On Monday, 15 December 2025 at 5 pm, Mohammed Alsudairi (Australian National University) will give a talk at the ZMO. Entitled Narratives of Sino-Middle Eastern Futures, the lecture looks at what might lie ahead for the ties between the two regions, based on sources from the 2010s onwards.
Abstract
Narratives of Sino-Middle Eastern Futures attempts to discern the future trajectory and endpoint of Sino-Middle Eastern relations – are we on the precipice of a post-American Chinese hegemony in the region? Or are we reaching the outer limits of what is feasible within what are essentially transactional ties? Drawing on a wide range of multilingual sources from 2010 to 2023, and based on a framework of thin constructivism, the book – which will be introduced in this talk – delves into the Chinese, Saudi and Assadist Syrian elite narratives regarding the Middle Eastern regional order and China’s envisaged place within it. By centering local perspectives, it offers insights into how these actors – with diverse positionalities in the region (vis-à-vis the United States) and different national capabilities – are debating the future of China in the Middle East (and against the dominant vision of Sino-American rivalry over the region), and what the juxtaposition of their multiple narratives mean for where things are headed.
Mohammed Alsudairi is Lecturer in Politics and International Relations of the Arabic Speaking World at the Centre for Arab and Islamic Studies, Australian National University. He is the Head of the Asian Studies Program at the King Faisal Centre for Research Studies and a recipient of an Alexander von Humboldt Foundation fellowship. His publications have appeared in The Middle East Journal, Third World Quarterly, Journal of Contemporary China, Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East, and Oxford University’s Journal of Islamic Studies. His most recent book, co-authored with Dr. Andrea Ghiselli, Narratives of Sino-Middle Eastern Futures, is out with Cambridge University Press (2025). Read more.
The event takes place at ZMO. No registration is necessary to attend in person.
Date: Monday, 15 December 2025
Time: 5:00 pm – 6:30 pm
Location: Leibniz-Zentrum Moderner Orient, Kirchweg 33, 14129 Berlin