Christopher R. O’Dea is an adjunct fellow at Hudson Institute. A former international investment management executive, he is an authority on capital markets, political economy and public finance, and the national security implications of infrastructure finance and governance.O’Dea contends that China has developed a new approach to acquiring and projecting economic and political power. Having appropriated Western innovation to become the dominant player in so many manufacturing industries, China has reverse-engineered the logic of conquest by deploying Chinese state-owned companies to gain control of the ports, logistics terminals, ground transport and digital communication networks required to move goods from China and Southeast Asia to consumer markets around the world.In a world of integrated supply chains, Chinese control of essential economic infrastructure poses a profound challenge to the US and the West. Companies, investors and government agencies will need to understand this challenge and develop strategies for the new economic and geopolitical environment.“Asia Rising: Ships of State?”, O’Dea’s original research on this hidden threat, was published in the Naval War College Review. The pathbreaking essay highlights the importance of commercial shipping capabilities to a nation’s sea power, and how China’s global shipping and logistical network might soon allow it to challenge US maritime supremacy.O’Dea is a contributor to National Review and Strategika, the online journal of the Hoover Institution Working Group on the Role of Military History in Contemporary Conflict. He has briefed the Working Group on Chinese mercantile and maritime expansion.” O’Dea has advised the Canadian Department of National Defence on the security ramifications of Chinese investments in port infrastructure, and received a grant from the department to assess the risks of Chinese investment in Canada’s critical economic assets at a time of grey-zone conflict.
Listed skills include Strategy, Business Development, Marketing Strategy, Investments, and 17 others.