Digital China now operates formally across two equal environments, domestic and international. Digitalization is now framed as the foundation for a global development model. Great power competition is now defined as a competition over digitalization. And Global Digitalized Development is now a core component of Xi’s modernization vision.
You may have already seen last week’s new “Plan for the Global Layout of Digital China Construction” I didn’t think the national strategy Beijing calls “Digital China,” already more than six years old and personally tied to Xi Jinping, could rise any higher in national importance.
I was wrong. It can. And it just did.
This strategy milestone reflects a major global shift in the top-level design of Xi Jinping’s 20-year vision to reshape the current stage of human development through digitalization. Borrowing the Party’s own strategy lexicon, the Plan formally adds an International Environment to Digital China‘s top-level design. In doing so, it creates a new global strategy for Digitalized Development.
Here is what that means for us.
Xi Jinping just changed the nature of competition in the digital age.
As framed by the Party, Xi didn’t simply update digital policy. He reframed the essence of global competition. More precisely, Xi redefined competition as a struggle over digitalization, that is, the capacity to add value to data, including the governance and control of data itself. In the Party’s telling, this reframes great power competition for the digital age. It is an enormous shift.
And yet it wasn’t reported anywhere. Not on the evening news, not in the papers, not even in expert analysis and commentary. Beijing must be pleased. We appear to have missed it entirely.
Digitalized Development Goes Global
The new Digital China Plan explicitly calls for extending “Digitalized Development” (数字化发展) to the “International Environment” (国际环境). This term, “Digitalized Development,” is not generic. It is a Party term-of-art (提法) that describes the digitalized construction of the Five-Sphere Integrated Plan, namely “the development of socialism with Chinese characteristics encompassing the economic, political, cultural, social and eco-environmental spheres.”
Prior to 2023, this term applied almost exclusively to the “Domestic Environment” (国内环境). Not anymore. The Party now presents a new conceptual framework, “Global Digitalized Development” (全球数字化发展), and explicitly identifies the great power driving it.
When Xi Jinping first mentioned Global Digitalized Development at the 5th World Internet Conference (Wuzhen Summit) in 2018, it seemed like he was simply acknowledging a rising international development concept. It was easy to dismiss.
In hindsight, it was the first step in a five-year theoretical evolution. By the time the new Digital China Plan was released in February 2023, the Party had fully internalized and redefined the term. Global Digitalized Development now expands Xi’s vision of Chinese Style Modernization. It no longer applies only to China. It now describes a digitalized model of socialist development for the international environment as well.
In other words: Chinese Style Modernization is now positioned as a global competitor to Western (capitalist) models of development. Digitalization is the engine. Marxist theory is the guide. And international application is the goal. It is an extraordinary ideological call to action.
The 2522 Global Framework
The plan explains that Digital China construction will now be organized according to the “2522 Global Framework”:
- Two Foundations: Digital Infrastructure and Data Resource System.
- Five Sphere Integrated Plan: Deep fusion of digital technology with economic, political, cultural, social, and ecological spheres.
- Two Capabilities: Digital Technology Innovation System and Digital Security Barrier
- Two Environments: Domestic and International
Even expressed in dense theoretical language, the implications are stunning.
The Plan explains that Digital China construction will be structured based on the “2522 Global Framework,” namely, strengthen the “Two Foundations” of Digital Infrastructure and the Data Resource System; promote the Deep Fusion of digital technology with economic, political, cultural, social, and ecological civilization to construct the “Five Sphere Integrated Plan;” strengthen the “Two Capabilities” of the Digital Technology Innovation System and Digital Security Barrier; [all of these to] optimize digitalized development in the “Two Environments,” [both] domestic and international.
《规划》明确，数字中国建设按照“2522”的整体框架进行布局，即夯实数字基础设施和数据资源体系“两大基础”，推进数字技术与经济、政治、文化、社会、生态文明建设“五位一体”深度融合，强化数字技术创新体系和数字安全屏障“两大能力”，优化数字化发展国内国际“两个环境”。
“Central Committee and State Council Issue ‘Plan for the Global Layout of Digital China Construction’” (中共中央 国务院印发《数字中国建设整体布局规划》, Xinhua, February 27, 2023.
Digital China’s Evolution: From domestic strategy to global project
Since Xi’s vision for Digital China emerged after the 18th Party Congress in 2012, and especially after it became national strategy following the 19th Party Congress in 2017, Digital China has focused on the digitalized transformation of Chinese society in support of socialist modernization. This, in turn, was supposed to demonstrate that a digitalized model of modernization, Chinese Style Modernization, could serve as a viable alternative to Western modernization.
Until recently, this was largely theoretical. But now Xi Jinping has called for practical international efforts across all five digitalized spheres to promote the Chinese model abroad. Even inside China, some commentary reflects confusion about the pace and scope of this shift.
As Study Times put it just two weeks before the Plan:
Handle the relationship between top-level design and practical exploration well. Promoting Chinese Style Modernization involves each sphere, including economic, political, cultural, social, and environmental civilization…
处理好顶层设计与实践探索的关系。推进中国式现代化涉及经济、政治、文化、社会、生态文明等各个领域…
Dong Zhenhua (董振华), “Continuously Expand and Deepen Chinese Style Modernization” (不断拓展和深化中国式现代化) , Study Times, February 10, 2023
Digital China‘s timeline previously aligned with the 2035 and 2049 milestones of National Rejuvenation. Xi has now moved up the timeline, added a new near-term landmark in 2025, and called for immediate action.
If you’re thinking this must be all about Xi’s response to deepening technology competition. I’m with you on that one. But the new Plan does not mean that the “monumental” and “complex” task just got easier. In fact, it got a lot harder. Xi is now asking for a lot more.
General Secretary Xi Jinping has repeatedly stressed that informatization provides a favorable opportunity for our country to seize the high ground in the new round of development and build new advantages in international competition. This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for the Chinese nation.
习近平总书记多次强调，信息化为我国抢占新一轮发展制高点、构筑国际竞争新优势提供了有利契机，为中华民族带来了千载难逢的机遇。
Zhuang Rongwen (庄荣文), “Thoroughly Implement the Spirit of the 20th National Party Congress and Boost Chinese Style Modernization through Digital China Construction” (深入贯彻落实党的二十大精神 以数字中国建设助力中国式现代化), People’s Daily, Page 10, March 3, 2023
Why this matters and why we missed it
We cannot say whether Digital China will succeed. The Party itself calls the task “monumental” and “complex.” Nor do we fully understand how these systems will be structured or operated, and likely neither does China. But a new Plan, a proposed bureaucratic reorganization, and an upcoming international data forum all provide further evidence that the effort is real, comprehensive, and accelerating.
The overall structure of the strategy has not changed. But the emphasis and end states have. Digital China now operates formally across two equal environments, domestic and international. Digitalization is now framed as the foundation for a global development model. Great power competition is now defined as a competition over digitalization. And Global Digitalized Development is now a core component of Xi’s modernization vision.
A shift like this should have been front page news. Instead, it passed unnoticed. It is difficult to know why Digital China seems to have escaped widespread notice in the West. Some experts have argued that Digital China is nothing more than a meme, a diagnosis long aided by PRC English-language media. Perhaps the daily nature of the US-China technology competition makes for better reading, perhaps the nature of the strategy, theoretical and couched in dry Party jargon, makes it hard to digest. Regardless, we failed.
A Nationwide education campaign and our opportunity
The changes introduced by the new Plan are significant enough that the Party has launched a nationwide education campaign to educate cadre and citizens on what just happened. The Cyberspace Administration of China has released explainers, videos, and infographics designed to help domestic audiences understand the new global logic of Digital China. We should do the same.
My plan is for all of us to learn alongside them. Today, we begin with the “2522 Global Framework.” The “2522” is a mnemonic device to help cadre and citizens understand and remember the essential elements of the new Digital China Plan.
The graphic at the top of this blog shows CAC’s official explainer on the right, with my translation on the left. For now, all we are going to do is exactly what CAC told its readers to do: study the four main points.
The issuance and implementation of the “Plan” is aimed at fully leveraging the driving and leading role of Digital China construction; coordinating the comprehensive fusion and application of digital technologies in constructing each of the economic, political, cultural, social, and ecological spheres; better supporting High Quality Development in the economy and society; and providing an inexhaustible driving force to advance Chinese Style Modernization.
《规划》的印发实施，就是要充分发挥数字中国建设的驱动引领作用，统筹推进数字技术在经济、政治、文化、社会、生态文明建设各领域全过程中的融合应用，更好支撑经济社会高质量发展，为推进中国式现代化提供不竭动力。
Zhuang Rongwen (庄荣文), “Thoroughly Implement the Spirit of the 20th National Party Congress and Boost Chinese Style Modernization Through Digital China Construction” (深入贯彻落实党的二十大精神 以数字中国建设助力中国式现代化), People’s Daily, Page 10, March 3, 2023
2522 explained simply
Let’s start from the bottom up: 2-5-2-2.
First, the “Two Foundations.”
- Digital Infrastructure + Data Resource System
- “New Type (Digital) Infrastructure” and a “Data Element Resource System” have long been two of the “means” of Digital China. The original third “means” of Digital China, the “Information and Communications Technology (ICT) Industrial Ecosystem,” was incorporated into a more expansive concept, the “Digital Technology Innovation System,” in the new 2522 framework (see below).
Second, the “Five-Sphere Integrated Plan.”
- Economic + Political + Social + Cultural + Ecological
- Each of the five spheres is undergoing “deep fusion” (another Party term-of-art that we are going to cover in detail later) with digital technology. Once complete, the five spheres are digitally transformed and ready for innovative applications in the “two environments:” domestic and international.
Third, the “Two Capabilities.”
- Digital Security Barrier + Digital Technology Innovation System
- Digital China is now bookended by security and innovation. The concepts are not new. Security and innovation have long been emphasized by Xi Jinping personally. So what’s changed? Two things:
- The New Technology Innovation System replaced the former Information and Communications Technology Industrial Ecosystem. The new system specifically seeks to mobilize the private sector to address technology bottlenecks in strategic sectors and abolishes the former ecosystem’s primary focus on state-led means. Much more on this key change in future posts.
- The security component is also new, and has appeared on both sides in various editions of this same graphic. For instance, CAC places it nearer the international component. A Tencent graphic places it nearer the domestic component. I’m not sure which is authoritative, or if it matters. Much more to come on this change also.
Fourth, the “Two Environments.”
- Domestic Digital Governance Ecosystem + International Cooperation in the Digital Domain
- This is the most significant change. Digital China will now be formally implemented and synchronized across two environments: domestic and international. This is what makes the Plan a global one. (See my translation note on the contextual meaning of “整体布局.”)
- Again, it important to stress that the structure of the Digital China strategy has not changed, only the emphasis. The Digital China strategy has always had an international component, but it was nothing close to an equal partner with the domestic component. As the graphic is designed to show, the “two environments” are now equal.
- In this context, the term “digital domain” is an expansive term and includes the digitally-transformed components of the Five-Sphere Integrated Plan.
- Translation note: “Sphere” and “domain” are used here to translate the same word in Chinese, “领域.” “Five-Sphere Integrated Plan” is the official PRC translation of the original Chinese term-of-art. “Digital domain” is the standard translation of the original Chinese technical term.
…build an open and win-win pattern of international cooperation in the digital domain. Systemically plan international cooperation for the digital domain; establish an international exchange and cooperation system for the digital domain with multi-level coordination, multi-platform support, and multi-subject participation…
…构建开放共赢的数字领域国际合作格局。统筹谋划数字领域国际合作，建立多层面协同、多平台支撑、多主体参与的数字领域国际交流合作体系…
“Central Committee and State Council Publish ‘Plan for the Global Layout of Digital China Construction’” (中共中央 国务院印发《数字中国建设整体布局规划》, Xinhua, February 27, 2023.
Conclusion. What We Need to Do.
We cannot yet know how China will operationalize this global vision. We cannot yet measure how successful it will be. But the ambition is unmistakable.
My main interest in all of this is to ensure that our leaders recognize the seriousness, scope, and speed of Digital China implementation, evaluate what risks, if any, that it carries, and build an informed response together with our allies and partners that serves the greater good.
This will be a monumental and complex task for us. I hope we’re accelerating.
