China’s Belt and Road Security: The Increasing Role of Insurance and Private Security Companies

The unprecedented amount of Chinese funds dedicated to the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and Beijing’s win-win vision of global connectivity and development is going to face a harsh reality that encompasses a wide threat spectrum. Chinese corporations just started to acknowledge that the risks associated with outbound foreign direct investments carries a higher failure rate due to intertwined factors such as: economic crises, conflict, civil unrest, assets nationalization and currency devaluation, just to name a few. In several cases, the Chinese State-Owned Enterprises’ (SOEs) infrastructural projects, macro size and breakneck implementation speed catalyze crisis in the already unstable socio-political environments. The solution to political and criminal violence’s spillovers along the BRI requests a broader involvement that also encompasses the Chinese insurance and private security sectors.