The purpose of all the infrastructure projects in the periphery is to tie China together, allow economic opportunities in the periphery, and promote trade, travel and migration between different parts of China.
To grossly simplify it, China is a lot less of a single nation than it claims to be. Historically, it was a collection of states that were bound together into a single empire, but most places still retained local identity over the imperial one, and most Chinese dynasties failed not because external pressures were raised to insurmountable level, but rather because the thin fabric tying the states together fell apart and the empire just disintegrated.
The CPC sees this, not any external threat or national level domestic challenger, as the primary threat and problem facing them in the future. To fix it, they employ a policy of trying to integrate the periphery by building infrastructure in such a way to make it easier to travel between provinces than it is to travel inside provinces, so that new economic structures arise which make the people in one province dependent on people in other provinces, and so that travel and marriage of people across the provinces would in the long term make the distinctions fade away.
China bashers often talk about things like how much abject poverty or wealth inequality there still is, or their demographic problems, or malinvestment. Sure, these are problematic, but if you use a little imagination, initiatives like this maybe don't look so dumb.
I think Chinese political and economic leadership is absolutely world class and may some day be viewed by historians as the best the world has ever seen, especially if you consider both the breadth and speed of their accomplishments.
I can certainly sympathize with this viewpoint and even share it in some ways. However, I think it's a bit hyperbolic to call them world-class when you view their accomplishments through a lens that accounts for their human rights violations and atrocities. Very few governments in the world can claim to be completely void of these violations, but China is particularly egregious in this regard.
Are they really though? Indeed they abuse political dissidents and disallow free speech, but are there really that many people that violate these rules any more?
It's a valid worldview to say "that doesn't matter", but not everyone agrees with that stance. A (mostly) benevolent dictatorship is a perfectly valid form of rule if you ask me.
> Are they really though? Indeed they abuse political dissidents and disallow free speech, but are there really that many people that violate these rules any more?
A kidnap victim getting Stockholm Syndrome doesn't make the kidnapping OK.
Bad rules are a problem even if people follow them.
How many people are actually getting kidnapped is certainly relevant.
And "bad" (often a matter of philosophical opinion) rules may be a problem, but how big of a problem, and should also be compared to the relative success of alternatives, such as "freedom" as enjoyed in the USA, and it's current trajectory of aggregate economic success and personal happiness. Personally, I think China doesn't have very much to be ashamed of, and much to be proud of.
To grossly simplify it, China is a lot less of a single nation than it claims to be. Historically, it was a collection of states that were bound together into a single empire, but most places still retained local identity over the imperial one, and most Chinese dynasties failed not because external pressures were raised to insurmountable level, but rather because the thin fabric tying the states together fell apart and the empire just disintegrated.
The CPC sees this, not any external threat or national level domestic challenger, as the primary threat and problem facing them in the future. To fix it, they employ a policy of trying to integrate the periphery by building infrastructure in such a way to make it easier to travel between provinces than it is to travel inside provinces, so that new economic structures arise which make the people in one province dependent on people in other provinces, and so that travel and marriage of people across the provinces would in the long term make the distinctions fade away.