Why Obama's Asia Trip Is Not Playing Well in China

CBS News
President Obama arrived Wednesday morning in Japan for the next leg of his Asia tour.

China's 'Zombie' Steelmakers Hit With Huge U.S. Tariffs

Ed Flanagan
NBC News
Similar dissatisfaction with dumping has been seen in Europe, India and Australia, where investigations and similar taxes have also been levied against Chinese steel.

Conversation

05.16.16

Escalation in the South China Sea

Julian G. Ku, M. Taylor Fravel & more
International tensions are rising over the shipping lanes and land formations in the South China Sea. Last week, the People’s Liberation Army Air Force scrambled fighter jets in response to a U.S. Navy ship sailing near the disputed Fiery Cross Reef...

2016 Elections in a Changing Asia-Pacific

Paul Haenle & Douglas H. Paal from Carnegie China
With Tsai Ing-wen taking office in Taipei next week and the U.S. presidential election approaching, new players will be taking the reins in the Asia-Pacific. In this podcast with Paul Haenle, Douglas Paal discusses the future of U.S.-China relations...

The Latest U.S.-China Trade Spat Is over Chicken

Charles Riley
CNN
The Obama administration has accused China of unfairly blocking U.S. poultry imports, the latest in a series of election-year trade disputes between Washington and Beijing.

China Scrambles Fighters as U.S. Sails Warship near Chinese-Claimed Reef

Michael Martina, Greg Torode and Ben...
Reuters
China denounced the U.S. patrol as an illegal threat to peace which only went to show its defense installations in the area were necessary.

As Trump Becomes Presumptive Nominee, China Urges Objectivity

Ben Blanchard
Reuters
"We hope people in all fields can rationally and objectively view this relationship." Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei said.

China Is Building Its First Overseas Military Base in Djibouti—Right next to a Key US One

James Jeffrey
Public Radio International
China signed an initial 10-year lease for their base, and will pay $20 million per year in rent.

China Appears to Confirm New Missile Test

Military Times
China maintains that “technological research experiments ... within China’s boundaries are normal and are not aimed at any specific nations or targets.”

Chinese Official Calls Trump 'Irrational' on Trade

David Shepardson
Reuters
Chinese Finance Minister Lou Jiwei criticized Trump for his proposal that tariffs on imported Chinese goods be increased to up to 45%.

Conversation

04.12.16

Should Internet Censorship Be Considered a Trade Issue?

Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian, Susan Shirk & more
A new report from the Office of the United States Trade Representative lists, for the first time, Chinese Internet censorship as a trade barrier. The possible implications are complex: it could strengthen the hand of U.S. businesses, but also stands...

4-Star Admiral Wants to Confront China. White House Says Not So Fast

David Larter
Navy Times
Adm. Harry Harris is proposing a response to China's island-building that may include launching aircraft and conducting military operations.

Campaign Season’s Anti-China Tone Is Likely to Cloud Meeting With Obama

Mark Landler
New York Times
While tarring China is a predictable election-year tactic, there were deeper corrosive forces at play this year.

How Trump’s Hard Line on Trade Could Backfire

Bob Davis
Wall Street Journal
“If they don’t behave,” the Republican businessman warned at a debate, Chinese companies under a Trump presidency could face tariffs of 45%.

China's Xi to push Obama next week on North Korea talks

Ben Blanchard
Reuters
On this issue, China's position is consistent. We are dedicated to the decentralization of the Korean peninsula.

U.S. Hopes for Talks with China about Possible THAAD Move to South Korea

Andrea Shalal
Reuters
Beijing underscored its concerns but seemed to open the door to a diplomatic solution.

U.S. Proposes Reviving Naval Coalition to Balance China’s Expansion

Ellen Barry
New York Times
Chief of the U.S. Pacific Command proposed reviving a coalition that had collapsed because of protests from China.

China Warns U.S. After Trump Wins Nevada Caucus

Bill Gertz
Washington Free Beacon
China warned the U.S. not to adopt punitive currency policies that could disrupt U.S.-China relations after Donald Trump’s win in the Nevada caucus.

Books

02.23.16

The Diplomacy of Migration

Meredith Oyen
During the Cold War, both Chinese and American officials employed a wide range of migration policies and practices to pursue legitimacy, security, and prestige. They focused on allowing or restricting immigration, assigning refugee status, facilitating student exchanges, and enforcing deportations. The Diplomacy of Migration focuses on the role these practices played in the relationship between the United States and the Republic of China both before and after the move to Taiwan. Meredith Oyen identifies three patterns of migration diplomacy: migration legislation as a tool to achieve foreign policy goals, migrants as subjects of diplomacy and propaganda, and migration controls that shaped the Chinese American community.Using sources from diplomatic and governmental archives in the United States, the Republic of China on Taiwan, the People’s Republic of China, and the United Kingdom, Oyen applies a truly transnational perspective. The Diplomacy of Migration combines important innovations in the field of diplomatic history with new international trends in migration history to show that even though migration issues were often considered “low stakes” or “low risk” by foreign policy professionals concerned with Cold War politics and the nuclear age, they were neither “no risk” nor unimportant to larger goals. Instead, migration diplomacy became a means of facilitating other foreign policy priorities, even when doing so came at great cost for migrants themselves. —Cornell University Press{chop}Correction: Meredith Oyen’s employer was misidentified in an earlier version of this video. She is an Assistant Professor at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County.

Sinica Podcast

02.22.16

Allegiance

Kaiser Kuo & Jeremy Goldkorn from Sinica Podcast
Kaiser and Jeremy recorded today’s show from New York, where they waylaid Holly Chang, founder of Project Pengyou and now Acting Executive Director of the Committee of 100, for a discussion on spying, stealing commercial spying, spying, and Broadway...

Q. and A.: Yan Xuetong Urges China to Adopt a More Assertive Foreign Policy

Yufan Huang
New York Times
Director at Tsinghua University advocates "moral realism" as China challenges the US for world leadership.

Conversation

02.02.16

How Close Was the Latest Close Call in the South China Sea?

Julian G. Ku, Feng Zhang & more
Had things in fact calmed down in recent weeks as the Chinese official press claimed, only to be stirred up again needlessly by another Freedom of Navigation sail by the U.S. Navy?

Viewpoint

12.30.15

The Perils of Advising the Empire

Jeremiah Jenne
Goodnow was not the first, nor would he be the last, foreign academic to have their views appropriated in support of illiberal regimes. Recent controversies involving Daniel Bell, whom The Economist once directly compared to Frank Goodnow, and his...

Books

12.29.15

Crouching Tiger

Peter Navarro
Will there be war with China? This book provides the most complete and accurate assessment of the probability of conflict between the United States and the rising Asian superpower. Equally important, it lays out an in-depth analysis of the possible pathways to peace. Written like a geopolitical detective story, the narrative encourages reader interaction by starting each chapter with an intriguing question that often challenges conventional wisdom.Based on interviews with more than thirty top experts, the author highlights a number of disturbing facts about China's recent military buildup and the shifting balance of power in Asia: the Chinese are deploying game-changing "carrier killer" ballistic missiles; some of America's supposed allies in Europe and Asia are selling highly lethal weapons systems to China in a perverse twist on globalization; and, on the U.S. side, debilitating cutbacks in the military budget send a message to the world that America is not serious about its "pivot to Asia."In the face of these threatening developments, the book stresses the importance of maintaining U.S. military strength and preparedness and strengthening alliances, while warning against a complacent optimism that relies on economic engagement, negotiations, and nuclear deterrence to ensure peace.Accessible to readers from all walks of life, this multidisciplinary work blends geopolitics, economics, history, international relations, military doctrine, and political science to provide a better understanding of one of the most vexing problems facing the world. —Prometheus Books{chop}

Is CES Still Relevant?

Tim Bajarin
Re/code
[T]he CES show is international, and it embraces companies from all over the world. But make no mistake, the Chinese have arrived, and they plan to disrupt the traditional CE players as much as possible and take market share away from them fast.

Media

12.22.15

‘New Yorker’ Writers Reflect on ‘Extreme’ Reporting About China

Eric Fish from Asia Blog
While international reporting on China has improved by leaps and bounds since foreign journalists first started trickling into the country in the 1970s, major challenges remain in giving readers back home a balanced image. That was the message from...

U.S. Navy Commander Implies China Has Eroded Safety of South China Sea

JANE PERLEZ
New York Times
A senior American naval commander has implicitly accused China of creating artificial islands in the South China Sea.

Books

12.10.15

Pacific

Simon Winchester
Following his acclaimed Atlantic and The Men Who United the States, New York Times bestselling author Simon Winchester offers an enthralling biography of the Pacific Ocean and its role in the modern world, exploring our relationship with this imposing force of nature.As the Mediterranean shaped the classical world, and the Atlantic connected Europe to the New World, the Pacific Ocean defines our tomorrow. With China on the rise, so, too, are the American cities of the West coast, including Seattle, San Francisco, and the long cluster of towns down the Silicon Valley.Today, the Pacific is ascendant. Its geological history has long transformed us—tremendous earthquakes, volcanoes, and tsunamis—but its human history, from a Western perspective, is quite young, beginning with Magellan’s sixteenth-century circumnavigation. It is a natural wonder whose most fascinating history is currently being made.In telling the story of the Pacific, Simon Winchester takes us from the Bering Strait to Cape Horn, the Yangtze River to the Panama Canal, and to the many small islands and archipelagos that lie in between. He observes the fall of a dictator in Manila, visits aboriginals in northern Queensland, and is jailed in Tierra del Fuego, the land at the end of the world. His journey encompasses a trip down the Alaska Highway, a stop at the isolated Pitcairn Islands, and a trek across South Korea and a glimpse of its mysterious northern neighbor.Winchester’s personal experience is vast and his storytelling second to none. And his historical understanding of the region is formidable, making Pacific a paean to this magnificent sea of beauty, myth, and imagination that is transforming our lives. —HarperCollins{chop}

Sinica Podcast

12.01.15

Live at the Bookworm, Part II

Kaiser Kuo, Jeremy Goldkorn & more from Sinica Podcast
This is the second part of the Live Sinica discussion recorded last month during a special event at the Bookworm literary festival. In this show, David Moser and Kaiser Kuo were joined by China-newcomer Jeremy Goldkorn, fresh off the plane from...

China and U.S. Say They’ve Made Strides in Trade Talks

Neil Gough
New York Times
The United States and China said that they had made progress on sticking points in trade.

Media

11.18.15

Chinese Students in America: 300,000 and Counting

Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian
In 1981, when Erhfei Liu entered Brandeis University as an undergraduate, he was only the second student from mainland China in the school’s history. “I was a rare animal from Red China,” Liu said in a September 1 interview with Foreign Policy, “an...

Media

10.30.15

Xi’s State Visits As Seen on the Cover of ‘China Daily’

Orville Schell
The state visits of Chinese Communist Party General Secretary and President Xi Jinping to Washington, D.C. in September and London last week were both significant milestones in China’s long term “rejuvenation,” a key element in Xi’s vaunted notion...

Conversation

10.28.15

Making Waves in the South China Sea

Peter Dutton, Jessica Chen Weiss & more
Challenging China’s newly assertive behavior in the South China Sea, this week the U.S. Navy sailed some of its biggest ships inside the nine-dash line, exercising its claim to freedom of movement in international waters plied by billions in trade...

Media

10.28.15

‘Stop Boasting and Fight’

Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian
On October 27, the high-stakes maritime game of chicken that has been playing out in the South China Sea came to a head. In a long-discussed freedom of navigation patrol, the United States sailed the USS Lassen, a guided missile destroyer, within 12...

1 Month Later: What Are the Long-Term Implications of Xi's U.S. Trip?

Yukon Huang
Diplomat
While political and security matters dominated headlines, Xi’s U.S. trip was actually driven by economics.

A Land China Loves and Hates

Murong Xuecun
New York Times
The Chinese hostility to America is first and foremost the result of government propaganda.

U.S. Allies See Trans-Pacific Partnership as a Check on China

Jane Perlez
New York Times
The Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal was welcomed as a win for the United States in its contest with China for clout in Asia.

China’s 3,000-Acre Aircraft Carriers Could Change the Balance of Power in the Pacific

JAMES STAVRIDIS
Foreign Policy
That’s why the United States needs to act now.

Media

10.01.15

U.S. Presidential Candidates on China

Our Presidential Quotes tracker keeps you up to date on what the candidates are saying about China, and where and when they say it.

China Navy Calls for United States to Reduce Risk of Misunderstandings

Reuters
China hopes the United States can scale back activities that run the risk of misunderstandings, and respect China's core interests.

Jack Ma to US: Quit Worrying So Much About China

Everett Rosenfeld
CNBC
"You American people worry too much about the China economy," Ma said at the annual Clinton Global Initiative meeting.

U.S. Pulls Spies from China After Hack

Evan Perez
CNN
The U.S. suspects that Chinese hackers were behind the breach at the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, which exposed the fingerprints of 5.6 million government employees.

The Thucydides Trap: Are the U.S. and China Headed for War?

GRAHAM ALLISON
Atlantic
In 12 of 16 past cases in which a rising power has confronted a ruling power, the result has been bloodshed.

On U.S. Visit, China’s Xi Jinping Tries to Have It Both Ways

ANDREW BROWNE
WSJ: China Real Time Report
Xi Jinping often seemed caught between two audiences—his skeptical hosts who needed gentle reassurance and the crowd back home who admire his firm rule and tough nationalism.

A Dangerous Game: Responding to Chinese Cyber Activities

Ryan Pickrell
Diplomat
Those calling for tougher U.S. measures should think twice.

Chinese Youth Admire American Culture But Remain Wary of U.S. Policy

CHRIS BUCKLEY
New York Times
“We really like American culture, but we also like to have a government that doesn’t show weakness abroad.”

China Angered By Hillary Clinton Tweet on Women's Rights

Tessa Wong
BBC
China has reacted furiously at Hillary Clinton's recent comments about China's record on women's rights.

How A 10-Gallon Hat Helped Heal Relations Between China And America

Adam Taylor
Washington Post
Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping's 1979 tour marked a turning point in Americans' views of Communist China.

Six Questions for Chinese President Xi Jinping

Steven Mufson
Washington Post
Chinese President Xi Jinping does not usually conduct open news conferences, but when in America, do as the Americans do.

China’s First Lady Tones Down Star Power

LAURIE BURKITT And TE-PING CHEN
Wall Street Journal
On U.S. visit, Peng Liyuan must balance charity pursuits to not steal focus from Xi.

Enacting Cap-and-Trade Will Present Challenges Under China’s System

CHRIS BUCKLEY
New York Times
White House officials have lauded President Xi Jinping's anticipated promise of a national market for China in greenhouse gas quotas.

China to the U.S.: Return Our Fugitives

Sophia Yan
CNN
China has launched campaigns dubbed "Operation Foxhunt" and "Operation Skynet," aimed at returning suspected criminals from abroad to stand trial at home.

China's Xi Promises Better Investment Climate, Cyber War Deal Seen

MICHAEL MARTINA, ERIC M. JOHNSON AND...
Reuters
Seeking to warm bilateral ties and project a sunny climate for U.S. business, Xi Jinping vowed to cut restrictions on foreign investment.

Conflict Flavors Obama’s Meeting With Chinese Leader

David Sanger and Julie Hirschfeld Davis
New York Times
This week’s meeting between President Obama and Mr. Xi is fraught with points of conflict, and its unspoken subtext is whether the president will confront the Chinese directly, deliberately causing friction in the relationship in hopes of drawing...

Obama and Xi Must Do More Than Agree to Disagree

Jimmy Carter
Huffington Post
They can forge a consensus on how to build trust through U.S.-China collaboration that acts to solve our common global challenges.

There is Still Hope for U.S.-China Relations: Schell

CNBC
Orville Schell, Arthur Ross Director at the Asia Society's Centre on US-China Relation, likens the developments in U.S.-China ties to a "constant ballet" and outlines his expectations for Xi's state visit. 

Why Tibet Could Be the Best Opportunity for Xi Jinping

Matteo Mecacci and Bhuchung Tsering
Huffington Post
The state visit is a growing alarm about China's less than peaceful rise, and provides a rare opportunity for Obama to give an important message on Tibet.

Conversation

09.22.15

Xi Jinping’s Message to America

Taisu Zhang, Graham Webster & more
China’s President Xi Jinping addressed an audience of more than 700 American businesspeople in Seattle on Tuesday evening on the first stop on his first state visit to the United States. Regular ChinaFile Contributors who watched the speech offer...

Conversation

09.22.15

Can the U.S. & China Make Peace in Cyberspace?

Charlie Smith, Rogier Creemers & more
Chinese President Xi Jinping arrives in the United States today on his first state visit. Xi will address a group of American business leadersin Seattle. High on their list of concerns about trade with China is cyber hacking, cyber espionage and...