The Second Cold War Observatory – Details, episodes & analysis

This episode features scholars who research East European countries situated on geopolitical border zones and characterized by long-term external economic dependence. Current geopolitical tensions and geoeconomic restructuring are rapidly transforming the maneuver space of local regimes. What do these positions tell us about third-country maneuvering and its limits in the current global context? How are these positions transformed in the context of global industrial restructuring? And what theoretical considerations do they highlight as necessary to grasp the potential impacts of geoeconomic transformation? 

To answer these questions, we are joined by several guests:

1. David Karas proposes a regulationist framework to compare ongoing reconfigurations in the internal and international dimensions of American and European capitalism.
2. Agnes Gagyi, Tamás Gerőcs, and Linda Szabó show how the current Hungarian regime’s geopolitical balancing supports a historic wave of reindustrialization at the intersection of German and East Asian EV and battery production chains.  
3. Nina Djukanović focuses on Serbia's resistance to lithium mining and the Western Balkans' semi-peripheral position in relation to the EU. Analyzing this in the context of the EU’s twin green and digital transitions, she offers a critique of green extractivism and growth-based solutions to climate change. 
4. Lela Rekhviashvili and Evelina Gambino examine the extractive character of infrastructure-led development and discuss how previous failures prefigure the revival of infrastructure projects, focusing on two large infrastructure projects in Georgia: the Deep Sea Port of Anaklia and Namakhvani Hydropower Plant (HPP) projects.

You can read the corresponding essays on Dispatches of the Second Cold War Observatory.

In this episode, we look to history to consider areas of potential areas for US-China environmental politics and cooperation today.  Dr. Vladimir Jankovic discussed US-Soviet scientific cooperation in the 1980s, early climate cooperation, and the 1989 Sundance Symposium on Global Climate Change dubbed ''greenhouse glasnost'' by its sponsors. What are the legacies of this conference and partnership, and how did they move the needle on our understanding of climate change? What happened after the collapse of the USSR? What were the lasting impacts on the scientific field, and what might be the implications for climate and environmental (geo)politics today?

Dr. Vladimir Jankovic is a historian of atmospheric sciences who writes on the cultural history of meteorology, medical environmentalism, and contemporary urban climatology in relation to urban design. His research focuses on scientific, cultural, and social engagement with weather and climate since the 1700s. He is currently president of the International Commission for the History of Meteorology and a Reader in History of Science and Atmospheric Humanities at the Centre for the History of Science, Technology and Medicine (CHSTM), University of Manchester. 

In 2005, he was featured on Storms of War, the Discovery Channel’s five-episode documentary on warfare and the weather. He is the author of Reading the Skies (Chicago, 2000), Confronting the Climate (New York, 2010), Intimate Universality (with Fleming and Cohen, 2005), Weather Local Knowledge and Everyday Life (with Barbosa, 2009), and Klima (with Fleming, Chicago, 2011).

Links and resources from the episode:

• US and China agree to boost green energy in climate action ‘gesture’ in The Financial Times
• The Aspen Institute
• Greenhouse Glasnost: The Crisis of Global Warming by Terrel Minger (1990)
• Ross, Andrew. 1991. Is global culture warming up? Social Text.
• 1989 New York Times article: "Summit of Sorts on Global Warming" 
  The book
• Reading the Skies A Cultural History of English Weather, 1650-1820 by Vladimir Jankovic (2001) 

In this episode, we sit down with Dr. Tim Zajontz to discuss growing geopolitical and geoeconomic competition across infrastructure, economic corridors, and resource extraction in Africa, specifically Uganda, Tanzania, and Zambia. 

Dr. Zajontz is a Lecturer in Global Political Economy at the Dresden University of Technology, Germany. He is also a Research Fellow at the Centre for International and Comparative Politics at Stellenbosch University, South Africa. His research focuses on Africa’s international relations and political economy, particularly Africa-China and Africa-EU relations. Before joining academia, Tim worked in several advisory positions in German and EU politics. He is also the co-founder of a German not-for-profit that collaborates with partners in the social and health sectors in Uganda. Tim currently researches geopolitical developments on the African continent and the political economy of competing connectivity initiatives in Africa and has co-edited a book on Africa’s Railway Renaissance, which was recently published. 

Recommended Resources:

• Zajontz, T. 2023. The Political Economy of China’s Infrastructure Development in Africa Capital, State Agency, Debt.
• Zajontz, T, Pádraig Carmody, Mandira Bagwandeen, Anthony Leysens (editors). 2024. Africa’s Railway Renaissance: The Role and Impact of China.
• Zajontz, T. 2022. ‘Win-win’ contested: negotiating the privatisation of Africa's Freedom Railway with the ‘Chinese of today’. The Journal of Modern African Studies. 
• Zajontz, T. 2022.  Debt, distress, dispossession: towards a critical political economy of Africa’s financial dependency. Review of African Political Economy.
• Zajontz, T. 2022. Seamless imaginaries, territorialized realities: the regional politics of corridor governance in Southern Africa. Territory, Politics, Governance.

In this episode, we talk with Dr. Ksenija Hanaček about her research on the Polar Silk Road and extractivism and environmental conflicts in the Arctic region. Dr. Hanaček is a political ecologist and a Margarita Salas postdoctoral fellow at Global Development Studies, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Helsinki and at Institute for Science, Technology and Environment Global (ICTA), at the Autonomous University of Barcelona, where she is working on the Atlas of Environmental Justice. Her research focuses on environmental conflicts due to extractivist and mega infrastructure projects in the Arctic region. Current research includes commodity frontiers, climate coloniality and green extractivism, the Belt and Road Initiative’s expansion to the Arctic (“Polar Silk Road”), nuclear supply chain and environmental justice struggles in post-Soviet spaces, and coal extraction conflicts in southwestern Siberia.  

RELATED LINKS

• Global Atlas of Environmental Justice: http://envjustice.org/ [envjustice.org]
• Article: On thin ice–The Arctic commodity extraction frontier and environmental conflicts
• Article: Nuclear supply chain and environmental justice struggles in Soviet and Post-Soviet countries 

This episode centers on competition in two technology sectors in Argentina: nuclear energy and smart cities. While they may seem like disparate sectors, Dr. Maximiliano Vila Seoane shows how both illustrate the interest of Argentine state actors in cooperating with Chinese counterparts in science & technology, specifically in areas that used to be dominated by US or Western partners. He offers a nuanced and localized understanding of how competition in these sectors is unfolding in various provinces and cities in Argentina. 

Dr. Maximiliano Vila Seoane is a  researcher at the National Scientific and Technical Research Council in Argentina. He is a professor at the School of Politics & Government of the National University of San Martín. His interests span cybersecurity, international politics, and development. Currently, he is interested in how the intensifying rivalry between the US and China is transforming digital capitalism, particularly in Latin America.

RELATED LINKS

• Book talk on The Rise of the Infrastructure State.
• Media coverage on Chinese surveillance tech in Latin America:
• 'Safe like China': In Argentina, ZTE finds eager buyer for surveillance tech: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-argentina-china-zte-insight-idUSKCN1U00ZG
• Made in China, Exported to the World: The Surveillance State: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/24/technology/ecuador-surveillance-cameras-police-government.html
• In a Secret Bunker in the Andes, a Wall That Was Really a Window: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/26/reader-center/ecuador-china-surveillance-spying.html

In this episode, we talk with Dr. Andrea Polio about his research on Chinese technology companies in Nairobi, Kenya, and how African cities have emerged as proxy arenas where different modes of international relations are given effect through the development of infrastructure. He discusses how African cities are crucial actors and sites of the geopolitics of digital infrastructure, which will increasingly be one of the key geopolitical arenas of the 21st century as the US, China, and the EU compete for global influence with new programs of development finance. In a related  paper, Dr. Pollio argues that urban areas are already beholden to  competition between different state actors and units of capital for infrastructure networks in the global south. In this context, Africa's fast-growing metropolises have emerged as testbeds of shifts in the geopolitics of information towards multipolar magnets of power.

Dr. Andrea Pollio is a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellow jointly at the Department of Urban and Regional Studies of the Polytechnic of Turin and at the African Centre for Cities of the University of Cape Town, where his research addresses the impact of private Chinese technology companies in Nairobi's Silicon Savannah. His broader work explores the interface between technology economies, development, and urbanization in Africa.  He has also studied the impact of private Chinese capital on two East-African cities (Addis Ababa and Nairobi) that have emerged as key destinations for the urbanization of Chinese investments in the continent.

Twitter: @andretwp

Related Links:

Cities as Geopolitical Testbeds of Digital Infrastructure by Andrea Polio 

Acceleration, development and technocapitalism at the Silicon Cape of Africa, by Andrea Pollio in Economy and Space

Urban statecraft: The governance of transport infrastructures in African cities, by Liza Rose Cirolia and Jesse Harber in Urban Studies

IMF Sub-Caharan African Regional Outlook

The geopolitics of debt in Africa in the Review of African Political Economy 

In this episode, Seth and Jess are joined by fellow Second Cold War Observatory research associate and professor Nick Jepson. The conversation explores debt in the context of China-US rivalry while considering the nature of the current crisis/impasse and how we arrive here. It then turns to cases in Sri Lanka and Laos to explain the drivers of national debt and join many others who have debunked 'debt trap diplomacy. Nick concludes with thoughts on the border  global financial system, where it might be heading, and how this looks in a world-historical context.

Dr. Nick Jepson is the Leverhulme Early Career Fellow at the Global Development Institute and School of Environment, Education and Development at the University of Manchester. He studies the political-economic implications of the rise of China and is the author of In China's Wake (Columbia UP). His current project focuses on China's growing role as a financier of development projects across the world via the BRI.

Related Links:

Nick Jepson's book: In China's Wake How the Commodity Boom Transformed Development Strategies in the Global South

Daniela Gabor. 2021. The Wall Street Consensus. Development and Change, 52(3).

Jepson, Nick. 2021. Hidden in Plain Sight: Chinese Development Finance in Central and Eastern Europe. Development and Change, 52(5).

A conversation with Marcelo Saguier (Director of the Area of International Studies, National University of San Martín) on the relationship between domestic politics and geopolitics surrounding resource extraction in Argentina. Argentina is a leading producer in the minerals and petroleum sectors. With the global energy transition, countries have ramped up investment in renewable energy sources, particularly the critical minerals used in Lithium batteries. In this episode, Saguier explores the mining–development nexus in Argentina. As both Chinese and American firms increase engagement in resource extraction, Saguier suggests that Argentina will not be forced to choose between the two but rather actively avoid it.

Dr. Marcelo Saguier works at the School of Politics and Government, National University of San Martin (UNSAM). He is a researcher at Argentina's National Scientific and Technical Research Council. His research focuses on the international political economy of the environment.

Related Links:

Batteries Are the Battlefield: The next geopolitical contest may be over green technology, and China, for now, is poised to win control of those supply chains. in Foreign Policy 

Canadian Mining Investments in Argentina and the Construction of a Mining–Development Nexus, in Latin American Policy by Saguier and Peinado.

Dams, Chinese investments, and EIAs: A race to the bottom in South America? in Ambio by Gerlak,  Saguier, Mills-Novoa, Fearnside & Albrecht.

The IMF’s top 10 biggest debtors 

In this episode with Dr. Steve Rolf, we explore the deepening connections between states and platforms in the two heartlands of the digital economy, China and the US.

In a recent paper, Steve Rolf and Seth Schindler develop the notion of State Platform Capitalism (SPC) as an emergent logic of competition for both states and firms, in which platforms are increasingly mobilized by the US and Chinese states as geopolitical-economic agents. Far from simply undermining state authority in a zero-sum power struggle, they look at the ways in which Beijing and Washington instrumentalize domestic platform firms in pursuit of geopolitical–economic objectives, while platforms become increasingly interdependent with their home state institutions. Competition in the global political economy is increasingly centered on the recruitment of users and nations to these rival state-platform nexuses (national ‘stacks’) as a means of establishing and exercising extraterritorial economic and political power.  Our conversation explores variations between American and Chinese modes of SPC. Dr. Rolf explains two main domestic varieties of SPC -- in China, state venture capital and tough regulation are driving platforms toward compliance with state goals. In the US, the 'hidden developmental state' based on the military-industrial complex uses contracts as carrots to enlist platforms for geopolitical-economic ends. We also discuss the paper's examination of three spheres of SPC competition in the global political economy: digital currencies,  technical standards, and cybersecurity.

Dr. Steven Rolf is an ESRC Research Fellow at the Digital Futures at Work Research Centre at the University of Sussex. He is a political economist and examines the digitalisation of economies, transformations of work, the rise of platforms, and the territorial and political implications of these changes.  He recently concluded an interdisciplinary project entitled ‘China and the transformation of global capitalism.’ 

Related Links:

The US–China rivalry and the emergence of state platform capitalism in Environment and Planning A: Economy and Space.

Big Tech Sells War: https://bigtechsellswar.com/

America's Frontier Fund: https://americasfrontier.org/

State of Innovation The U.S. Government's Role in Technology Development, by Fred L. Block, Matthew R. Keller