From Opportunity to Caution: Italian Elite Discourse and Policy Evolution towards Chinese Investment

This paper examines how and why Italian political elites have transformed their discourse on Chinese foreign direct investment (FDI) in critical sectors between 2013 and 2024, and how this discursive shift relates to concrete changes in Italy’s policy stances, especially in the realm critical sectors. While Italy initially framed Chinese investment as an economic opportunity, culminating in its entry in the Belt and Road Initiative in 2019, elite discourse has progressively moved toward greater caution and regulatory scrutiny. The paper asks what explains this evolution and how discursive change interacts with empirical policy outcomes with a strong focus on the digital domain, specifically on the 5G sector. The analysis is informed by a discursive institutionalist perspective, complemented by insights from international political economy and foreign policy analysis, which together highlight how ideational change interacts with material interests and external alignment pressures. Drawing on a qualitative content analysis of parliamentary debates and elite interviews, the study traces the changing frames through which Chinese investment has been discussed across successive legislative periods. It identifies the relative weight of several explanatory factors: shifts in domestic foreign and economic policy orientations, increasing alignment with the United States, evolving EU-level regulatory debates, and changing business preferences toward Chinese capital in key critical sectors. Rather than treating discourse as auxiliary, the analysis explicitly links discursive patterns to the empirical evolution of Italy’s investment screening practices and regulatory posture. By connecting what elites say with what governments do, the study offers a more integrated account of how elite stances vis-à-vis Chinese investments and the regulatory evolutions adapt under conditions of growing geopolitical and economic contestation.