Questions about the planning and implementation of the China–Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) continue to reverberate around discussions of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). Such questions are of great importance for those attempting to understand the BRI, because the CPEC has often been hailed as the New Silk Road's “flagship project.” Since many CPEC projects in Pakistan – such as Gwadar port – have progressed slower than expected, analysts are trying to work out why.
Mukhtar et al.'s book represents an attempt to contribute to these debates from a different angle than the macro-level political and economic analyses usually presented by scholars of international relations and international political economy. Instead, this volume approaches the topic from the perspective of cross-cultural relations between Chinese and Pakistani employees of CPEC projects in Pakistan. Using a mix of qualitative and quantitative approaches, the five authors of this study have tried to assess the impacts of social networking and communication issues on the progress of the CPEC. Semi-structured interviews of workers in three sectors – telecoms, energy and public sector development projects – constitute the qualitative part of the study. Surveys make up the quantitative aspect.
The book is divided into five chapters, including the introduction and conclusion. Chapters two to four constitute the meat of the study. Chapter two outlines the role of the CPEC in the BRI and in China–Pakistan relations, as well as contextualizing the contribution of the research to knowledge of the CPEC. It presents a solid background but is quite brief concerning the implementation of projects in Pakistan, focusing more on the cross-cultural aspects of cooperation. Chapter three presents the qualitative results of the semi-structured interviews. Chapter four presents the quantitative results of the surveys. Thus, the core of the book's research findings resides in these middle three chapters.
The potential value of the book lies in the connections between the research into cross-cultural issues between Chinese and Pakistani workers and their impact on the progress of CPEC projects. However, it is precisely on this point – the interconnections between cross-cultural issues and project implementation in Pakistan – that the authors do not manage to probe deeply enough. While the analysis of cross-cultural issues goes into a great deal of depth on the problems which arise when workers from two different cultures interact, there is frustratingly little analysis of how these affect the implementation of specific projects. There is no dedicated chapter analysing the effects of cross-cultural issues presented in chapters three and four on the progress of individual CPEC projects. This omission makes the book something of a conundrum for those looking to acquire a better understanding of CPEC and the BRI.
Nevertheless, the book does present some stimulating analysis of the problems arising when workers from two countries cooperate on the territory of one of them. Chapter three is the book's highlight in this regard. The interviews reveal a range of important differences between Chinese and Pakistani employees’ attitudes to their work and to each other. Predictably, the Pakistani workers tend to view their Chinese bosses as workaholic and demanding, while the Chinese see their Pakistani colleagues as lacking discipline. However, beneath this commonplace conclusion there are useful insights into the similarities and differences between the Chinese concept of guanxi and the Pakistani concept of hawalas, both of which are concerned with personal relationships and social networks. For instance, the Chinese sent to work in Pakistan tend to build relations with a “task-oriented vision” (p. 68), while Pakistanis prioritize their families. The conclusion of the chapter is that in contexts where employees had received cross-cultural training and had previous international experience – as well as managerial support – things ran more smoothly. There are lessons to be learnt here for any international project involving cooperation between workers from two countries with different cultural traditions and languages.
The quantitative study of survey data in chapter four is – surprisingly – less useful. This is primarily because the data are not presented clearly. The multitude of figures, tables and explanations are not presented concisely. Some extend over several pages, so could have been moved to the appendices. The chapter is long at 40 pages, yet the summary of findings is vague: employee behaviour is “influenced by many factors” and there may be “different employee responses” (p. 110). Tantalizingly, the authors claim on the same page that “the networking behaviour and employee adjustment in both sample groups aided in achieving the CPEC project outcomes”; yet there is no support for this bold assertion in the evidence presented in the chapter. Indeed, since it is now well known that CPEC implementation has been slower than expected, such a conclusion is likely to be erroneous.
Overall, the book does contain some interesting material on cross-cultural cooperation between Chinese and Pakistani workers, primarily in chapter three. It should therefore be useful to those looking for information on this topic. However, for readers searching for answers as to why CPEC project implementation in Pakistan has been so slow, the book will not be of much assistance. The authors simply do not tie together the fascinating scraps of information they have gathered about interactions between Chinese and Pakistanis with the details of the progress of specific CPEC projects in Pakistan. For this reason, the book, like CPEC itself, has produced limited results and represents something of a squandered opportunity to shed light on the dark recesses of Sino-Pakistani cooperation.
