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51. China below the Radar: Israel-US Strategic Dialogue on Technology

Author:
Assaf Orion and Shira Efron
Publication Date:
07-2022
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Institute for National Security Studies (INSS)
Abstract:
The statements issued by President Biden during his visit to the Middle East include little mention of China. However, close reading reveals that between the lines, China is quite present in the agreements reached by the President and Israel and Saudi Arabia. The dialogue on technology cooperation announced by Jerusalem and Washington, which is related directly to the Great Power competition, signals a new stage in partnership between the countries: Israel alongside the United States, even if not against China
Topic:
Diplomacy, Science and Technology, Bilateral Relations, and Rivalry
Political Geography:
China, Middle East, Israel, Asia, North America, and United States of America

52. The Race to Electric Vehicles: Technology, US-China Rivalry, and Big Money

Author:
Ariel Sobelman
Publication Date:
06-2022
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Institute for National Security Studies (INSS)
Abstract:
In recent years Israel has become a leading player in auto tech, and China is interested in Israeli developments in a field that is expected to assume a significant role in the rivalry between Washington and Beijing. Therefore, it is important for Israel to define a national strategy on the issue, in order to avoid unnecessary involvement in the inter-bloc clash
Topic:
Green Technology, Innovation, Rivalry, and Electric Vehicles
Political Geography:
China, Asia, North America, and United States of America

53. Introducing Third Way’s US-China Digital World Order Initiative

Author:
Valerie Shen and Jayson Browder
Publication Date:
06-2022
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Third Way
Abstract:
If it wasn’t clear three months ago, it is clear now: the next global era will be defined by democracy versus autocracy. In this competition, a new and decisive divide pits America’s approach of “digital democracy” against China’s approach of “digital autocracy.” This great divide places the US and allies on one side and China's unfettered access to sensitive data on the other. China’s digital authoritarianism has been described as "one giant QAnon" and is ubiquitous among the 1.4 billion inhabitants of the country. Moreover, one of the greatest threats to American national security interests is if China prevails in exporting and normalizing its model of digital supremacy. China’s global network of surveillance systems is antithetical to liberal democratic values, as it monitors, punishes, and conditions citizens, as well as influences them through automated disinformation campaigns. China’s ambition for global digital supremacy is real and supported by aggressive diplomatic efforts and massive financial investments. The effort by the United States and like nations to maintain a peaceful and prosperous world order will require a level of sophistication and commitment unrivaled in our history. China is not only an adversary. It is sometimes a partner whose massive economy is deeply entwined with that of the US and other friendly nations. This is not the zero-sum game of the Cold War conflict, and the hope is that it never becomes so. Will liberal democracies strengthen and proliferate or weaken and dwindle in the 21st century? The Chinese state intends to shape the global digital order in its image by redrawing technological norms and standards. Ultimately, the US-China national security competition may hinge on who sets the digital world order.
Topic:
Science and Technology, Authoritarianism, Democracy, Digital Economy, Innovation, and Rivalry
Political Geography:
China, Asia, North America, and United States of America

54. Cutting through the Value Chain: The Long-Run Effects of Decoupling the East from the West

Author:
Gabriel Felbermayr, Alexander Sandkamp, and Hendrik Mahlkow
Publication Date:
03-2022
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW)
Abstract:
With ever-increasing political tensions between China and Russia on one side and the EU and the US on the other, it only seems a matter of time until protectionist policies cause a decoupling of global value chains. This paper uses a computable general equilibrium trade model calibrated with the latest version of the GTAP database to simulate the effect of doubling non-tariff barriers - both unilateral and reciprocal - between the two blocks on trade and welfare. Imposing trade barriers almost completely eliminates bilateral imports. In addition, changes in price levels lead to higher imports and lower exports of the imposing country group from and to the rest of the world. The targeted country group increases exports to the rest of the world and reduces imports. Welfare falls in all countries involved, suggesting that governments should strive to cooperate rather than turning away from each other. By imposing a trade war on Russia, the political West could inflict severe damage on the Russian economy because of the latter’s smaller relative size.
Topic:
International Cooperation, International Trade and Finance, European Union, Conflict, Trade Wars, Protectionism, and Rivalry
Political Geography:
Russia, China, Europe, Asia, North America, and United States of America

55. A Primer on the 2022 National Security Strategy

Author:
Peter Juul and Heba Malik
Publication Date:
10-2022
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for American Progress - CAP
Abstract:
The 2022 National Security Strategy introduces new ideas on navigating strategic competition with China and Russia, investing at home, and a renewed focus on the fight against climate change.
Topic:
Security, Climate Change, National Security, Rivalry, and Strategic Interests
Political Geography:
Russia, China, Europe, Asia, North America, and United States of America

56. Overcoming American Hegemony: The Central Paradox of Chinese and Russian Revisionism

Author:
Adam P. MacDonald
Publication Date:
10-2022
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Military and Strategic Studies
Institution:
Centre for Military, Security and Strategic Studies
Abstract:
China and Russia are adopting increasingly assertive dispositions to reconstitute local geopolitical environments to their strategic advantage, requiring the erosion of American anchored hegemonic networks in their respective home regions. Despite growing material power bases, these pursuits are and will most likely continue to be unsuccessful. First, they are seen as threatening to other regional powers who are increasingly working together to counteract them. Second, these counterbalancing efforts reinforce the importance of the United States, given its still preponderant capabilities and networked centrality, in facilitating the coordination of existing and new political, economic and security arrangements which are increasingly oriented against China and Russia. A central paradox lies at the heart of these powers’ revisionist approaches: their actions inhibit desired new geopolitical realities, principally defined by alignment patterns, from emerging by reinforcing rather than displacing American hegemonic regional networks. Despite the negative strategic results being produced, it is expected both powers will double down on their current approaches to try to impose favorable regional realities before their power capacity wanes as domestic challenges grow. China and Russia are not existential challenges to but rather re-invigorate American hegemonic networks and its leading role within them. The greatest threat to American hegemony is not external but internal in terms of domestic alienation against the hegemonic project itself.
Topic:
Hegemony, Geopolitics, Rivalry, Multipolarity, and Revisionism
Political Geography:
Russia, China, and United States of America

57. The 21st Century's Great Military Rivalry

Author:
Graham Allison and Jonah Glick-Unterman
Publication Date:
09-2022
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
PRISM
Institution:
Institute for National Strategic Studies (INSS), National Defense University
Abstract:
A quarter-century ago, China conducted what it called “missile tests” bracketing the island of Taiwan to deter it from a move toward independence by demonstrating that China could cut Taiwan’s ocean lifelines. In response, in a show of superiority that forced China to back down, the United States deployed two aircraft carriers to Taiwan’s adjacent waters. If China were to repeat the same missile tests today, it is highly unlikely that the United States would respond as it did in 1996. If U.S. carriers moved that close to the Chinese mainland now, they could be sunk by the DF-21 and DF-26 missiles that China has since developed and deployed. This article presents three major theses concerning the military rivalry between China and the United States in this century. First, the era of U.S. military primacy is over: dead, buried, and gone—except in the minds of some political leaders and policy analysts who have not examined the hard facts.1 As former Secretary of Defense James Mattis put it starkly in his 2018 National Defense Strategy, “For decades the United States has enjoyed uncontested or dominant superiority in every operating domain. We could generally deploy our forces when we wanted, assemble them where we wanted, and operate how we wanted.”2 But that was then. “Today,” Mattis warned, “every domain is contested—air, land, sea, space, and cyberspace.”3 As a result, in the past two decades, the United States has been forced to retreat from a strategy based on primacy and dominance to one of deterrence. As President Joe Biden’s National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan and his National Security Council colleague Kurt Campbell acknowledged in 2019, “The United States must accept that military primacy will be difficult to restore, given the reach of China’s weapons, and instead focus on deterring China from interfering with its freedom of maneuver and from physically coercing U.S. allies and partners.”4 One of the architects of the Trump administration’s 2018 National Defense Strategy put it less diplomatically and more succinctly: “The era of untrammeled U.S. military superiority is over.”5
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, Deterrence, Strategic Competition, Rivalry, and Military
Political Geography:
China, Taiwan, and United States of America

58. The Effects of US-China Rivalry on Latin America and Their Implications

Author:
Sungwoo Hong, Yeo Joon Yoon, Jino Kim, Jeewoon Rim, and Jimin Nam
Publication Date:
02-2021
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Korea Institute for International Economic Policy (KIEP)
Abstract:
The conflict between the United States and China may be the issue of most importance as well as interest to the world, prior to COVID-19. This conflict between the two countries is appearing not only in the economic sector, but also in various field such as politics, diplomacy, and military affairs. Such competition between the two countries is likely to escalate further as multilateral systems such as the WTO are threatened and protectionism intensifies in the post-COVID-19 world. Even within Latin America, the competition between the two countries frequently appears in a variety of forms. Conflicts between the United States and China in Latin America tend to occur mainly in the infrastructure sectors. Furthermore, the United States pressured Latin American countries to choose between the United States and China, with the results of this pressure depending on the political orientation of the ruling government. In order to investigate the impact of retaliatory tariffs between the two countries on Latin American countries’ exports and welfare, we employ an event analysis for exports and computational general equilibrium (CGE) model for welfare, with Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, and Chile as the subject of our analysis. Based on the outcome of the event study, Brazil’s exports to the United States moderately increased due to the tariff imposition, and such an effect persisted for short term. Its exports to China rose considerably immediately after the tariff imposition, and then the impact tended to decrease over time. By contrast, it is difficult to conclude that the tariff imposition had a statistically significant and lasting effect on the exports of the remaining three countries to the United States and China. As a result of the analysis using the CGE model, meanwhile, the tariffs imposed between the United States and China trivially increased the welfare of Latin American countries.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Economy, Tariffs, Exports, Trade, and Rivalry
Political Geography:
China, Asia, South America, Latin America, Korea, and United States of America

59. Finding Firmer Ground: The Role of Civil Society and NGOs in U.S.-China Relations

Author:
The Carter Center
Publication Date:
02-2021
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
The Carter Center
Abstract:
This report looks back with respect and admiration on the decision of America’s and China’s leaders to restore normal diplomatic relations after a 30-year hiatus that witnessed war, economic isolation, and the bitter evaporation of long-standing contacts between the American and Chinese people. Its recommendations seek to contribute to an updated vision of U.S. engagement across the next century.
Topic:
Diplomacy, International Cooperation, Bilateral Relations, Hegemony, Conflict, Peace, and Rivalry
Political Geography:
China, Asia, North America, and United States of America

60. Competing Visions of International Order in the South China Sea

Author:
International Crisis Group
Publication Date:
11-2021
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
International Crisis Group
Abstract:
The disputes in the South China Sea are fundamentally about claims of sovereignty, the broadest of which are staked by Beijing. The Chinese-U.S. rivalry, meanwhile, loads the dissension with geopolitical significance. Both major powers stand to gain by accepting the constraints of international law.
Topic:
Territorial Disputes, Hegemony, Maritime, Conflict, and Rivalry
Political Geography:
China, Asia, North America, and United States of America