Prof Verena Madner is now a member of the Management Committee of the EU-COST funded China in Europe Research Network (CHERN), which has been initiated by the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and the University of Bristol. CHERN aims to contribute to a better understanding of both the nature and trajectories of Chinese investments and the inter-connections between those investments and the wider social, political-economic and geopolitical issues they raise for particular European countries and for the EU as a whole.