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In addition to rubber-stamping Xi Jinping’s third term as Chinese Communist Party general secretary, the 20th Congress of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), which concluded last week, offered signs of a bumpy road ahead for China. The country is confronting both economic troubles and an increasingly unfavorable geopolitical environment. Xi’s work report, delivered during the party congress, gives insights into how China will respond to these challenges in its domestic and foreign policy, and the implications for Latin America could be significant.
The highly choreographed proceedings alluded to China’s economic headwinds, which will limit economic growth rate to about 3 percent this year. The slowdown will leave Beijing with fewer resources to commit to its once-expansive foreign policy agenda, including in Latin America. The writing has been on the wall for several years, as China’s economic engagement with the region has tapered, especially greenfield investment and sovereign lending, once-prominent features of the China-Latin America relationship.
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