Viewpoint
05.21.20A New U.S. ‘Consensus’ on China May Not Be as Solid as It Appears
The COVID-19 pandemic has brought ties between Washington and Beijing to their lowest level since the countries normalized relations in 1979, with many observers warning that they have entered into either “a new Cold War” or at least “a new type of...
Viewpoint
05.21.20How Will Historians Look Back at the Coronavirus Outbreak?
Imagine that a historian decides to reflect on the pandemic, asking quite simply, “How did it come to this?” There would be many ways of telling that story. But one way would be to chart a series of off-ramps on the road to disaster. Some of these...
China in the World Podcast
05.20.20U.S.-China Relations 2020: Coronavirus and Elections
from Carnegie China
China is facing growing international scrutiny due to its initial mishandling of the coronavirus outbreak. Countries are increasingly questioning the motives underlying Beijing’s recent international aid efforts, and there is growing concern over...
China in the World Podcast
05.14.20Missing in Action: U.S.-China Cooperation on Coronavirus
from Carnegie China
The coronavirus outbreak has highlighted the many issues in the U.S.-China relationship. Why can’t Washington and Beijing better coordinate a response to the pandemic, replicating their cooperative efforts during the 2008 financial crisis and 2014...
Conversation
03.28.20Is U.S.-China Cooperation on COVID-19 Still Possible?
Over the past two weeks, as the outbreak of the virus known has COVID-19 has accelerated its deadly spread around the world, an already collapsing U.S.-China relationship appears to be entering a period of free fall. This is happening at a moment...
Viewpoint
03.20.20Xi Jinping May Welcome Trump’s Racism
The coronavirus pandemic has ushered in a new low-point for the already strained relationship between the U.S. and China—and it could get worse in the months ahead as the toll rises and there is more urgency to assign blame. At the White House press...
Books
02.24.20Fateful Triangle
Brookings Institution Press: In this Asian century, scholars, officials, and journalists are increasingly focused on the fate of the rivalry between China and India. They see the U.S.’s relationships with the two Asian giants as now intertwined, after having followed separate paths during the Cold War.In Fateful Triangle, Tanvi Madan argues that China’s influence on the U.S.-India relationship is neither a recent nor a momentary phenomenon. Drawing on documents from India and the United States, she shows that American and Indian perceptions of and policy toward China significantly shaped U.S.-India relations in three crucial decades, from 1949 to 1979. Fateful Triangle updates our understanding of the diplomatic history of U.S.-India relations, highlighting China’s central role in it; reassesses the origins and practice of Indian foreign policy and nonalignment; and provides historical context for the interactions between the three countries.Madan’s assessment of this formative period in the triangular relationship is of more than historic interest. A key question today is whether the United States and India can, or should, develop ever-closer ties as a way of countering China’s desire to be the dominant power in the broader Asian region. Fateful Triangle argues that history shows such a partnership is neither inevitable nor impossible. A desire to offset China brought the two countries closer together in the past, and could do so again. A look to history, however, also shows that shared perceptions of an external threat from China are necessary, but insufficient, to bring India and the United States into a close and sustained alignment. That requires agreement on the nature and urgency of the threat, as well as how to approach the threat strategically, economically, and ideologically.With its long view, Fateful Triangle offers insights for both present and future policymakers as they tackle a fateful, and evolving, triangle that has regional and global implications.{chop}
Conversation
01.08.20China: The Year Ahead
As 2019 drew to a close, ChinaFile asked contributors to write about their expectations for China in 2020.
12.03.19
Chinese Government Says it Will Sanction U.S. NGOs in Hong Kong
The Chinese government plans to sanction at least five U.S. NGOs for alleged misdeeds in Hong Kong, a Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) spokesperson told reporters at a press conference on December 2. Hua Chunying described the move as a response to...
Viewpoint
10.01.19We Need to Pull U.S.-China Relations Back from the Brink. Here’s How.
Like it or not, the U.S. and China are in the process of “decoupling.” The two countries find themselves drifting dangerously back into a state of growing distrust, and even antagonism. Both sides have their narratives and grievances that prevent...
Viewpoint
09.18.19Beyond Hawks and Doves
Two recent documents—as well as the critiques they have elicited—furnish the basis for a more nuanced debate on U.S. policy towards China. First, on July 4, a group of roughly 100 figures from the policy, military, business, and academic communities...
Conversation
09.13.19Why Is the FBI Investigating Americans Who Study in China?
Over the last two years, the FBI has questioned at least five U.S. citizens who have studied at Yenching Academy, a Master’s degree program hosted by Peking University. The purpose of the interviews, according to NPR, is to “ascertain whether they...
China in the World Podcast
09.05.19Is the U.S.-China Relationship in Free Fall?: Part II
from Carnegie China
Da Wei argues that shifting domestic politics in China and the United States are negatively impacting bilateral ties. In Washington, there is no longer widespread support for engagement with China. In Beijing, debates over the role of the state in...
China in the World Podcast
09.05.19Is the U.S.-China Relationship in Free Fall?: Part I
from Carnegie China
The Trump administration has focused China’s attention on the need to address underlying issues in the bilateral relationship, but it has overstepped. Trump’s use of tariffs has hardened Chinese views and limited Beijing’s ability to make...
Viewpoint
08.08.19The U.S. Recently Erected a New Hurdle to U.S.-China Academic Cooperation. Here’s What It Might Mean.
A recent move by the U.S. Department of Commerce reminds us that academic relationships are not immune from the effects of deteriorating U.S.-China relations. In April 2019, the Department included several Chinese universities on its Unverified List...
Conversation
08.01.19How Should the U.S. Government Treat Chinese Students in America?
The State Department’s top education official Marie Royce gave a speech entitled “The United States Welcomes Chinese Students.” In it, she quoted recent remarks from Donald Trump, who said, “We want to have Chinese students come and use our great...
Books
07.09.19Kissinger on Kissinger
St. Martin’s Press: As National Security Advisor to Richard Nixon, Henry Kissinger transformed America’s approach to diplomacy with China, the USSR, Vietnam, and the Middle East, laying the foundations for geopolitics as we know them today.Nearly 50 years later, escalating tensions between the U.S., China, and Russia are threatening a swift return to the same diplomatic game of tug-of-war that Kissinger played so masterfully. Kissinger on Kissinger is a series of faithfully transcribed interviews conducted by the elder statesman’s longtime associate, Winston Lord, which captures Kissinger’s thoughts on the specific challenges that he faced during his tenure as the National Security Agency, his general advice on leadership and international relations, and stunning portraits of the larger-than-life world leaders of the era. The result is a frank and well-informed overview of U.S. foreign policy in the first half of the 1970s.{chop}
Conversation
07.08.19The Other Tiananmen Papers
In the wake of the lethal use of force by China’s military against demonstrators in Tiananmen Square and citizens of Beijing on June 4, 1989, the United States and other governments were confronted with a series of vexing moral and policy questions...
Media
06.11.19ChinaFile Presents: Erasing History—Why Remember Tiananmen
On the evening of June 3, ChinaFile hosted a discussion on the Chinese government’s efforts to control, manipulate, and forestall remembrance of the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989 and the bloody crackdown that ended them. Participating in the...
Conversation
05.30.19What Are We Getting Wrong about the Trade War?
from ChinaFile
Since the collapse of trade talks in mid-May, voices from both sides have warned of the economic havoc their side can unleash while boasting of their economy’s resilience. Academics in China speak about weaponizing the country’s foreign exchange...
Viewpoint
04.30.19Trade: Parade of Broken Promises
from Democracy: A Journal of Ideas
The trade war between the United States and China has not given either side much to cheer about. As of January, Washington has levied 10 percent tariffs on U.S.$250 billion in Chinese goods, and China has reciprocated with similar tariffs on U.S.$...
Conversation
04.30.19If the U.S. and China Make a Trade Deal, Then What?
The U.S.-China trade war has always been about more than just trade. Among other issues, it represents a move towards the decoupling of the two economies. Sometime within the next few weeks, Washington and Beijing may call a truce on the trade war...
China in the World Podcast
04.18.19In Reassessing China, Europe Sharpens Its Approach
from Carnegie China
In recent weeks, Beijing has both won victories and suffered defeats during important summits and dialogues with France and Italy, as well as the European Union. French President Emmanuel Macron invited German Chancellor Angela Merkel and European...
China in the World Podcast
04.15.19Susan Thornton on a Crisis in U.S.-China Relations
from Carnegie China
Over three years into Trump’s presidency, U.S.-China trade and economic issues remain unresolved while security concerns are creeping into the bilateral agenda. Thornton contends that Washington and Beijing should quickly agree on an initial trade...
Viewpoint
03.08.19Here’s How the Trade War Is Affecting Hollywood
In February 2017, the United States and China began renegotiating the five-year film pact that had limited the annual number of foreign film exports to China to 34 and the share of revenue payable to foreign-rights holders to 25 percent of gross box...
Conversation
03.01.19The Future of China-U.S. Military Relations
The U.S.-China military relationship has been relatively stable over the past few years. Both sides’ leaders recognize that effective relations between the two militaries help prevent crises and stabilize the broader bilateral relationship. Events...
Viewpoint
02.22.19‘We’re Very Sexy People’: How the U.S. Miscalculated Its Allure to China
The Sino-Vietnamese War is rarely remembered or discussed today. But 40 years ago, the war appeared to herald a tectonic shift in regional and global politics and helped forge a close, more trusting relationship between the leader of the free world...
Conversation
02.02.19What Do the Huawei Indictments Mean for the Future of Global Tech?
The United States indictments against Huawei look set to significantly worsen already tense relations between China and the U.S. As America pressures allies to drop Huawei and other Chinese firms, U.S. and European officials point to China’s own...
China in the World Podcast
01.18.19Graham Allison on Avoiding the Thucydides Trap
from Carnegie China
Allison says the Thucydides Trap is the best framework to understand why there is potential for conflict between the United States and China. As China grew stronger, the U.S. failed to recognize Beijing would increasingly assert its own vision for...
China in the World Podcast
01.15.19China’s Shift to a More Assertive Foreign Policy
from Carnegie China
Shi points to two important turning points in China’s shift to a more assertive foreign policy: the 2008 global financial crisis, which made it clear that China’s economic development was an important engine for global growth; and Xi Jinping’s rise...
Viewpoint
01.09.19Normalization of Sino-American Relations: 40 Years Later
The spirited 2019 New Year’s speeches of Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen and China’s President Xi Jinping have just reminded the world that, 40 years after the normalization of relations between the United States and China, the potentially explosive...
Viewpoint
12.21.18A Look Back at China in 2018
In 2018, the outlook for China regarding its politics, economy, and relationship with the United States darkened considerably. The removal of presidential term limits and Xi Jinping’s interactions with the Trump administration prompted rare...
Conversation
12.11.18Is this the Beginning of a New Cold War?
Beyond complicating trade negotiations between the United States and China, the arrest of Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou has renewed concerns that the two countries are embarking on a new Cold War, based on economic preeminence and technological innovation...
China in the World Podcast
12.07.18Devising a New Formula for Global Leadership
from Carnegie China
Yan asserts the U.S.-China relationship is experiencing structural disruptions, the resolution of which will have a lasting impact on the two countries. He says the tensions in the U.S.-China relationship are primarily due to the narrowing gap...
China in the World Podcast
12.07.18Managing a Fragile Transition in U.S.-China Relations
from Carnegie China
Haenle and Cui discuss lessons from the past 40 years of the bilateral relationship, central areas of cooperation and competition, and a future framework that will allow China and the U.S. to avoid conflict. Cui asserts that U.S. and Chinese...
Viewpoint
12.06.18‘The Events Were Regrettable’
In late February 1989, a month after becoming president, Bush visited Beijing and invited roughly 500 people to a “Texas barbecue” at a posh Beijing hotel. The invitees included Fang Lizhi, the famous astrophysicist and political dissident. The...
Conversation
12.04.18Did President George H.W. Bush Mishandle China?
ChinaFile contributors discuss 41st U.S. President George H.W. Bush’s legacy for U.S.-China relations. —The Editors
China in the World Podcast
12.02.18China Is Rising Faster
from Carnegie China
Wang says that it has been primarily China’s development that has driven changes in the U.S.-China relationship going back to the Qing Dynasty. However, the U.S. still has significant influence and can play an important role in guiding China’s...
Conversation
11.27.18How to Be a Chinese Scientist without Being China’s Scientist
As trade tensions between the United States and China worsen, a new technological cold war looms, casting its shadow over American universities and research institutions. How should individual scientists of Chinese origin decide whether to accept a...
China in the World Podcast
10.18.18How Will China Respond to Global Concerns about its Trade and Economic Policies?
from Carnegie China
Official Chinese narratives about the U.S.-China trade war have not included Chinese reflection or discussion of what role China’s own policies have played in creating trade tensions. Many of the concerns on structural issues, such as market access...
China in the World Podcast
10.09.18The U.S. and China as Peer Competitors in the Indo-Pacific
from Carnegie China
The Trump administration has taken a more confrontational approach to bilateral relations with China, implementing tariffs on nearly half of all Chinese exports to the U.S. and treating Beijing as a strategic competitor across many aspects of the...
Viewpoint
10.05.18Banning Chinese Students is Not in the U.S. National Interest
President Donald Trump has made no secret of his desire to radically revamp America’s immigration policies. Indeed, his family separation policies, which sparked nationwide protests and public revulsion after they were rolled out in May 2018, were...
Features
10.02.18Here Are the Fortune 500 Companies Doing Business in Xinjiang
News reports from the western Chinese region of Xinjiang have described alarming, widespread, and worsening violations of the human rights of its predominantly Muslim, ethnically Turkic inhabitants, primarily the region’s approximately 11 million...
Excerpts
09.30.18For Generations of P.R.C. Leaders, a World ‘Alive with Danger’
There can be few jobs more difficult than that of paramount leader of China: the surrounding world invariably alive with danger, the extent of the state, its integrity and stability forever uncertain. For an outsider, it is easy to observe that the...
China in the World Podcast
09.20.18North Korea Diplomacy and U.S.-China Relations
from Carnegie China
Paul Haenle joined Kaiser Kuo to discuss next steps for DPRK diplomacy and tensions between the United States and China over trade, Taiwan, and the Belt and Road Initiative. Haenle shared his experience working as White House representative to the...
Conversation
09.10.18Is the Trade War Hurting Xi Jinping Politically?
What are the domestic politics for Xi Jinping of a trade war? How much is the trade war actually hurting China’s economy? And what other effects is this having on China, and on Xi’s ability to govern?
China in the World Podcast
08.28.18Technology and Innovation in an Era of U.S.-China Strategic Competition
from Carnegie China
China has taken significant steps to implement national strategies and encourage investment in order to surpass the U.S. in high tech fields like artificial intelligence. In this podcast, Paul Haenle sat down with Elsa Kania, adjunct fellow at the...
Viewpoint
08.27.18Beijing’s Bid for Global Power in the Age of Trump
from TomDispatch
As the second year of Donald Trump’s presidency and sixth of Xi Jinping’s draws to a close, the world seems to be witnessing one of those epochal clashes that can change the contours of global power. Just as conflicts between American President...
China in the World Podcast
07.25.18U.S.-China Tensions over Trade and Technology
from Carnegie China
Chen says deteriorating bilateral relations are due to both the Trump administration’s trade policies and to a growing U.S. consensus that foreign policy toward China should be reevaluated. The Chinese government’s view that industrial policy is a...
Conversation
07.12.18Can China Replace the U.S. in Europe?
The G7 debacle reminded Europeans the problems with relying on a fraying transatlantic partnership. Meanwhile, China has been playing a larger role on the continent, increasing its investment and its political influence. On July 6-7, Bulgaria held...
Sinica Podcast
07.09.18Kurt Campbell on U.S.-China Diplomacy
from Sinica Podcast
Kaiser talks to former Assistant Secretary of State for East Asia and Pacific Affairs Kurt Campbell about his career, his critique of engagement, and the fascinating events that happened on his watch—including the extrication of blind activist...
China in the World Podcast
06.11.18A World in Transition
from Carnegie China
As the world is in the midst of considerable uncertainty and transition, Ambassador William J. Burns points to the emergence of rising powers like China and India, challenges to regional order in the Middle East, and revolutions in new technologies...
06.07.18
Letter from U.S. Congress Questions U.S. NGO’s Ties to Chinese Government
The United States House of Representatives’ Committee on Natural Resources is “seek[ing] clarification” regarding the advocacy activities of U.S.-based non-profit National Resources Defense Council (NRDC). In a June 5 letter to the NRDC president,...
Viewpoint
05.23.18Germany Needs China to Save the Global Order from Trump
from Mercator Institute for China Studies
The U.S. president’s attacks on multilateralism may push Chancellor Merkel into an unlikely alliance with Beijing. Germany and the EU have to test ways to work with China in the absence of transatlantic coordination. The goal must be to organize an...
Conversation
05.18.18Does China Have a Jobs Problem?
In a surprise Sunday tweet, U.S. President Donald Trump said he supported helping the phone-maker ZTE, a Chinese tech giant which has been one of the hardest hit from U.S.-China trade tensions. “Too many jobs in China lost,” he wrote. Though Trump...
Conversation
05.11.18Do American Companies Need to Take a Stance on Taiwan?
China’s airline regulator recently sent a letter to 36 international air carriers requiring them to remove from their websites references implying that Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macau are not part of China. In a surprisingly direct May 5 statement, the...
Conversation
05.07.18Can China Afford to Play Hardball with the U.S.?
In the midst of roiling trade tensions between the United States and China, last week Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin led a delegation of Donald Trump’s top economic advisors to Beijing. Demands were made in both directions and talks were...
ChinaFile Recommends
05.04.18U.S.-China Trade Talks End with Strong Demands, but Few Signs of a Deal
New York Times
The Beijing talks were unlikely to result in a comprehensive deal, but experts said they could still be a first step toward reaching some sort of accord.
ChinaFile Recommends
05.04.18U.S.-China Trade Talks End with Strong Demands, but Few Signs of a Deal
New York Times
The Beijing talks were unlikely to result in a comprehensive deal, but experts said they could still be a first step toward reaching some sort of accord.
ChinaFile Recommends
05.04.18Chinese Lasers Injure Us Military Pilots in Africa, Pentagon Says
CNN
Chinese personnel at the country's first overseas military base in Djibouti have been using lasers to interfere with US military aircraft at a nearby American base, activity that has resulted in injuries to US pilots