Social Sciences in China Review

No.3, 2019

Contemporary China-US Strategic Relations from the Perspective of American Scholars (Abstract)

Qiu Huafei

In the 40 years since the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and the United States, structural bilateral relations have undergone significant changes due to a power shift. In the 21st century, China’s development has gone beyond the Asia-Pacific region and has had a global effect. The peaceful rise of China has aroused great concern from all parties in the United States: how does the hegemonic America face the peaceful rise of China and avoid a hegemonic war? Facing the so-called “security dilemma” in the AsiaPacific region, the US academic community on strategy holds diverse understandings of China’s peaceful rise. The strategic option of simply containing China has been questioned. At the same time, it is believed that the US political goal should be to prevent China from becoming an enemy in order to contain it. Starting from the study of building a new type of great power relations and the competition in the Asia-Pacific region, there are American scholars who focus on building a new type of great power relations between China and the United States at the global, regional, and national levels, as well as on the issue of controlling power triggered by the hedging strategy. In response to the China-US economic and trade friction, American scholars expressed concerns about the current rapid deterioration of China-US relations caused by the Trump administration, and they have proposed a “smart competition” strategy to deal with China’s rise and the economic and trade friction, emphasizing the resolution of key disputes through negotiations to establish US advantages and effectively competing with China to better conform to the global order established by the United States itself. In terms of China’s active role in global governance, American scholars urge the Trump administration to implement a “smart strategy” in maintaining the strong global influence and rulemaking power of the United States and to focus more on and directly lead and change the global governance system, including joining some of China’s new global initiatives, so that the United States can use its strong global influence to continue to dominate the rules and norms of global governance and push the development of the agendas of global governance in a direction that is favorable to the US.