Learning from the competition – Chinese and Japanese infrastructure export strategies in Asia with the evidence from railway projects in Indonesia

After China launched the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) in 2013, Japan followed by launching its Partnership for Quality Infrastructure (PQI) in 2015. Scholarly comparison focuses on competition and norm diffusion perspectives, but the question remains open in terms of what drives the design of infrastructure policies. We develop a theoretical framework consisting of geopolitical competition and selective policy learning as the dual drivers for infrastructure policy design. While geopolitical competition results in specialisation and the occupying of strategic niches, policy learning results in convergence, through direct and indirect interactions. We analyse them from the dimensions of (1) definition, (2) character of state support and (3) degree of multilateralisation of the two initiatives. In addition to reviewing policy design, we provide empirical evidence from railway projects in Indonesia to illustrate how China as a late comer occupy a niche in infrastructure development to compete with Japan that had a long infrastructural presence. Despite being often framed as competitors, both China and Japan demonstrated policy learning after the Jakarta-Bandung high-speed railway (HSR) bidding competition. China adopted policy learning in the implementation stage of Jakarta-Bandung HSR and Japan adopted policy learning in the second phase of Jakarta mass rapid transit (MRT) project.