A truly refreshing study on the labor politics in China's BRI project in Laos. Challenging the conventional focus on the debtor-creditor relations, Chen looks at the how the debt financing actually works on the operational level. Contrary to a debt trap, https://doi.org/10.1080/00130095.2020.1810011

...the Chinese government was soft on the equity requirement from the Lao government in the loan dispensation, but hard on the SOE EPC contractors to put up own capital in order to move the project forward. The EPC contractors, in turn, pressured the private labor contractors...

...for their paid-in capital. Not surprisingly, the most vulnerable group were the labor, who might worked for months without even being sure they would get paid. But unlike common assumption, Lao labor were not powerless; in fact, they had a level of leverage vis-a-vis their...

...Chinese bosses, who had limited recourse in a foreign country while being squeezed by the SOE EPC contractors. Chinese labor, being isolated and far from home, had little negotiation power. Even if they attempted collective action, it was quickly silenced by the Chinese...

... authorities. Chen's close-up field observations reveal previously overlooked dynamics and force us to rethink the complicated power relations involved in Chinese overseas projects. The assumed beneficiaries may not be. The "neo-colonialism" logic is turned upside down.