China’s 2026 APEC host year is putting President Xi Jinping’s vision for international cooperation beside a regional trade agenda, giving Beijing a platform to press its case as leaders prepare to meet in Shenzhen.
The Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum announced its theme, “Building an Asia-Pacific Community to Prosper Together,” in Shenzhen on Dec. 12, 2025. APEC named openness, innovation and cooperation as its priorities. Leaders’ Week is scheduled to begin Saturday, Nov. 14, with the leaders’ meeting set for Nov. 19.
A 2023 Chinese government white paper says Xi first advanced the global “community with a shared future” vision in 2013. A 2018 amendment to China’s Constitution added language about building a human community with a shared future. The white paper presents the Belt and Road Initiative and initiatives on development, security and civilization as ways to advance the vision. On Nov. 6, Assistant Foreign Minister Zhao Zhiyuan also named the Global Governance Initiative, describing the four initiatives as strategic guidance for that effort.
The white paper says the Belt and Road Initiative supports shared development. It reports that, by July 2023, more than three-quarters of countries and over 30 international organizations had signed related cooperation agreements with China. Those figures are the Chinese government’s account.
The vision’s purpose is disputed. Beijing’s white paper says it does not aim to replace one system or civilization with another. In an Oxford University Press book, scholars Steve Tsang and Olivia Cheung argue that Xi seeks to steer the liberal international order toward a China-centered model and gain support among Global South countries. The white paper traces China’s approach to the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence. China’s Constitution also names mutual noninterference as a foreign-policy principle.
Xi’s address to APEC leaders on Oct. 31, 2025, urged members to defend multilateral trade rules and maintain cross-border commerce and investment while improving supplier connections. He called on economies to “join hands rather than part ways.”
APEC’s schedule places the leaders’ meeting in Shenzhen on Nov. 19, following the start of Leaders’ Week on Nov. 14.
