| With the development and advancement of the "Belt and Road" concept,international investment between China and countries along the route has entered into a new stage of rapid growth.Under such background,this paper uses Social Network Analysis(SNA)methods to construct and analyze the international investment network between China and "Belt and Road" countries and its main characteristics.This paper also empirically tests the determinants behind the network both from the perspectives of individual countries and overall network,with a view to better grasp the future development trends and directions of international investment network between China and the countries along the routeFirst of all,this article builds directed-weighted investment network topology maps from 2009 to 2018 based on the amount of foreign direct investment,and then describes the typical facts of the international investment network along the "Belt and Road".The results show that China,Russia,Thailand,Singapore and other major countries maintain a core position in the network;the number of core countries is increasing,and the core levels of India,Indonesia,Lithuania,Poland,Estonia,Serbia,and Greece have all increased.In addition,the influence and scope of international investment networks are also constantly expanding,with the importance of investment relations between neighboring countries increasing significantlySecondly,through the indicators and methods of network scale and density,network centrality,core-edge analysis,and cohesive subgroup analysis,this paper conducts a comprehensive quantitative analysis of the characteristics of the international investment network between China and "Belt and Road" countries.The results found that in terms of centrality,the scale of the international investment network along the "Belt and Road" has continued to expand,and China has an absolute advantage in the overall network,but its influence has been diluted to a certain extent by the expansion of investment networks.In terms of substructures,the number and type of core and peripheral countries in the overall network are relatively stable.The"Belt and Road" initiative has significantly promoted the increase in the coreness of the formerly marginalized countries with predominant geographical locations.In terms of cohesive subgroups,geographic accessibility has become the dominant characteristics,highlighting the importance of focusing on infrastructure interconnection and geographic strategic layout in foreign direct investment along the "Belt and Road".Thirdly,this paper conducts an empirical test on the determinants of the characteristics of investment networks along the "Belt and Road".On the one hand,starting from the level of individual country within the network,the panel regression results of each country as the research object show that the level of economic development and the development of the banking industry have a significant positive impact on a country’s position in the network,while government intervention has a significant negative impact.On the other hand,this article takes the overall network as the research object and adopts the QAP regression analysis method.The regression results show that the differences in economic strength and influence are significantly positively correlated with intra-regional investment relations and the amount of investment between countries.The effect of net domestic credit differences and total tax rate differences are relatively weak.Furthermore,the differences in bank non-performing loan ratios and the total number of domestic listed companies are negatively related to intra-regional investment relationships and inter-country investment volumesFinally,on the basis of summarizing the full-text research conclusions,this article puts forward corresponding policy recommendations from the perspectives of regional,directional,and reciprocal investment considerations,with a view to assisting China to conduct more efficient international investment. |
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