Author: Philipp Brugner

Interview on science cooperation with China in Austrian newspaper Die Presse: “Europa muss rote Linien definieren”

Gábor Szüdi and Philipp Brugner from our partner ZSI gave an interview to Austrian daily newspaper Die Presse about their report on science, technology and innovation cooperation between the EU and China in the field of digital technologies.

Together they spoke about practical examples where project-based cooperation between European and Chinese partners was reassessed after it was started due to risks of knowledge security or dual use. At the same time they re-emphasised the important status of China as a global partner to tackle the societal challenges of our time given the country’s strong scientific performance and its commitment to large-scale research and innovation investments contributing to tackling climate change, enhancing food security or further exploring the use of outer space by humans. Concludingly, they echoed ReConnect China’s general approach by underlining that trust-building between the two sides and at any level (national, institutional, individual) is crucial to shape reciprocally beneficial EU-China STI relations for the future.

You can find the interview on Die Presse online (with paywall).

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Photo by Fernando @cferdophotography on unsplash.com

ReConnect China marks one-year milestone and hosts public roundtable in Vienna

ReConnect China, a Horizon Europe funded project aiming to generate independent knowledge for a resilient future with China for Europe and its citizens, marked its one-year milestone hosting a momentous second consortium meeting and a public round table in Vienna from November 16-17.

Building on the momentum generated since its kick-off meeting in Ghent in November 2022, representatives from ReConnect China’s 15 partner institutions from across Europe converged in Vienna for two days. The consortium meeting provided a platform for reflection on the project’s achievements in its inaugural year and facilitated strategic planning for the future. Work package leaders together with consortium partners delved into the progress made since the project’s inception, highlighting key accomplishments and addressing the challenges that have been met. The collaborative spirit was palpable as partners engaged in discussions to set a cohesive path forward, aligning their efforts to enhance the project’s impact in the coming year.

The ReConnect China public roundtable on November 17

The public round table (organised in a hybrid format), a focal point of the Vienna meetings, gave stage to ReConnect China’s research conducted and the results generated over the first year. The experts leading these activities within the project delivered presentations covering the four research priorities of ReConnect China. Prof. Bart Dessein, in his capacity as project coordinator, opened the discussion with some introductory words. Having been stimulated by the inputs of experts, several questions were addressed to the speakers by the – predominantly – Austrian audience (invitations for this roundtable focussed on Austrian stakeholders; participants came from institutions like Austrian Council for Research, Science, Innovation and Technology Development, Austrian Economic Chamber, Vienna Institute for Intl. Economic Studies, Austrian Institute for Intl. Affairs, University of Vienna, Austrian Research Promotion Agency, and the Federal Chancellery of Austria).

Below the presentation titles of the roundtable:

  • “What does ReConnect China do?” Presented by Prof. Bart Dessein, Scientific Coordinator of ReConnect China, Ghent University. Prof. Dessein provided an engaging introduction to the project, unveiling its core objectives and presenting significant research outcomes from the first year.
  • “Europe’s Research Cooperation with China – Risks and Opportunities” Presented by Philipp Brugner, Researcher, Senior Project Manager, ZSI. Philipp Brugner explored the risks and opportunities associated with Europe’s research collaboration with China.
  • “The Economy of China: The Rise of the Electric Car Industry” Presented by Miguel Otero, Senior Analyst, Elcano Institute, ES. Miguel Otero delved into the economic landscape of China, specifically focusing on the burgeoning electric car industry.
  • “China’s Domestic Politics – Building a Database for Better Understanding Domestic Political Developments” Presented by Prof. Christian Göbel, University of Vienna. Prof. Göbel shared insights into the development of a comprehensive database aimed at enhancing the understanding of China’s domestic political landscape.
  • “China’s Foreign Policy Against the Background of the EU Strategy De-Risking” Presented by Astrid Pepermans, Senior Research Fellow, and Victor De Decker, Research Fellow, Egmont Institut, BE. Astrid Pepermans and Victor De Decker elucidated China’s foreign policy within the context of the EU’s De-Risking strategy.
  • ReConnect China Roundtable_final agenda

The public round table served as a platform for knowledge sharing and facilitated a meaningful dialogue on the complexities of EU-China relations.

For more information about ReConnect China and its updates, please also follow us on Twitter, WeChat and Weibo.

Presentation of the EU-China STI analysis for the meeting of the European Network for Academic and Scientific Exchange with China

On November 10, 2023, Philipp Brugner from ZSI, ReConnect China task leader on EU-China science, technology and innovation analysis, took part in the ENASEC – European Network for Academic and Scientific Exchange with China online meeting to present the main outcomes of the recently finished analysis in the context of the ReConnect China project.

About ENASEC: The European Network for Academic and Scientific Exchange with China (ENASEC) is a sub-project of ENTRANCE (Expertise & Transfer Network on China & Europe). It is intended to serve the regular exchange between German and European universities and research institutions on cooperations with China. The experiences, strategies and framework conditions for cooperations with China, which differ from country to country, represent a special enrichment, which can also give impulses for the own practice. Potentially, however, the project will also address much more concrete questions, such as the extent to which heterogeneous China strategies can also influence intra-European cooperation and what possibilities exist to use the common weight as a bargaining chip vis-à-vis Chinese partners. The experience gained in shaping relations with China is potentially transferable to the management of academic and scientific collaborations with countries that come with specific legal, ethical, or political challenges.

ReConnect China Policy Briefs no.2 and 3 draw policy recommendations on EU-China STI cooperation in the big data-related scientific fields

Based on the comprehensive report on EU-China STI cooperation in the big data-related scientific fields (artificial intelligence, big data and machine learning), two more policy briefs were published by the project. We used the report’s key results and aimed at embedding them in the overall policy discourse and legislative framework pertaining to science and technology cooperation between the EU and China. As a corollary, current developments in STI policy-making both on the EU’s and China’s side are explained, with a particular focus on the question how both actors aim to govern the future proliferation and protection of data stemming from research on AI, BD and ML from a legal viewpoint. The policy briefs conclude with a list of policy recommendations addressed both to the EU and the Member States level. While any risks or unfavourable conditions in research cooperation with China that could potentially conflict the EU’s interests and values must definitely be taken into account, we recommend European R&I actors to take case-by-case decisions on concrete research cooperation offers from their Chinese counterparts that are grounded in information provided by specific risk assessment and due diligence services.

Report on EU-China cooperation in science, technology and innovation published

At the beginning of September, ZSI finished its work on the report on EU-China cooperation in STI. The report is part of ReConnect China’s WP1 on science and technology and features a co-publication and co-patent analysis aimed at assessing the volume of cooperation between European and Chinese R&I actors. Due to their high relevance as emerging technologies and being of specific interest both to the EU and China, the study’s focus has been limited to the fields of Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning and Big Data. Regarding the specific list of countries involved in this analysis, we defined “European countries” as the EU’s 27 Member States plus associated countries to Horizon Europe, namely the United Kingdom, Norway and Switzerland (= EU27/AC). In spite of the fact that only the UK has formally associated to Horizon Europe at the time of finalising this report, we decided to include Norway and Switzerland as well, given their strong role in the whole European R&I system. For both the co-publication and the co-patent analysis we worked with the latest data available from Web of Science from the PATSTAT database respectively (in both cases the period from 2011 to 2022).

Our analysis caters to the needs of a growing European demand to understand China’s involvement in science, technology and innovation cooperation with European actors better. At the same time, the empirical findings discussed in this report may be conducive to national and European R&I policy makers alike, given the on-going debate on how to address research cooperation with China in the future in the light of mounting concerns about security risks, the disregard for research integrity and the misuse of civilian research for military purposes (dual use).

ReConnect China_D1.1_Report on the results of research cluster on EU-China research cooperation_co-patent,co-publication analysis

First ReConnect China podcast deals with the “Art of Forging Relations” between Europe and China

Our first podcast deals with “Remonstrating”, or the Art of Forging Relations between the Europe and China. Based on our policy brief on the same topic published in May, its authors Bart Dessein and Jasper Roctus from Ghent University are guests in this first edition of the ReConnect China podcast.

During the conversation with Huanyu Zhao, Bart Dessein and Jasper Roctus shed more light on the origin of the term “Remonstrating” and plausibly demonstrate its practicability to interpret the challenging environment of current EU-China relations.

Sit back, relax, listen, and join us as we delve into this fascinating topic.

More information on the podcast on Soundcloud. The transcripts for the podcast can be found here.

Soon, the ReConnect China podcast series will be available on Spotify too.

Science Diplomacy Collaboration with China – ReConnectChina represented at COST Workshop

In the framework of a science diplomacy workshop organised by the COST Association for new COST (European Cooperation in Science and Technology) Actions on 28 June 2023, ZSI researcher Gábor Szüdi had the chance to present the co-operation risks and potentials with China (as an example of a ‘non-like-minded country’) within collaborative R&I projects, using the tools of science diplomacy.
The presentation highlighted the differences between the EU and Chinese interpretation of STI co-operation and science diplomacy, drawing also on national examples, explaining the inherent tensions that might be successfully mitigated by the ongoing work in ReConnectChina.
The workshop therefore served also as an excellent opportunity to introduce high-level researchers from all around Europe (principal investigators of COST Actions in manifold thematic areas) the thematic foci and strategic priorities of ReConnect China.

Research from ReConnect China at the EU-SPRI 2023 conference

The annual EU-SPRI conference is the leading European event on science, technology and innovation (STI) policy. This year’s conference on the theme “Research with impact” took place from June 14 – 16 at the University of Sussex Business School in the UK. ReConnect China researcher Philipp Brugner (ZSI) together with Robin Schindowski from Bruegel, researcher in our sister project “China Horizons”, took part in the conference with a paper stemming from their joint work in the two EU-funded projects.

The paper deals with a descriptive approach towards China’s state-controlled R&D financing for companies and research institutions in the clean energy sector. It sheds more light on the various channels through which the government participates in their R&D activities, which, despite their complexity and the challenge to map all of them (in particular when it comes to China’s regional levels), may be categorised along the following three prevalent types:

  • National Key R&D programmes
  • Firm-level R&D subsidies
  • Government equity participation (in so called “SOE” – state-owned enterprises)

Given these ways of vertical governmental innovation support to accelerate the development of clean energy technologies as a current top-priority for Chinese leaders, the research paper, towards its final structure, further aims to carve out as well as quantify some of the trade-offs associated with China’s approach to harness vertical innovation support as a means to do industrial policy. As China is world-leader in manufacturing (and increasingly also in design and innovation) of clean energy technologies, this paper may also be situated in the European Union’s current debate about de-risking from China (by decreasing the EU’s import dependency) while decarbonising the European industry to meet the goals stipulated by the Green Deal until 2030 and 2050.

Europe-China Table: Answering China’s Narrative Challenge to Europe

Clingendael organises the first policy roundtable within ReConnect China

On 18 April 2023, the Clingendael Institute is organizing an invitation-only, online Europe-China Table for European policymakers. It will discuss how to respond to the challenges China’s international narrative is posing to the European Union.

China has become a formidable player in the ‘global battle of narratives’, a battle that is of vital importance to geopolitical competition. Whereas China seems to be effective in selling its model and policies to many countries across the globe, in particular in the Global South, the EU is struggling to convince these countries that its liberal model has more to offer than autocratic regimes such as China. How should the EU and its member states respond to China’s narrative, and how can the EU better promote its own world view and policies?

We will answer this question with discussants Karin Mössenlechner, Director Asia & Oceania of the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and Dr. Chiyuki Aoi, Professor of International Security at the University of Tokyo. Ties Dams, Research Fellow at Clingendael – the Netherlands Institute of International Relations, will provide an input paper for the discussion, and the roundtable will be moderated by Dr. Ingrid d’Hooghe, Coordinator of the Clingendael China Centre.

The event will be held under the Chatham House Rule.

First public report on EU-China STI cooperation forthcoming in August 2023

ZSI works on a study to shed light on research and innovation cooperation patterns between EU MS and China

The first public report of ReConnect China will be available in August 2023 and work on it has already started. ZSI leads on developing a report assessing cooperation patterns between R&I actors in China and the EU Member States. The study will be based on two specific dimensions of analyis:

  • Co-patenting analysis (last 10 years) based on EPO PATSTAT Global 2022 single edition (worldwide patent database: PATSTAT contains bibliographical and legal status patent data from leading industrialised and developing countries): The objective is to identify both prevalent, but also emerging cooperation networks between R&I institutions and private companies in China and the EU MS based on jointly filed patents
  • Co-publication analysis (last 10 years) based on Web of Science data for jointly authored scientific works between institutions/individuals from EU and China (classified by Science-Metrix ontology): The objective is to identify both prevalent, but also emerging cooperation networks between R&I institutions (research institutes and universities) in China and the EU MS based on jointly co-authored scientific publications

The analysis will be compared against the current policy background pertaining to EU-China negotiations and frameworks for cooperation in science, technology and innovation. At the end, the report’s findings shall be conducive for answering the following questions:

  1. In which economic sectors (based on co-patenting activities) and scientific fields (based on co-publication activities) does cooperation take place?
  2. What are challenges, drivers, perils, but also opportunities for EU partners when cooperating with China in STI?
  3. Do the cooperation patterns identified correspond to recommendations made in official EU policy documents related to STI (EU Global Approach to R&I/2021, Tackling R&I foreign interference/2022 etc.)?