Asia Trends #11 – Special Edition – Young Europeans Rethink Geopolitics | Le Prix Asia Centre

Asia Trends #11 - Special Edition - Young Europeans Rethink Geopolitics | Le Prix Asia Centre We are proud to present this special issue of Asia Trends #11, showcasing the best contributions from our very first edition of the Essays Challenge, a European-wide competition launched in Spring 2025 as part of our new Asia Sparks program. Asia Sparks was created to identify and support a new generation of researchers passionate about Asia and its global significance. It connects young scholars, our “Sparkers”, with experienced mentors from Asia Centre and provides a framework for developing original strategic thinking. The essay challenge represents a core element of this initiative, offering early-career researchers an opportunity to share their perspectives on key Asian geopolitical issues. The 2025 edition focused on China’s foreign policy and its global interactions, a complex topic that invited critical analysis, comparative thinking, and innovative viewpoints. While the competition was formally open to citizens of European Union member states under the age of 30, we were pleased to receive contributions that extended beyond EU borders, reflecting the growing appeal of Asia-focused research among young scholars internationally. In total, we received 51 registrations and 27 full submissions. Participants represented a wide array of academic institutions and nationalities, including: Austria, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Poland and Spain. In addition, we received strong contributions from outside the European Union, including Australia, Canada and Switzerland, further confirming the global resonance of the challenge’s theme. Each submission was evaluated through a two-stage anonymous review process, based on six criteria: relevance to the theme, originality, structure and clarity of argument, research quality, writing style, and strategic contribution. The internal screening by Asia Centre experts led to a shortlist, which was reviewed by a final jury. The ten selected essays featured in this issue reflect the intellectual ambition and thematic diversity of a new generation of European researchers. Their work explores the shifting contours of China’s global engagement across legal, strategic, economic, and ideological domains. From the foreign policy function of Chinese private security companies to China’s evolving interpretation of the law of the sea, these essays reveal how China’s power projection blends hard, soft, and legal instruments. Several contributions offer fresh perspectives on China’s economic statecraft, examining financial liberalisation as a vector of influence and unpacking the logics of investment diplomacy in Latin America. Others papers delve into bilateral dynamics within Europe, focusing on Hungary’s semi-alignment and Italy’s ambivalent trajectory within the Belt and Road Initiative. China’s growing role in Middle Eastern security, at the intersection of diplomacy and militarisation, is also critically assessed. Two essays take a step back to explore underlying trends: one traces the ideological and pragmatic continuities between Deng Xiaoping and Xi Jinping, while another unpacks how China mobilises digital aesthetics and online control tools to shape both domestic governance and its international image. Together, these Sparks papers help us to read between the lines of official discourse and detect what often escapes traditional analysis: the weak signals, implicit strategies, and shifting norms that shape China’s behaviour on the global stage. The essays confirm what seasoned analysts at Asia Center increasingly observe: China no longer plays by the same rulebook. Its diplomacy blends official channels with informal leverage, economic interdependence with coercion, and international law with selective reinterpretation. The line between domestic control and foreign projection has blurred with cultural diplomacy, investment practices, and public security now used as instruments of st...