China and Regionalism in the Middle East
CHINA AND THE EU IN THE ERA OF REGIONAL AND INTERREGIONAL COOPERATION (PETER LANG)
What is China’s relationship to regionalism and regional entities in the Middle East? What does the form of its engagement with such bodies tell us about the nature of Middle East regionalism and its prospects? Such questions are relevant given China’s preferences for bilateral ties with states in the region on one side and wish to improve trade and commercial interests through collaboration on the other. The most notable aspect of the latter was Beijing’s development of a China Arab States Cooperation Forum and advocacy of a free trade bloc with the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), with which it had stop-start negotiations until 2017.
And yet, despite the Forum and efforts to establish a free trade agreement (FTA) with the GCC, the experience of regionalism and China’s contribution towards it has been sparse to date. The chapter explains this by first considering the emphasis on regionalism over regionalisation in the Middle East – but one that has been constrained by a number of factors. The scope for external actors like China to engage at a regional level are limited, as demonstrated by its relations with key regional entities, including the Arab League, the China Arab States Cooperation Forum, the GCC, the Maghreb Arab Union and other extra-regional bodies which have significant representation from the Middle East, such as the oil-producing cartel, the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC). China’s interactions with these organisations varies, from nonexistent to information...
