Media Type: Article
Jie Dalei, an expert on Taiwan and U.S.-China relations, analyzes the results of the 2024 elections in Taiwan in this piece published by the Institute of International and Strategic Studies. He seeks to explain the failure of the Kuomintang (KMT) to secure the presidency, considers the future of the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP), and assesses implications of the president-elect Lai Ching-te administration for cross-Strait and U.S.-China relations.
Qu Qingshan, one of China’s top Party theorists, argues that developing and modernizing the financial system is an integral component in the pursuit of modernization and “rejuvenation of the Chinese nation.” He emphasizes that for China to be a strong player in the global financial system, several structural risks in the domestic finance industry must be addressed. This piece appears in one of the leading Party newspapers and echoes Xi Jinping’s recent emphasis on strengthening the financial system, signaling policy priorities.
Wu Zhaohui, vice minister of the Ministry of Science and Technology and China’s lead delegate at the 2023 Bletchley AI Summit, delivered a keynote address at a summer 2023 AI conference in Beijing. This news coverage includes highlights of his speech where he suggested ChatGPT will usher in a ‘new industrial revolution,’ and have significant impacts on labor, production, business models, and the global economic landscape more broadly.
This is a news report of a January State Council meeting, where rural revitalization, regulation of the food delivery industry, and capital market regulation were discussed. Alongside these topics, the State Council emphasized the need to better integrate artificial intelligence (AI) in manufacturing. This signals focus at senior leadership levels on the role AI can play in China’s bid to become an advanced manufacturing powerhouse.
Meeting in San Francisco in November 2023, Biden and Xi agreed to launch U.S.-China talks on the risks associated with advanced AI systems and potential areas for bilateral collaboration. In this piece, researchers at Tsinghua University detail where Washington and Beijing’s interests on AI issues might converge, and what they see as the most fruitful areas for discussion. While there is some consensus on basic principles around AI in the defense sphere, they argue, more fruitful discussions will center on non-traditional security fields – including the social governance challenges engendered by AI and the application of AI toward anti-crime and anti-terrorism objectives.
This is a transcript of a July 2023 speech delivered by Shi Yinhong, an international relations scholar at Renmin University, and an interview conducted by Xue Li, a researcher at the Institute of World Economy and Politics of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. Shi argues that due to rising suspicion of China in developing countries and economic resource constraints at home, Beijing must become much more targeted and responsive to the needs of developing countries in initiating and facilitating projects along the BRI. Shi also encourages Beijing and Chinese experts to be careful when making public assessments of the geo-strategic significance of the BRI so as not to raise concerns in potential partner countries.
Da Wei, a professor at Tsinghua University, argues the Xi-Biden summit in November 2023 revealed U.S.-China relations have entered a “new normal” characterized by four features: mutual acceptance that tension will continue indefinitely, mutual assessment that full-blown conflict would be unacceptable, mutual understanding that neither country will fulfill its strategic goals completely, and mutual observation that economic and social resilience is possible amidst intense bilateral competition.
Niu Haibin, a foreign policy scholar at the Shanghai Institutes for International Studies, explains the rising international influence of the Global South and assesses implications for China. Niu recommends Beijing amp up efforts to frame itself as a member of the Global South and publicly push for expansion of BRICS and other initiatives, which can enhance China’s ties with individual members of the Global South and build perceptions of China as a leader of among them.
Ren Lin, a global governance scholar at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, suggests Washington is selectively engaging the Global South in ways designed to intensify contradictions and antagonisms between its membership. This strategy, Ren assesses, ultimately aims to isolate China and reduce the effectiveness of BRICS and other groups that threaten U.S. agenda-setting in global governance.
Xiang Haoyu, a research fellow at a prominent Chinese think tank, presents a typology of China’s diplomatic partnerships – which range from “strategic” partnerships (the most common type, held with at least 80 countries) to “all-weather” or “permanent” partnerships, describing very close ties with countries such as Pakistan, Venezuela, and Belarus. Xiang contrasts Beijing’s pursuit of partnerships to the “zero-sum” alliance network of the West, and suggests partnerships are a powerful diplomatic tool for Beijing that can be flexibly adapted to the counterpart country’s conditions and needs.