China Can Deal With the US: Scholars
Global Times
2020/7/7 0:13:41
Illustration: Liu Rui/GT
Some people in both China and the US are worried that the trade war the US launched against China since 2018 will soon impact other areas - investment, education, science and technology, judicial matters, the Hong Kong and Xinjiang questions and more. They are concerned that it will eventually evolve into a new cold war between the two major powers.
Niall Ferguson and other well-known American scholars have recently published articles contending that a new cold war has broken out between China and the US. What do Chinese scholars think about this issue?
The research group on China-US people-to-people exchanges at the Chongyang Institute for Financial Studies, Renmin University of China recently conducted a telephone questionnaire that surveyed 100 Chinese scholars. Here are the results exclusive in the Global Times: Of all the surveyed Chinese scholars, 62 percent believe that the US is indeed waging a new cold war against China. But more than 90 percent believe that China is capable of coping well with the new cold war offensive by the US.
Is the US capable of launching another cold war against China?
In the past three years, the attitude of the US toward China has turned sharply downward. Indeed, most Chinese scholars feel frosty relations are already there. According to the survey's results, 62 percent of Chinese scholars believe that the US is launching a new cold war against China, while only 35 percent disagree. Some scholars believe that the state of affairs between China and the US are more of a "cool war." Many scholars call on China to abandon its illusions, face reality, and meet these challenges.
One of the respondents, Liu Weidong, a researcher at the Institute of American Studies at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said Chinese scholars used to hold the view that China-US relations can never be too good or too bad. However, right now the new understanding is that the relationship between China and the US will never be the same again. There is also a view holding that China-US relations are falling off a "cliff."
As for the US policy toward China, Liu believes that a growing number of scholars believe the US adopts a policy of "confrontation" and "containment," and some scholars use a new term "confinement." At present, Chinese scholars generally believe that the US political circle has reached a domestic consensus to be tough on China.
Liu said that China should give up its illusions about the US for three main reasons. First, at present the US political circle does no justice to China. Second, the US policy toward China is relentless and unbridled. In the past, the US has been willing to respond whenever China compromised. But the Trump administration has broken the convention, and it will impose tougher sanctions on China if China deals a strike back. Third, the US seems to be willing to accept a "lose-lose" situation in order to suppress China.
Regarding the term "new cold war," Liu said that the old "Cold War" was a specific term referring to the confrontation between the two fronts of the US and the Soviet Union. But now it is the US unilaterally trying to organize an anti-China front, while China does not have an anti-US front.
In short, China is not the former Soviet Union and the US is not what it was. The global environment in which there was a great ideological confrontation between capitalism and socialism no longer exists. The international community is generally eager for peace and development. So, if the US really wants to launch a new cold war against China, will China and the US go into a "cold war" equivalent to the one between the US and the Soviet Union?
When questioned whether a new cold war like the US-Soviet one is likely between China and the US, 82 percent of Chinese scholars do not think it will happen. Only 13 percent think it is possible for China and the US to enter a US-Soviet style standoff.
In the context of globalization, countries' interests are intertwined. Most countries in the world do not want to take sides in a competition between China and the US. At the bilateral level, the US and the Soviet Union had completely decoupled. By comparison, the interests of China and the US are so intertwined at foundational levels of trade, finance, education, counter-terrorism and global public security.
From the perspective of the willingness of both sides, China has no intention to engage itself in a cold war. The current major problems in the US are ethnic conflicts, wealth gaps, aging, financial crisis and industrial hollowing-out and so on, especially in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Ding Yifan, a researcher at the Institute of World Development, Development Research Center of the State Council, believes that some people in the US advocate a new cold war by using empirical thinking to examine current China-US relations. They hark back to the Soviet-style containment. This idea is totally divorced from reality. Some US politicians have drastically miscalculated the situation.
First, China and the US cannot sever all their ties. As the world's most important trading partners, China and the US have intertwined interests. The profits of large US companies in the Chinese market even exceed those in the US market. Major US companies will not allow decoupling to take place between China and the US.
Second, some US politicians have greatly overestimated the country's capital and technological power. During the confrontation between the US and the Soviet Union, the capital and technological advantages of the US were very obvious. But now this overwhelming advantage no longer exists.
Can the US really contain China's rise?
In the eyes of most Chinese scholars, although the US is unable to launch a cold war similar to the great game between the US and the Soviet Union, the "cooling" of China-US relations has become a general trend. However, 90 percent of them believe that China can cope well with the US new cold war offensive against China. Only 6 percent of scholars are pessimistic.
Liu Zongyi, a research fellow with Shanghai Institutes for International Studies, believes that the situation between China and the US is very different from that between the US and the Soviet Union. Economically, China and the US are closely linked and interdependent. Although the US wants to decouple itself from China, it is very difficult. In terms of values and ideology, China is not in clash of values and ideologies with the West. In terms of geopolitics and military, the confrontation between the two
2020/7/7 0:13:41
Illustration: Liu Rui/GT
Some people in both China and the US are worried that the trade war the US launched against China since 2018 will soon impact other areas - investment, education, science and technology, judicial matters, the Hong Kong and Xinjiang questions and more. They are concerned that it will eventually evolve into a new cold war between the two major powers.
Niall Ferguson and other well-known American scholars have recently published articles contending that a new cold war has broken out between China and the US. What do Chinese scholars think about this issue?
The research group on China-US people-to-people exchanges at the Chongyang Institute for Financial Studies, Renmin University of China recently conducted a telephone questionnaire that surveyed 100 Chinese scholars. Here are the results exclusive in the Global Times: Of all the surveyed Chinese scholars, 62 percent believe that the US is indeed waging a new cold war against China. But more than 90 percent believe that China is capable of coping well with the new cold war offensive by the US.
Is the US capable of launching another cold war against China?
In the past three years, the attitude of the US toward China has turned sharply downward. Indeed, most Chinese scholars feel frosty relations are already there. According to the survey's results, 62 percent of Chinese scholars believe that the US is launching a new cold war against China, while only 35 percent disagree. Some scholars believe that the state of affairs between China and the US are more of a "cool war." Many scholars call on China to abandon its illusions, face reality, and meet these challenges.
One of the respondents, Liu Weidong, a researcher at the Institute of American Studies at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said Chinese scholars used to hold the view that China-US relations can never be too good or too bad. However, right now the new understanding is that the relationship between China and the US will never be the same again. There is also a view holding that China-US relations are falling off a "cliff."
As for the US policy toward China, Liu believes that a growing number of scholars believe the US adopts a policy of "confrontation" and "containment," and some scholars use a new term "confinement." At present, Chinese scholars generally believe that the US political circle has reached a domestic consensus to be tough on China.
Liu said that China should give up its illusions about the US for three main reasons. First, at present the US political circle does no justice to China. Second, the US policy toward China is relentless and unbridled. In the past, the US has been willing to respond whenever China compromised. But the Trump administration has broken the convention, and it will impose tougher sanctions on China if China deals a strike back. Third, the US seems to be willing to accept a "lose-lose" situation in order to suppress China.
Regarding the term "new cold war," Liu said that the old "Cold War" was a specific term referring to the confrontation between the two fronts of the US and the Soviet Union. But now it is the US unilaterally trying to organize an anti-China front, while China does not have an anti-US front.
In short, China is not the former Soviet Union and the US is not what it was. The global environment in which there was a great ideological confrontation between capitalism and socialism no longer exists. The international community is generally eager for peace and development. So, if the US really wants to launch a new cold war against China, will China and the US go into a "cold war" equivalent to the one between the US and the Soviet Union?
When questioned whether a new cold war like the US-Soviet one is likely between China and the US, 82 percent of Chinese scholars do not think it will happen. Only 13 percent think it is possible for China and the US to enter a US-Soviet style standoff.
In the context of globalization, countries' interests are intertwined. Most countries in the world do not want to take sides in a competition between China and the US. At the bilateral level, the US and the Soviet Union had completely decoupled. By comparison, the interests of China and the US are so intertwined at foundational levels of trade, finance, education, counter-terrorism and global public security.
From the perspective of the willingness of both sides, China has no intention to engage itself in a cold war. The current major problems in the US are ethnic conflicts, wealth gaps, aging, financial crisis and industrial hollowing-out and so on, especially in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Ding Yifan, a researcher at the Institute of World Development, Development Research Center of the State Council, believes that some people in the US advocate a new cold war by using empirical thinking to examine current China-US relations. They hark back to the Soviet-style containment. This idea is totally divorced from reality. Some US politicians have drastically miscalculated the situation.
First, China and the US cannot sever all their ties. As the world's most important trading partners, China and the US have intertwined interests. The profits of large US companies in the Chinese market even exceed those in the US market. Major US companies will not allow decoupling to take place between China and the US.
Second, some US politicians have greatly overestimated the country's capital and technological power. During the confrontation between the US and the Soviet Union, the capital and technological advantages of the US were very obvious. But now this overwhelming advantage no longer exists.
Can the US really contain China's rise?
In the eyes of most Chinese scholars, although the US is unable to launch a cold war similar to the great game between the US and the Soviet Union, the "cooling" of China-US relations has become a general trend. However, 90 percent of them believe that China can cope well with the US new cold war offensive against China. Only 6 percent of scholars are pessimistic.
Liu Zongyi, a research fellow with Shanghai Institutes for International Studies, believes that the situation between China and the US is very different from that between the US and the Soviet Union. Economically, China and the US are closely linked and interdependent. Although the US wants to decouple itself from China, it is very difficult. In terms of values and ideology, China is not in clash of values and ideologies with the West. In terms of geopolitics and military, the confrontation between the two
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