Podcast: Elizabeth Economy on Xi Jinping’s Third Revolution and the Future of U.S.-China Relations
The China Program is part of the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center
FSI researchers strive to understand how countries relate to one another, and what policies are needed to achieve global stability and prosperity. International relations experts focus on the challenging U.S.-Russian relationship, the alliance between the U.S. and Japan and the limitations of America’s counterinsurgency strategy in Afghanistan.
Foreign aid is also examined by scholars trying to understand whether money earmarked for health improvements reaches those who need it most. And FSI’s Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center has published on the need for strong South Korean leadership in dealing with its northern neighbor.
FSI researchers also look at the citizens who drive international relations, studying the effects of migration and how borders shape people’s lives. Meanwhile FSI students are very much involved in this area, working with the United Nations in Ethiopia to rethink refugee communities.
Trade is also a key component of international relations, with FSI approaching the topic from a slew of angles and states. The economy of trade is rife for study, with an APARC event on the implications of more open trade policies in Japan, and FSI researchers making sense of who would benefit from a free trade zone between the European Union and the United States.
In the nearly seven years since assuming the role of General Secretary of the Communist Party of China, Xi Jinping has had far-ranging impact on the country’s policies at home and abroad. From his anti-corruption campaign and tightening restrictions on civil society to championing the Belt and Road initiative and abolishing China’s presidential term limits, Xi is transforming the Chinese state and its place on the global stage.
Among the cutting-edge topics that China scholars are beginning to explore is Xi’s impact on Chinese politics and its concomitant influence on what and how scholars study Chinese politics. Last December, the China Program at Shorenstein APARC hosted a conference that drew preeminent scholars of Chinese politics and comparative politics primarily from across the United States and Canada, where they gathered to assess the state of the discipline, and where the field might go next.
Too Big for One Room
The conference traces its origins to a prior gathering at the American Political Science Association (APSA). The number of attendees at that meeting outpaced any room upgrade APSA could provide. “We were impressed by the number of people studying Chinese politics,” said the China Program Director Jean Oi . “It was apparent to many of us who attended that meeting that it was time we convened a separate event with leaders in the field.”
The need to bring together the multiple generations of scholars of Chinese politics was also clear. “Younger scholars today are so much more well-equipped with various sophisticated methodologies such as machine learning and web scraping,” noted Oi. “We decided it would be useful to gather those doing various types of research, quantitative and qualitative, to think about what we don’t know about Chinese politics but would like to know; and how possibly we might go about doing that research. Our goal for this conference was to try to identify collectively some of those questions for the study of Chinese politics and how our research might contribute to the broader field of comparative politics.” The first gathering of Chinese politics scholars took place at Harvard in December 2017.
‘Burning Questions’ Light Up Second Gathering
That first conference at Harvard reinforced the utility of inter-dialog and helped organizers secure a grant from APSA, which along with support from from FSI and Shorenstein APARC facilitated the second gathering, this time at Stanford. To ensure that the sessions allowed for maximum participant engagement, attendees were assigned into seven working groups. In the months preceding the conference, each group prepared a memo identifying the key questions in the field of Chinese politics, the ways to addressing these questions, and the synergies between Chinese politics and comparative politics .
“The State of the Field in Chinese Politics” conference opened with presentations by the seven small group leaders to a plenary session, followed by discussion of the various burning questions identified by the participants. Unsurprisingly, one prominent item across many of the memos was the oversized impact of Xi on China. Other areas of interest included “elite politics,” the relationship between newfound billionaires and the party, the renewed role of state-owned enterprises in the economy, and the current status of relationships between the private sector, the Party, and the state
Several groups also expressed their desire to learn more about the internal workings of the Party, specifically the adaptation of political institutions over time. While observers often point out that China’s political institutions have changed little compared to its economic institutions, scholars have also found that, in fact, the changes within China’s governmental organizations have been subtle yet profound. But how can we determine when an organizational structure changes the ways in which it operates, and who decides? The field of Chinese politics remains uncertain about these questions.
On the second day, conference attendees were joined by several Stanford scholars of comparative politics, including FSI Director Mike McFaul and FSI Senior Fellows Lisa Blaydes, Beatriz Magaloni and Barry Weingast, who responded to the group memos. Breakout discussions of methodology followed.
Keeping the Fire Going
(From left to right): Professors Kellee Tsai, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology; Jean Oi, Stanford University; Mary Gallagher, University of Michigan; and Margaret Pearson, University of Maryland confer with one another
The conference concluded with a plenary session that focused on the questions "Where are we now?” and “Where do we go next?" One conclusion from the closing was an acknowledgment of the need to more fully consider China in the context of its interactions with other countries in the region as well as globally. “I think that ‘China in the Global Context’ may very well be the theme of our next conference,” said Oi.
A third conference is tentatively scheduled for December 2019. The five partners behind the series—Stanford University, Harvard University, Duke University, MIT, and the University of Michigan—are currently seeking outside funding to keep this effort going. The hope is that the next meeting will be at Duke University.
The pace of China-U.S. strategic competition has accelerated in the Asia-Pacific, causing heightened concern among U.S. allies and partners in the region over China’s economic expansion, Belt and Road Initiative, and maritime ambitions that challenge U.S. dominance in the region. Even U.S. allies as reliable as Australia are wondering openly about the capacity of the U.S. to balance Chinese influence. The Trump administration’s isolationist rhetoric, abandonment of TPP, withdrawal from the Paris Climate Accords, and “flinch” during the recent trade war has increased this concern. China meanwhile has demonstrated increased sophistication in diplomacy and in neutralizing historical U.S. advantages. The new frontiers of cyber and space are the most likely domains in which these challenges will play out from a security perspective. The choices that the U.S. makes in these realms in the next two years may establish a course for the region that cannot be corrected later.
Ambassador Jeffrey Bleich is the former US ambassador to Australia and Special Counsel to President Obama in the White House. He is currently a partner at Dentons and CEO of Dentons Diplomatic Solutions, where he focuses on privacy and data security, internal investigations, market access, and cross-border disputes involving the Indo-Pacific region.
As ambassador, his term was marked by the US "rebalance" to the Asia Pacific, with Australia being the focal point for that shift. His efforts included overseeing record growth in trade and investment between the US and Australia, bringing the Defense Trade Cooperation Treaty into force, establishing new alliance agreements for satellites and cybersecurity, executing a new space cooperation agreement that supported the Mars Curiosity rover landing, leading joint US-Australia efforts in Afghanistan’s Uruzgan province, and promoting regional human rights efforts. For his federal service, Amb. Bleich has received numerous awards, including the highest civilian honors awarded by the Director of National Intelligence and the United States Navy. In 2014, he received the State Department's highest award for a non-career ambassador, the Sue Cobb Prize for Exemplary Diplomatic Service.
Amb. Bleich currently serves as Chair of the Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board (appointed by President Obama) and as a member of the East-West Center (appointed by Secretary Kerry). He also serves by appointment of the Governor on the Governor's 11-member International Trade and Investment Council. He was formerly the President of the State Bar of California, and the Chair of the California State University Board of Trustees, and currently serves on the Board of Stanford’s Center For the Advanced Study of Behavior Science, and the Board of Amherst College. He has been elected as a life member to both the American Law Institute and the Council on Foreign Relations.
Amb. Bleich received his B.A. from Amherst College (with high honors), M.P.P. from Harvard (with highest honors), and J.D. from U.C. Berkeley (with highest honors) where he also served as Editor-in-Chief of the California Law Review. He clerked for Judge Abner Mikva of the DC Circuit, Chief Justice William Rehnquist of the U.S. Supreme Court, and Judge Howard Holtzmann of the Iran-U.S. Claims Tribunal in the Hague, before becoming a partner at Munger Tolles & Olson. Amb. Bleich has been regularly listed among the Daily Journal's Top 100 attorneys in California, honored as a California Lawyer Attorney of the Year and listed in Lawdragon 500 and in America's Best Lawyers as a top “Bet the Company” lawyer.
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This event is part of the China Program’s Colloquia Series entitled "A New Cold War?: Sharp Power, Strategic Competition, and the Future of U.S.-China Relations " sponsored by Shorenstein APARC's China Program.
A New Cold War?: Sharp Power, Strategic Competition, and the Future of U.S.-China Relations
Trade conflict has exploded. The media is rife with stories of China’s unfair trade practices, cyber theft, IP theft and forced technology transfers. Who will first scale the commanding heights of technological supremacy? Who will be the first mover in AI, robotics and biotechnology? What are the implications of Beijing’s ambitious infrastructure projects, including its Belt and Road Initiative? How is China’s “sharp power” deployed, and what are its implications for political and civic life in the U.S.? Can the Trump administration and Beijing’s leadership reach agreement on our trade disputes? Are these just the beginning salvos of an increasingly turbulent future? As U.S. policy towards China sharply veers away from “constructive engagement” to “strategic competition,” the Stanford China Program will host a series of talks by leading experts to explore the current state of our bilateral relations, its potential future, and their implications for the world order.
Please note venue change to Bechtel Conference Room (Encina Hall, 1st Floor)
This panel aims to bring together a diverse spectrum of speakers to generate discussion and debate regarding Chinese Influence and American Interests: Promoting Constructive Vigilance, a report jointly issued on November 29, 2018 by the Hoover Institution at Stanford University and the Center on U.S.-China Relations at Asia Society.
Chinese Influence and American Interests: Promoting Constructive Vigilance has sparked sharp reactions as it urges American governments, organizations and individuals to engage in “constructive vigilance” to counter China’s illicit, influence-seeking operations across a broad spectrum of American political and civic life, including U.S. federal and state governments; university campuses; and the technology sector. What is the evidence behind these claims? What are the implications of these claims? Is the Chinese threat real or speculative? How can we responsibly assess the difference?
Link to report found
Gordon H. Chang is the Olive H. Palmer Professor in Humanities and professor in the Department of History at Stanford University. With degrees from Princeton and Stanford, Chang specializes in the history of U.S.-China relations and Asian American history. He has written and edited many books and essays on these topics. Among these are Friends and Enemies: The United States, China, and the Soviet Union, 1948-1972 (Stanford University Press, 1990); Morning Glory, Evening Shadow: Yamato Ichihashi and His Internment Writing, 1942-1945 (Stanford University Press, 1997); Asian Americans and Politics: Perspectives, Experiences, Prospects (Woodrow Wilson Center Press, 2001); Chinese American Voices From the Gold Rush to the Present (University of California Press, 2006); Asian American Art: A History, 1850-1970 (Stanford University Press, 2008); and Fateful Ties: A History of America’s Preoccupation with China (Harvard University Press, 2015). At Stanford, he is co-directing the Chinese Railroad Workers in North America Project that is recovering and interpreting the history of Chinese workers who toiled on the first transcontinental rail line and other lines in the 19th century.
Larry Diamond is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution and at the Freeman Spogli Institute (FSI) for International Studies. For more than six years, he directed FSI’s Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law, where he now leads its Program on Arab Reform and Democracy and its Global Digital Policy Incubator. He is the founding co- editor of the Journal of Democracy and also serves as Senior Consultant at the International Forum for Democratic Studies of the National Endowment for Democracy. His research focuses on democratic trends and conditions around in the world, and on policies and reforms to defend and advance democracy. His 2016 book, In Search of Democracy, explores the challenges confronting democracy and democracy promotion, gathering together three decades of his writing and research, particularly on Africa and Asia. He has just completed a new book on the global crisis of democracy, which will be published in 2019, and is now writing a textbook on democratic development.
Elizabeth C. Economy is the C.V. Starr senior fellow and director for Asia studies at the Council on Foreign Relations and a distinguished visiting fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution. Her most recent book, The Third Revolution: Xi Jinping and the New Chinese State, (Oxford University Press, 2018) analyzes the contradictory nature of reform under President Xi Jinping. She is also author of By All Means Necessary: How China's Resource Quest is Changing the World(Oxford University Press, 2014) with Michael Levi, and The River Runs Black: The Environmental Challenge to China's Future (Cornell University Press, 2004; 2nd edition, 2010; Japanese edition, 2005; Chinese edition, 2011). She has published articles in policy and scholarly journals including Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, and the Harvard Business Review; and op-eds in the New York Times and Washington Post, among others. In June 2018, she was named one of the "10 Names That Matter on China Policy" by Politico Magazine.
David M. Lampton is Oksenberg-Rohlen Fellow and Research Scholar at Stanford University’s Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center. He also is Hyman Professor and Director of China Studies Emeritus at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. Having started his academic career at The Ohio State University, Lampton has been Chairman of the The Asia Foundation (2015-2018), president of the National Committee on United States-China Relations (1988-1997), and former Dean of Faculty at SAIS (2004-2012). He is the author of: Same Bed, Different Dreams: Managing U.S.-China Relations, 1989-2000 (2001); The Three Faces of Chinese Power: Might, Money, and Minds (2008); and, The Making of Chinese Foreign and Security Policy (editor, Stanford University Press, 2001). He received his B.A., M.A., and Ph.D. degrees from Stanford University where, as an undergraduate student, he was a fireman. Lampton has an honorary doctorate from the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Far Eastern Studies. His newest book, Following the Leader: Ruling China, from Deng Xiaoping to Xi Jinping, was first published in January 2014 and will be reissued in paperback with a new Preface early in 2019 by the University of California Press. His current field research and book-length project focuses on Beijing’s effort to build high-speed and other rail lines to Singapore from southern China.
Jean C. Oi is the William Haas Professor of Chinese Politics in the department of political science and a Senior Fellow of FSI at Stanford University. She is the founding director of the Stanford China Program at Shorenstein APARC. Professor Oi also is the founding Lee Shau Kee Director of the Stanford Center at Peking University. Her work focuses on comparative politics, with special expertise on political economy and the process of reform in transitional systems. Oi has written extensively on China’s political economy. Her most recent works include, Zouping Revisited: Adaptive Governance in a Chinese County, with Steven Goldstein (2018); Challenges in the Process of China’s Urbanization, with Karen Eggleston and Yiming Wang (2017); Going Private in China: The Politics of Corporate Restructuring and System Reform (2011); and Growing Pains: Tensions and Opportunity in China’s Transformation, with Scott Rozelle and Xueguang Zhou (2010).
This event is part of the China Program’s Colloquia Series entitled "A New Cold War?: Sharp Power, Strategic Competition, and the Future of U.S.-China Relations " sponsored by Shorenstein APARC's China Program.
A New Cold War?: Sharp Power, Strategic Competition, and the Future of U.S.-China Relations
Trade conflict has exploded. The media is rife with stories of China’s unfair trade practices, cyber theft, IP theft and forced technology transfers. Who will first scale the commanding heights of technological supremacy? Who will be the first mover in AI, robotics and biotechnology? What are the implications of Beijing’s ambitious infrastructure projects, including its Belt and Road Initiative? How is China’s “sharp power” deployed, and what are its implications for political and civic life in the U.S.? Can the Trump administration and Beijing’s leadership reach agreement on our trade disputes? Are these just the beginning salvos of an increasingly turbulent future? As U.S. policy towards China sharply veers away from “constructive engagement” to “strategic competition,” the Stanford China Program will host a series of talks by leading experts to explore the current state of our bilateral relations, its potential future, and their implications for the world order.
For a recap, audio, transcript and pictures of the event, please see the following link.
https://aparc.fsi.stanford.edu/china/multimedia/transcripts-chinese-influence-real-or-perceived
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President Trump’s trade war has infected every domain of Sino-American relations. For better or ill, Washington appears poised to dismantle China’s interdependence with the American economy, limit its role in global governance, counter its investments, and block its technological advances. How and on what terms will this end? The answer will depend on the capacity of the United States and China for statecraft and the effectiveness of each in raising its competitiveness. What challenges might hostile Sino-American coexistence entail for each nation? Which country is best positioned to develop the steadiest strategies, most purposive economic policies, and the most supportive relations with other states?
Ambassador Chas W. Freeman, Jr. is a senior fellow at Brown University's Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs. He is the former assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs (1993–1994), ambassador to Saudi Arabia (1989–1992), principal deputy assistant secretary of state for African affairs (1986–1989), and chargé d'affaires at Bangkok (1984–1986) and Beijing (1981–1984). He served as vice chair of the Atlantic Council (1996-2008); co-chair of the United States China Policy Foundation (1996–2009); and president of the Middle East Policy Council (1997–2009). He was the principal American interpreter during President Nixon's path-breaking 1972 visit to Beijing, the editor of the Encyclopedia Britannica article on diplomacy, and the author of America’s Continuing Misadventures in the Middle East; Interesting Times: China, America, and the Shifting Balance of Prestige; America’s Misadventures in the Middle East; The Diplomat’s Dictionary; and Arts of Power: Statecraft and Diplomacy. A compendium of his speeches is available at chasfreeman.net.
This event is part of the China Program’s Colloquia Series entitled "A New Cold War?: Sharp Power, Strategic Competition, and the Future of U.S.-China Relations " sponsored by Shorenstein APARC's China Program.
A New Cold War?: Sharp Power, Strategic Competition, and the Future of U.S.-China Relations
Trade conflict has exploded. The media is rife with stories of China’s unfair trade practices, cyber theft, IP theft and forced technology transfers. Who will first scale the commanding heights of technological supremacy? Who will be the first mover in AI, robotics and biotechnology? What are the implications of Beijing’s ambitious infrastructure projects, including its Belt and Road Initiative? How is China’s “sharp power” deployed, and what are its implications for political and civic life in the U.S.? Can the Trump administration and Beijing’s leadership reach agreement on our trade disputes? Are these just the beginning salvos of an increasingly turbulent future? As U.S. policy towards China sharply veers away from “constructive engagement” to “strategic competition,” the Stanford China Program will host a series of talks by leading experts to explore the current state of our bilateral relations, its potential future, and their implications for the world order.
This event is co-sponsored by Shorenstein APARC's China Program and the Southeast Asia Program
Analysts of China run two occupational risks: One is underestimating PRC capacities to achieve national objectives and the other is overestimating Chinese power. In this talk, David (Mike) Lampton will elaborate upon this observation by focusing on the PRC and Southeast Asian effort to build high speed- and conventional-speed rail connectivity between southern China and seven continental Southeast Asian neighbors, including Singapore. His talk will center on a research project he is undertaking with two Southeast Asian scholars involving field work in eight countries. In his preliminary assessment, “progress has been greater than widely realized, and the problems are very large.” Lampton will analyze: What factors in China and among its neighbors promote, and which retard, progress? Indeed, how do different countries define “progress” and what capacities do China's smaller neighbors have to shape and, in some cases, even resist developments? And, in light of all this, how might the United States think about appropriate economic, strategic, and diplomatic responses?
David M. Lampton is Oksenberg-Rohlen Fellow and Research Scholar at Stanford University’s Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center. He also is Hyman Professor and Director of China Studies Emeritus at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. Having started his academic career at The Ohio State University, Lampton has been Chairman of the The Asia Foundation (2015-2018), president of the National Committee on United States-China Relations (1988-1997), and former Dean of Faculty at SAIS (2004-2012). He is the author of: Same Bed, Different Dreams: Managing U.S.-China Relations, 1989-2000 (2001); The Three Faces of Chinese Power: Might, Money, and Minds (2008); and, The Making of Chinese Foreign and Security Policy (editor, Stanford University Press, 2001). He received his B.A., M.A., and Ph.D. degrees from Stanford University where, as an undergraduate student, he was a fireman. Lampton has an honorary doctorate from the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Far Eastern Studies. His newest book, Following the Leader: Ruling China, from Deng Xiaoping to Xi Jinping, was first published in January 2014 and will be reissued in paperback with a new Preface early in 2019 by the University of California Press. His current field research and book-length project focuses on Beijing’s effort to build high-speed and other rail lines to Singapore from southern China and involves interview and field research in eight countries. He is undertaking this research with two colleagues.
This event is part of the China Program’s Colloquia Series entitled "A New Cold War?: Sharp Power, Strategic Competition, and the Future of U.S.-China Relations " sponsored by Shorenstein APARC's China Program.
A New Cold War?: Sharp Power, Strategic Competition, and the Future of U.S.-China Relations
Trade conflict has exploded. The media is rife with stories of China’s unfair trade practices, cyber theft, IP theft and forced technology transfers. Who will first scale the commanding heights of technological supremacy? Who will be the first mover in AI, robotics and biotechnology? What are the implications of Beijing’s ambitious infrastructure projects, including its Belt and Road Initiative? How is China’s “sharp power” deployed, and what are its implications for political and civic life in the U.S.? Can the Trump administration and Beijing’s leadership reach agreement on our trade disputes? Are these just the beginning salvos of an increasingly turbulent future? As U.S. policy towards China sharply veers away from “constructive engagement” to “strategic competition,” the Stanford China Program will host a series of talks by leading experts to explore the current state of our bilateral relations, its potential future, and their implications for the world order.
Over the past six years, Chinese leader Xi Jinping and the rest of the senior Chinese leadership have unleashed a powerful set of political and economic reforms: the centralization of power under Xi himself, the expansion of the Communist Party's role in Chinese political, social and economic life, and the construction of a virtual wall of regulations to control more closely the exchange of ideas and capital between China and the outside world. Beyond its borders, Beijing has recast itself as a great power, seeking to reclaim its past glory and to create a system of international norms that better serves its more ambitious geo-strategic objectives. What are the implications of the Chinese leaders' reform efforts? How sustainable are they? What are the implications for relations with the United States and the rest of the world?
Elizabeth Economy is the C.V. Starr senior fellow and director for Asia studies at the Council on Foreign Relations and a distinguished visiting fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution. Her most recent book, The Third Revolution: Xi Jinping and the New Chinese State, (Oxford University Press, 2018) analyzes the contradictory nature of reform under President Xi Jinping. She is also author of By All Means Necessary: How China's Resource Quest is Changing the World (Oxford University Press, 2014) with Michael Levi, and The River Runs Black: The Environmental Challenge to China's Future (Cornell University Press, 2004; 2nd edition, 2010; Japanese edition, 2005; Chinese edition, 2011). She has published articles in policy and scholarly journals including Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, and the Harvard Business Review; and op-eds in the New York Times and Washington Post, among others. In June 2018, she was named one of the "10 Names That Matter on China Policy" by Politico Magazine.
This event is part of the China Program’s Colloquia Series entitled "A New Cold War?: Sharp Power, Strategic Competition, and the Future of U.S.-China Relations " sponsored by Shorenstein APARC's China Program.
A New Cold War?: Sharp Power, Strategic Competition, and the Future of U.S.-China Relations
Trade conflict has exploded. The media is rife with stories of China’s unfair trade practices, cyber theft, IP theft and forced technology transfers. Who will first scale the commanding heights of technological supremacy? Who will be the first mover in AI, robotics and biotechnology? What are the implications of Beijing’s ambitious infrastructure projects, including its Belt and Road Initiative? How is China’s “sharp power” deployed, and what are its implications for political and civic life in the U.S.? Can the Trump administration and Beijing’s leadership reach agreement on our trade disputes? Are these just the beginning salvos of an increasingly turbulent future? As U.S. policy towards China sharply veers away from “constructive engagement” to “strategic competition,” the Stanford China Program will host a series of talks by leading experts to explore the current state of our bilateral relations, its potential future, and their implications for the world order.
On November 29, 2018, a working group, co-chaired by Larry Diamond, senior fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and at the Hoover Institution, and Orville Schell, Arthur Ross director of the Asia Society’s Center on U.S.-China Relations, released the report “Chinese Influence and American Interests: Promoting Constructive Vigilance," which documents the extent of China’s influence-seeking activities in American society. The report details a range of assertive and opaque “sharp power” efforts that China has stepped up within the United States in multiple sectors. These, argue members of the working group, penetrate deeply the social and political fabric of our democratic society and exploit its openness.
APARC’s Donald K. Emmerson and Thomas Fingar provided the Chinese international affairs website Dunjiaodu with their own commentaries on the report. English language versions of both pieces were published by IPP Review (here and here), and are provided below.
APARC also hosted a special roundtable discussion of the report's findings and recommendations, featuring Diamond and Schell. You can listen to the event's audio recording on our website.
Comment on "Chinese Influence and American Interests"
By Donald K. Emmerson
December 24, 2018
Chinese Influence and American Interests: Promoting Constructive Vigilance is an important and timely report. It deserves translation into Chinese and wide circulation inside the PRC. It should be made available on-line for free downloading by people in China from all walks of life, including scholars, teachers, authors, entrepreneurs, and officials from Beijing down to the lowest levels of administration throughout the country. Relations between the US and China are far too important to the citizenries of our two countries to restrict access to the report to a miniscule proportion of China’s population—the elite English-reading few who enjoy privileged (uncensored) exposure to critical facts and comments regarding the Chinese government’s behavior abroad.
I willingly attended a meeting of the Working Group on Chinese Influence Activities in the United States. My academic specialty is Southeast Asia, including its relations with China, so I chose not contribute text to the report. Understandably, not every sentence in its the 199 pages exactly matches what I might have preferred to read or decided to write. (Relevant is my “Singapore and Goliath?” in the April 2018 Journal of Democracy.) But I supported the Working Group’s work and I agree with its outcome.
Included in the report is a dissenting opinion by Susan Shirk. I respect her view. But I am less concerned than she that the report risks “putting all ethnic Chinese under a cloud of suspicion.” The word “constructive” in the report’s subtitle explicitly conveys the Working Group’s desire neither to stereotype nor denigrate people of Chinese descent. At the meeting I attended, this wish was repeatedly expressed. I endorse and appreciate the editors’ caution that, alongside our critique, we “must be mindful to do no harm,” and that the report should not be misused to disparage ethnically Chinese people, who have indeed, as the editors state, made “enormous” contributions to American progress. I would merely enlarge that gratitude to include the economic, political, and cultural benefits attributable to ethnic Chinese individuals, historically and now, throughout the world—my own specialty, Southeast Asia, notably included.
"Flies and Barriers": On the China-U.S. Relationship
By Thomas Fingar
December 20, 2018
The recent report of the Working Group on Chinese Influence Activities in the United States was not timed to coincide with the 40th anniversary of Reform and Opening and the restoration of US-China diplomatic relations but it provides “teaching moment” opportunities for reflection on the ways in which China and the United States have managed the challenges of deeper engagement. I hope that the full report will be available in China and urge readers of this commentary to read it and to think about the issues it raises. I had no role in the preparation of the report but concur with the views expressed by Susan Shirk in her dissenting opinion.
One cluster of issues centers on important asymmetries in the US-China relationship. The report describes numerous ways in which Chinese entities interact with institutions and individuals in the United States and correctly notes the almost complete absence of legal and procedural impediments to such interaction. One cannot say the same about China. Four decades into the era of reform and opening, China remains far less open to foreign ideas, interaction, and influence than is the United States. I encourage readers to ask why that is the case and to consider the consequences and implications for China’s future development. To paraphrase Deng Xiaoping, the concerns raised in the Working Group report represent “flies” that entered the United States through the window of extensive engagement with China. The report calls for dealing with the flies, not closing the window. China seems increasingly determined to prevent the intrusion of foreign “flies” by erecting (or failing to lower) barriers.
Asymmetries in access are not limited to the dimensions of US-China relations discussed in this report. The US economy remains far more open to goods, investment, and ownership from China than China is to comparable forms of engagement by Americans. For decades, US laws, policy, and citizens accepted — even fostered — such asymmetries to strengthen our allies and partners. China has benefitted from this asymmetry, as have dozens of other countries. Policies to make our partners and allies stronger and more prosperous were designed to — and did — enhance American security and prosperity, but almost three decades after the end of the Cold War, many Americans understandably ask why we continue to accept such a high degree of inequality. What made sense during the Cold War and before our partners became stronger and more prosperous now seems unfair and unwise. As a result, American thinking about the ways we interact with other nations is shifting from acceptance of asymmetries to demands for reciprocity and equal treatment.
Some Chinese commentaries on the Working Group report have asserted that it reflects waning self-confidence and fear of China’s rise. Such assessments are wrong. Belief that we should receive essentially the same treatment from other countries as they accord to the United States and American citizens, firms, NGOs, and other entities reflects the strength of our commitment to fairness, not fear of competition. The long-held consensus that US policy should treat all countries (except explicit enemies, which China was from 1950 until the late 1960s) equally regardless of how they treated the United States has eroded significantly. That consensus is being replaced by calls for stricter reciprocity and treating other countries in the same way that they treat us. This sentiment is not limited to engagement with China but the Working Group report captures the emerging consensus by noting that Chinese media have far greater access to the United States than American reporters, newspapers, and broadcasts have to Chinese audiences. That is a fact, not an expression of paranoia or lack of confidence. Indeed, readers of this commentary might reflect upon why it is that China seems to lack confidence in the ability of its people to make their own judgments about foreign ideas and compete with foreign firms.
I was in China when the report was published and many Chinese interlocutors depicted its findings and recommendations as “proof” that the United States had abandoned engagement and reverted to containment policies designed to thwart China’s rise. Both their characterization of the report and their assertions about American policy are wrong. None of these interlocutors had read the report (their opinions were based on negative commentary), and I suspect that many would change their assessment if they had a chance to do so. I also suspect that many in China would change their minds about whether the United States is attempting to “contain” China if they had access to more — and more accurate — information about American willingness to acknowledge and manage the “flies” of engagement and Chinese efforts to erect barriers to Western ideas.