中国战略性矿产资源国际合作的演化博弈与策略

[Objective] This study aims to investigate how to ensure the sustainable supply security of China’s strategic mineral resources under the dual challenges of intensified major power intervention and rising policy uncertainty in mineral resource-rich countries [Methods] This study constructed a tripartite evolutionary game model involving mineral resource counties, the United States, and China to analyze the interactive evolution paths of strategies among the three parties and the conditions for their stability. [Results] (1) Under the coupling of multiple interests and dynamic equilibrium, the system exhibited a stable equilibrium strategy in which the mineral resource-rich countries maintained cooperation, the United States refrained from intervention, and China responded conservatively. (2) The intervention behavior of the United States had a significant benefit-driven characteristic, and the increase in its marginal benefits strengthened the intervention motivation, which might prompt mineral resource-rich countries to alter their cooperation pattern with China. (3) Mineral resource-rich countries faced internal structural constraints in policy transformation, and the presence of resource nationalism costs significantly reduced the likelihood of changing their cooperation patterns with China. (4) China’s combination of “incentive-punishment” policy tools could effectively curb the strategic shift tendency of mineral resource-rich countries and constrain the intervention space of the United States. [Conclusion] This study reveals that in the geopolitical game of strategic mineral resources, the economic constraints of the U.S. intervention and the internal conflict costs of mineral resource-rich countries are the two key mechanisms for maintaining cooperation stability. Therefore, China should establish a strategy system that responds dynamically to the game state, decisively employing response strategies—such as countermeasures and interest binding—when risks are high to ensure security, and returning to cost-optimal conservative response strategies when stability is approaching, so as to maximize long-term interests.