The phrase ‘one belt, one road’ has become a staple of discussions about China’s foreign policy and approach to the global economy. This is not least because the concept looks something like a signature foreign policy initiative of Chinese president Xi Jinping.
But the challenge has been unpicking exactly what the ‘one belt, one road’ slogan means. In English the name is clunky and somewhat misleading, a literal translation from a typically concise Chinese phrase yi dai yi lu, which in turn condenses two related ideas.
