Post-1949 US-China Relations: A (Very) Brief Overview

This post hopes to provide a brief overview of post-1949 US-China relations. While I do think/hope much of the analysis presented is accurate and nuanced, do note that many ideas and key events (e.g., 1989 Tiananmen) are left out. I’ve chosen what to include based on a personal judgement of how significant and interesting ideas or events are in understanding the relationship!

US-China relations occupy a distinct and significant position in modern international relations. As Deng Xiaoping’s “open door policy” led to China’s rapid economic transformation towards the end of the 20th century, many began to envisage the emergence of a new global hegemony and its concomitant reorientation of the international order. Under President Xi Jinping’s leadership, China is perceived to have adopted an increasingly assertive foreign policy, making a break from its Dengist past of “hiding and biding.” Since 2017, Xi has, in multiple critical foreign policy addresses, declared that the world is amid “great changes unseen in a century” (百年未有之大变局). Accordingly, US-China relations have become a rich and controversial area of study, one which this post will seeks to unwrap through a discussion of key ideas and historical flashpoints.

We begin with a discussion of modern, post-1949, relations between the US and the People’s Republic of China (PRC). From the US’ non-recognition of the new Communist Chinese government in 1949 to the Korean War from 1950–53, early US-China relations were characterised by a string of disputes which reinforced the notion that both countries’ values and systems were mutually incompatible. The US, gripped by “a virulent strain of anticommunism” in the early 1950s, would persist in supporting Chiang Kai-shek’s increasingly illegitimate Nationalist government based in the Republic of China (ROC), reflected in the US-ROC Mutual Defence Treaty in December 1954 and accompanying embargo on economic and diplomatic ties with the PRC.

In 1972, in a critical juncture in US-China relations, President Richard Nixon made his historic visit to Beijing. Meeting with Chairman Mao Zedong for the first time, the visit represented Nixon’s personal vision that China, as he wrote in 1967, “cannot be left forever outside the family of nations, there to nurture its fantasies, cherish its hates and threaten its neighbours”. Indeed, the significance that a unified China represented within the global order began to gain traction with key figures in government, including Henry Kissinger, who would lead the US’ policy of rapprochement towards China as Secretary of State.

Crucially however, the US’ rapprochement towards China did not stem from any single factor alone, but from a confluence of events during the 1960s and 1970s that made US-China engagement a strategic imperative for both countries. Prime among such factors is the geopolitical urgency that the Soviet Union’s rise presented in the late 1960s and early 1970s, which brought the US and China together “in service of great power competition.” The “realist” school of thought, to which the argument is attributed, lends credence to Realpolitik as a framework for understanding US-China détente, and can be seen to manifest in the foreign policies of subsequent US administrations towards China. In 1979, a concatenation of factors would drive President Jimmy Carter to establish formal diplomatic relations with China. China under Deng was eager to pursue economic reforms after a cataclysmic decade of the Cultural Revolution (1966–76); the United States continued to perceive the Soviet Union as an existential security threat amid the Cold War. Together, the international and domestic context both countries faced illustrates the strategic complexity both countries encountered in the process of normalizing relations, a context that would ultimately usher in a new era of Sino-American engagement.

Today, US-China relations appear to be at its lowest point since 1979. Popular narratives tend to juxtapose Deng’s strategic dictum of “hiding capabilities and biding time” (韬光养晦), with Xi’s foreign opportunism and aggression since 2013 in areas such as trade and security. Critical policies and initiatives including the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), and the militarization of the South China Sea, have turned focus to China’s growing capacity to refashion the global order to its interests, and present an existential challenge to the notion of Western exceptionalism. As Brookings Fellow Richard Hass argues, “China is becoming the first non-Western power in the modern international system with the weight and ambition to reshape the rules of the international order.”

While such narratives largely attribute China’s foreign policy reorientation to Xi’s personality, Rush Doshi instead frames China’s recent assertiveness as a continuity of preceding Chinese president Hu Jintao’s strategy. According to Doshi, Deng’s call for China to maintain a low-profile was always understood, by Party officials, to be a strategic, temporary policy that would change in accordance with the global balance of power. It was thus the case that China shifted from Tao Guang Yang Hui to a policy of “actively accomplishing something” (积极有所作为) in the aftermath of the 2008 Global Financial Crisis. Several signature policies closely associated with Xi Jinping thus have their roots in Hu’s presidency. The AIIB, for instance, was first proposed, discussed, and approved for implementation at the 18th Party Congress in 2009. Therefore, narratives surrounding the recent deterioration in US-China relations should refrain from overstating the singular importance of Xi, and instead critically chart the policy trajectory that China has taken in recent decades.

Importantly, Doshi’s argument appears to imply the existence of a Chinese “grand strategy” at achieving global hegemony. In The Long Game (2021), Doshi argues that Beijing has engaged in three sequential “strategies of displacement” to systematically undermine US influence. Other scholars dispute the existence such a strategy or question China’s intentions to create one at all. Nevertheless, Doshi’s framing of a coordinated and intentional strategy to displace the American order aligns with the mainline narrative in Western scholarship that suggests that the Chinese actively seek to refashion the world in its image. As Hass argues, Beijing has sought to occupy leadership vacuums created by US antipathy towards multilateral institutions and foster global support for its normative approaches to questions of sovereignty and human rights, internet governance and nation-building. Elizabeth Economy interprets China’s recent assertiveness to connote “a radically transformed international order.” In contrast, Singaporean diplomat Kishore Mahbubani purports that China has no desire to export its system, culture, or values to the rest of the world. Irrespective of China’s actual motives, such debates feed into an important discussion of the way in which policies are not exclusively guided by an accurate assessment of the other, but also by a strategic perception of the other’s power and threat.

The alarm with which US government officials perceive China is abundant within primary documents from state archives. The US Intelligence Community’s 2019 Worldwide Threat Assessment offers an exemplar. Chinese leaders, the report reads, “will increasingly seek to assert China’s model of authoritarian capitalism as an alternative—and implicitly superior development path abroad.” Former Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats further warned that China’s actions “reflect a long-term strategy to achieve global superiority.” Such has been the emerging American perception of China that Richard Madsen describes the emergence of a new “Yellow Menace narrative,” that not only frames China as a malign force but further evokes racism, as demonstrated during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Chinese perceptions of the United States, on the other hand, appear far more complex. Given China’s construct as a single-party state, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is often required to play two “games of chess,” one domestic and one foreign, in balancing between preserving domestic support and pursuing global ambitions. Under Xi, the “Chinese Dream” of “great rejuvenation” has thus been wielded as an anti-Western narrative to promote Sino-centrism, normalize ethnocentric discourse, and distract internal opposition. Given Xi’s success in repositioning himself as a populist leader, Cheng Li thus warns against underestimating Xi’s domestic popularity, which will likely prove crucial in China’s ability to pursue an increasingly assertive foreign policy. In this manner, strategic narratives and perceptions act as a key determinant to relations between states. Current and emerging domestic challenges both states face, however, present challenges to their ability to pursue foreign ambitions.

While foreign policies and ambitions may, on occasion, align with domestic aims, instances in which they contradict illustrate the strategic dilemmas both governments face against the backdrop of their rivalry. For China, shrinking labour participation and rising costs have led to semi-isolationist economic policies such as Made in China 2025, which threatens to reduce the allure for trade and foreign investment. China further confronts “acute structural vulnerabilities,” including an aging population and overburdened financial sector, that could stall growth, promote social unrest, and ultimately impede China’s foreign ambitions over the long term.

The United States faces its own unique challenges. The US’ strategic incoherence in dealing with China was evident in Trump’s desire to both patrol the South China Sea and pursue trade protectionism. US withdrawal from the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) presented a “major geopolitical gift” to China, while Biden, who has sought to reengage allies through the Paris Climate Accords and AUKUS security pact, continues to hamper US influence by pursuing a Trump-esque policy of “Ensuring the Future of America is Made in All of America” to target blue-collar workers. In this manner, domestic issues and interests can be seen as a vital determinant of, and constraint on, a state’s ability to execute foreign policy. More fundamentally, as Mahbubani argues, there is “no doubt that America lacks a comprehensive strategy on China”. US strategy towards China thus risks inconsistency. As Kissinger writes, “For countries relying on American policy, the perpetual psychodrama of democratic transitions is a constant invitation to hedge their bets.” Having established the conceptual paradigm through which current US-China relations can be understood, we now turn to an examination of key national policies that have come to dominate scholarship on the subject.

Launched in 2013, the Belt and Road Initiative represents the centrepiece of Xi’s geopolitical strategy. Reaching over 60 countries and exceeding 200 billion US dollars in Chinese investment, the initiative aims to provide infrastructure development along six economic corridors spanning Asia, Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. The BRI presents two key challenges to US hegemony in Africa and the Asia-Pacific. First, the BRI provides highly accessible infrastructure investments to developing countries as an alternative to Western economic institutions such as the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, which are commonly despised for their stringent loan conditionality. Second, the BRI manifests as a physical vehicle through which China can transmit its political and cultural values. Tanzania, for instance, has based its cybersecurity law off that of China, as a “BRI pilot country for Chinese political capacity building.” Meanwhile, Kenya has received satellite television and Chinese programming for thousands of its citizens. Both cases represent clear examples of China’s attempts to leverage its economic capacity to exert soft power on the African continent.

Territorially, China has made substantial advancements in the South China Sea, having reclaimed, “on an unprecedented scale and through once-unimaginable geoengineering,” almost 3000 acres across the Spratly Islands. Beijing has proceeded to militarise the area, building a network of artificial islands on which anti-cruise missiles and electronic jamming equipment are stationed to give China a military advantage in one of the world’s most important areas of global maritime trade. While a host of countries including Malaysia, Indonesia, and Vietnam, have voiced opposition to China’s actions and threatened international arbitration, China faces no serious obstacle given its global economic influence and centrality within multilateral institutions. Today, the Chinese navy continues to employ a strategy of intimidation to deter other claimant states.

From these case studies, important observations about Xi Jinping’s approach to foreign policy are drawn in considering the future trajectory of US-China relations. First, China’s massive economic capacity enables it to act as a development “one-stop shop.” To some extent, Beijing may thus be able to “bribe its way to regional hegemony” through the widespread provision of infrastructure investment, presenting a significant policy dilemma to Western economic institutions which must now adapt in order to remain relevant. Second, Xi’s assertiveness in the South China Sea conveys a flagrant disregard for international convention. The United States and its allies must thus find innovative means of influencing China’s behaviour which do not operate exclusively within the rubric of international law. Finally, Xi’s foreign policy appears to be rooted in a particular understanding of China’s history. The BRI evokes memories of the ancient Silk Road, while claims over the South China Sea represent Beijing’s understanding of the so-called nine-dash line. The ability to confront China effectively will require an understanding of these complexities. Policies undertaken by the US over the past few years demonstrate this awareness.

In June 2021, President Biden and the G7 announced the inception of the Build Back Better World (B3W) Partnership, a major global economic initiative among G7 countries which aims to “collectively catalyze hundreds of billions of dollars of infrastructure for low- and middle-income countries in the coming years.” Given China’s assertiveness, B3W is often framed as the US’ strategic counterbalance to the BRI. Given how recent the initiative was launched, B3W is currently eclipsed by the BRI in its scale and reach. However, at its core, the initiative represents a significant departure from the previous Trump administration’s policy of containment and exhibits the United States’ active endeavour to engage its allies in response to Chinese aggression. Strategically, B3W has the potential to reorient countries that would otherwise turn to China for development, given the initiative’s unique focus on climate, health and health security, digital technology, and gender equity and equality, which CSIS Fellow Jonathan Hillman describes as areas in which the US and G7 have a comparative advantage.

Furthermore, the US’ ability to leverage effective multilateral diplomacy is evident in the actions of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (Quad) and the recent formation of AUKUS. Beginning under Trump, the United States began articulating its understanding of a “Free and Open Indo-Pacific” (FOIP) as a policy to “maintain U.S. strategic primacy in the region” while “preventing China from establishing new, illiberal spheres of influence.” FOIP, a key tenet of which is the freedom of navigation of the South and East China Seas, is thus directly at odds with China’s recent militarization of the area. The Quad, consisting of Australia, India, Japan, and the United States, acts as an important multilateral framework to embody FOIP, and uses both economic and diplomatic incentives to shape China’s behaviour. This strategy, Richard Heydarian argues, resembles what political scientist Gerald Segal referred to as “constrainment” as opposed to “containment,” and offers a more effective means of engaging a geopolitical reality like China that is “simply too big to be ‘contained’.”

While the US has achieved success in certain domains of the Sino-American rivalry, other critical components of the relationship, including Cross-Strait relations, present far greater strategic challenges. Under Xi, reunification with Taiwan has become a more urgent and desperate goal of the CCP. At the 19th Party Congress in 2017, Xi declared reunification as one of fourteen must-do objectives to achieve “great rejuvenation.” This policy objective, again illustrative of the centrality of history within Xi’s policy, exhibits a strong irredentism and is referred to by Economy as Xi’s “number one priority.” Given this context, the Biden administration has had to tread carefully, and thereby maintains a policy of “strategic ambiguity” towards Taiwan, which enables for the continuation of US-Taiwan arms deals and diplomatic support while stopping short of a guarantee to defend Taiwan in the event of an attack by China. Such is also the case with regions which formally belong to China such as Hong Kong and Xinjiang. Xi has expressed that issues of internal affairs represent China’s “core interests,” and that the US should therefore “act cautiously.”

Recent policies by the United States and China thus appear to be deliberate and strategic attempts at reorienting the aspects of the international order. While the United States remains as the undisputed global hegemon, analysts assess that China could surpass the US as the world’s largest economy as early as 2026, and correspondingly see an expansion in its sphere of influence. While assessments of how the rivalry might conclude are far from certain, we now turn to the factor that can perhaps offer the most valuable insight on the future trajectory of US-China relations: technology and innovation.

Technology has and will continue to occupy a central role in the battle for global hegemony. Historically, the US’ ability to build upon technologies from the Cold War including the internet, computer processing and semiconductors, enabled it to achieve global pre-eminence. The present context is no different, as new, and emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence hold the potential to transform economies and military capabilities. Today, China leads the US in quantum communications, 5G and facial recognition software. While the US continues to lead in other fields such as AI and quantum computing, China has made it a deliberate objective, as Xi remarked, to “catch up and surpass” the United States.

Crucially, China’s construct as an authoritarian state has enabled it to develop a “multidecade plan to transfer technology to increase the size and value-add of its economy.” To remain competitive, the US government must thus emerge from its complacency in technological spending and begin to establish partnerships with the private sector to spur research and development in critical industries. A failure to do so would likely entail the steady erosion of US influence in an age of technological connectivity and advancement.

For these reasons, US-China relations form a rich and complex subject within modern international relations. This overview has sought to form an informed outlook on the great-power relationship that will define the 21st century. As China’s success at poverty alleviation and increasing living standards has lifted the aspirations of millions of its citizens, analysts have discussed the possibility of emerging democratic pressures and an ensuing crisis of legitimacy for the CCP (especially relevant given the White Paper Protests/A4 Revolution). On the other hand, US democracy appears to be in peril today. Navigating these unique challenges may ultimately determine who emerges victorious in the Sino-American rivalry. For now, it’s likely too early to tell.