging as a new venue for the rise of digital power. I focus specifically on the example of China’s Digital Silk Road (DSR), in particular medical artificial intelligence, in the wake of the pandemic. Drawing upon the DSR literature and the concept of health surveillance, this article investigates the role of digital health in expediting Silk Road cooperation, and it further speculates that digital health has become part of China’s political effort to reconcile the much-scrutinized security issues and the global demand for digital connectivity. Hence, it is indicative of China’s expanding digital power in the post-pandemic world.