National Committee on U.S.-China Relations

A call to action by President Xi Jinping has led to significant resources being devoted to the development and expansion of China’s think tanks. While some critics have derided them as “tanks without thinkers,” China’s think tanks play a growing part in the crafting of domestic and foreign policies. In addition, their connections to party leadership make them an invaluable window through which for...

In a globalized world where millions of people travel between east and west each year and formerly separate cultural zones now overlap, it has never been more important to understand the values and perspectives that inform cross-cultural relations. Two new works of cultural observation and commentary put the differences in education, identity, and politics in the United States and China in perspec...

In recent years, China has devoted massive resources to advancing its capacity for technological innovation. The resulting deluge of R&D activities has brought Chinese companies significant commercial success. However, the massive resources China has mobilized are not yet efficiently translating into successful outputs, resulting in a “low metabolism” of inputs into technology innovation. Scott Ke...

In this podcast interview, Ian Johnson discusses his recent book, the religious revival underway in China, and what this means for the world’s newest superpower, with National Committee Senior Director for Educational Programs Margot Landman. The Communist Party of China has long had an uneasy relationship with religion. Its antipathy reached a crescendo during the Cultural Revolution when religio...

Popular images of Chinese media generally cast it as an agent of state propaganda. This is hardly surprising given the history of Chinese official media, and the swift suppression of those who openly criticize the regime. Yet the dichotomy between media and the party, with the former perpetually dominated by the latter, is complicated by the emergence of what Maria Repnikova, in her new book, term...

Over the past four decades, global cities have emerged in both the United States and China, including Hong Kong. In the process, they have absorbed their local environments and expanded their commercial networks around the world. As the urban landscapes and global reach of Chinese and American cities have grown, so have their environmental footprints. Challenging issues of air and water quality, w...

In recent years, China has taken an increasingly active role in global affairs. From the managers of state owned enterprises to political and military leaders, Chinese have looked abroad, including to the resource rich Middle East. What does Chinese engagement mean for the region? What opportunities and challenges does the Belt and Road Initiative bring? Dr. Pan Guang, professor at the Shanghai Ac...

In his third book on China, acclaimed reporter and travel writer Michael Meyer provides an account of his 22 years of engagement with the country. Beginning with his arrival as a Peace Corps volunteer in rural Sichuan in 1995, The Road to Sleeping Dragon: Learning China from the Ground Up recounts how he came to understand the country that looms so large on today’s global stage. By sharing his dee...

Dr. Elanah Uretsky's recent book, Occupational Hazards: Sex, Business, and HIV in Post-Mao China, follows a group of Chinese businessmen and government officials as they conduct business in Beijing and western Yunnan Province, uncovering informal networks that result in political favors for the businessmen. The networks are built on liquor, cigarettes, food, and sex; risky behaviors turn into occu...

What does the modern Chinese consumer want, and how are those desires changing? Advertising guru and frequent television news commentator Tom Doctoroff, North Asia Area Director and Greater China CEO at JWT, discussed these issues and his new book, What Chinese Want: Culture, Communism and China's Modern Consumer at a National Committee public program on June 1, 2012 at Dorsey Whitney New York. Th...

Dr. John Garver, author of China's Quest: The History of the Foreign Relations of the People's Republic of China discussed his book with National Committee on U.S.-China Relations Vice President Jan Berris on April 14, 2016 in New York City. When the People's Republic of China was established in 1949, China was in a state of disarray. Decades of occupation and civil war had left the country fractu...

With the establishment of the People’s Republic of China in 1949, the Chinese communist leadership established a formal alliance with the Soviet Union. The pact between the two communist giants proved to be short-lived as ideological differences between Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev and Chinese Chairman Mao Zedong, coupled with the growing fear in China of Soviet encirclement, compromised the a...

Some people argue that the global balance of power is shifting away from the North Atlantic and toward the Asia-Pacific as countries such as India and China gain economic, military, and political influence. India and China may appear to be developing new international systems – for example, through the AIIB – that could threaten the post-war order developed by the United States and Western Europe....

Former World Bank Chief Economist and one of China's most influential economists, Justin Lin Yifu, discusses recent macroeconomic trends and China's long-term growth prospects at the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations annual forum on China's economy at the NYSE on January 7, 2013. For additional information and presentations by other leading Chinese economists, please visit: http://www.ncu...

The political ideology of Mao Zedong swept China following the establishment of the People’s Republic of China in 1949, and still has an impact on life in contemporary China. Maoism at the Grassroots, edited by Matthew D. Johnson and Jeremy Brown, examines the first decades of the People’s Republic of China from the perspective of ordinary people. While the Mao era is often regarded as a time of P...

Within the past few decades, China has undergone a series of profound social changes stemming from globalization and its own domestic economic reforms and political development. Cultural attitudes deeply embedded in China for centuries have changed seemingly overnight with the expansion of the Chinese middle class. Perhaps no city in China quite exemplifies this colossal transformation like Shangh...

What does record Chinese investment in the United States mean for Sino-American relations? What are the biggest benefits from and challenges to the U.S.-China trade relationship? These and other current issues were explored in a program featuring former Commerce Secretary Barbara H. Franklin and former U.S. Trade Representatives Carla A. Hills and Susan C. Schwab, in conversation with National Com...

South China Sea Tribunal Decision: Expert Briefing with Peter Dutton by National Committee on U.S.-China Relations

As China’s economy has expanded rapidly in recent decades, outbound Chinese FDI has reached record levels, and Chinese investors seeking opportunities abroad have seized on Europe as a preferred destination for outbound FDI. A massive influx of Chinese capital represents both opportunities and challenges for future Europe-China relations. Many relatively small countries view surging Chinese invest...

Many challenges face the United States as it looks across the Pacific to Southeast Asia, including the implications of the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement, tensions in the South China Sea, and China’s economic initiatives in the area such as the establishment of the Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank and the One Belt One Road (including the “Maritime Silk Road”) policy, among others. On June...

Unresolved questions about Hong Kong’s political future, long hidden beneath the surface of the territory’s bustling commercial activity, burst to the forefront in 2014 in response to proposed electoral reforms. Since then the struggle for democracy in Hong Kong has developed into a significant challenge to Beijing’s vision for the former British colony. The Umbrella Movement, the 2015 “Fishball R...

Heading into 2016, some expected a sharp decline in China’s economic growth. So far, China has avoided a hard landing and continues to meet its modified growth targets, but the slowdown is clearly real. As China adjusts to its “new normal,” business leaders remain anxious about the long term prospects of the world’s second largest economy. Slowing growth has reduced American corporate profits, but...

As the U.S.-China relationship continues to deepen in complexity, the two countries must manage strategic competition, negotiate trade and investment challenges, and cooperate on areas of mutual interest. We explored these issues, among others, in a program featuring former Secretaries of State Madeleine Albright and Henry Kissinger in conversation with National Committee President Stephen Orlins,...

Over the last decade, China has emerged as one of the largest suppliers of international development finance, with a large and growing overseas development budget. Yet China does not release detailed information about the “where, what, how, and to whom” of its development aid. This presents an obstacle for policy makers, practitioners, and analysts who seek to understand the distribution and impac...

Presidents Donald J. Trump and Xi Jinping met April 6-7, 2017 at President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate. As the two men met for the first time, much hinged on their discussions. Despite President Trump’s tough-on-China campaign rhetoric and provocative tweets since the election, he and his advisors have adopted a more conciliatory line since assuming office. China regarded the new administration wari...