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One of the key questions for understanding the future trajectory of regional order is whether or not China is trying to push the United States out of East Asia and build a China-dominated regional order. Some Western analysts accuse China of pursuing the Monroe Doctrine and excluding the United States from the region. This article argues that the Western discourse of China practicing the Monroe Doctrine is a misplaced characterization of China's behavior. Rather than having intention of pushing the United States out of East Asia and build a China-dominated regional order, China is pursuing a hedging strategy that aims at minimizing strategic risks, increasing freedom of action, diversifying strategic options, and shaping the U.S.' preferences and choices. This can be exemplified in five issue areas: China's ties with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) and China's foreign policy activism, China-Russia relations, the Conference on Interactions and Confidence-Building Measures in Asia (CICA) and the New Asian Security Concept, as well as China-U.S. relations. Beijing has explicitly acknowledged the U.S. predominance in the international system and reiterated its willingness to participate in and reform the existing system. It concludes by suggesting that, for a more peaceful future to emerge in East Asia, the United States and China, as an incumbent power and a rising power, will have to accommodate each other, and negotiate and renegotiate the boundaries of their relative power, as well as their respective roles in the future regional order where Beijing and Washington would learn to share responsibilities and leadership.

The China-U.S. relationship is the most important major power relationship in the 21st century. That this relationship can remain strategically stable and embrace further positive development is not only in the interests of themselves, but also of the whole international community. In other words, the relationship has gone far beyond the bilateral level to have increasingly significant implications for the Asia-Pacific region and the world at large. Currently, China and the U.S. are actively engaging each other in framing a new regional order in the Asia-Pacific, dealing with a series of global governance as well as geostrategic issues. During this process, some new challenges in their bilateral relationship are outstanding, including their ever more intense competition for a new world order, difficulty for their deepening cooperation on the new strategic basis of global governance, and their deficient security cooperation in the global arena. Facing these new challenges, both countries need to strive to manage their relationship more prudently and flexibly in order to keep it on the right track.

This article examines China’s respective roles as a suspect, victim, and stakeholder in countering international economic cyber espionage (ECE) activities. Refuting the widespread evidence and cases that have misguided those with interests or concerns in cyber security issues, the author underscores the cognitive defects and logical fallacies in the prevailing suspicion and accusations against China. Not only is China among the victims of ECE activities, it will face even more ECE threats in the future. With growing cyber capacity, however, China has been determined to develop into a strong cyber power while playing a more active role as a key stakeholder in containing ECE activities. To maintain a secure and favorable cyberspace, the international community must join hands in working out a common code of conduct in cyberspace, acknowledging China’s strenuous efforts and indispensable role in international cyberspace governance. The United States, in particular, needs to adopt a legal approach in seeking to settle ECE disputes with China while making more commitments to their bilateral cooperation against economic cybercrime.

The election of Donald Trump as the 45th U.S. President earmarks a new beginning of American domestic and foreign policies, to which his populist thinking and unconventional approach have caused great uncertainty. While recognizing the challenges that President Trump may bring to the world in general and China-U.S. relations in particular, the Chinese government under the core leadership of President Xi Jinping firmly believes in the world’s general trend for sustained progress, remains committed to the track of win-win cooperation with other countries, and is adopting both reactive and proactive attitudes toward the great changes in global arenas while taking every precaution against the worst possible scenario. To better manage China-U.S. relations at this critical juncture of world development, it is imperative for both countries to adapt to various new changes, deepen their mutual understanding of each other’s diplomatic philosophy, and continue sharing the dividends of peace and development. If the two countries can manage to pass the first few rounds of tests through more active conceptual matching-up and pragmatic cooperation, they will be in a better position to realize their respective national agendas of “rejuvenation of the Chinese nation” and “making America great again.” Otherwise, both countries and even the whole world may fall into devastating confrontation and escalating conflicts.

China under the leadership of President Xi Jinping has maintained strategic concentration since the election of President Donald Trump who has shown an anti-establishment approach to domestic and foreign affairs. China adheres to its diplomatic principles of preserving core national interests, making overall strategic agendas, going with the trends of the times, and seeking progress while stabilizing China-U.S. relations. China also attaches great importance to summit diplomacy and has achieved early outcomes through Xi-Trump meetings at both Mar-a-Lago and Hamburg. Nevertheless, China has yet to meet daunting challenges on its road ahead to a more stable, cooperative, and predictable relationship with the United States under President Trump.

As a pivotal region, the Indo-Pacific has become the power center of world geopolitics. China is actively working on strengthening win-win cooperation and inter-connectivity within the region. Toward this goal, it has launched the “Belt and Road Initiative (BRI)” from which all regional countries can benefit. From the geopolitical perspective, however, the United States has perceived growing challenge from China and is determined to maintain global supremacy by continuing to increase its military presence in the Indo-Pacific and enhancing its quadrilateral strategic cooperation with Japan, Australia and India. After the Obama administration’s “Rebalancing” efforts to sustain U.S. leadership in the Asia-Pacific by strengthening political, security and economic ties with regional countries, the Trump administration puts much emphasis on the security aspect of its Indo-Pacific strategy under the “America First” doctrine, and this is proving to be rather unwelcome among regional countries. As a result, China’s regional influence is expected to continue expanding with the promotion of the BRI and other initiatives to enhance regional integration.

Based on the analytical framework of securitization, this article argues that cooperation between China and the United States on climate change will not lose momentum despite President Trump’s seemingly passive stance. A securitization process on the climate issue has been ongoing in China since President Xi Jinping took office and proposed the Overall National Security Outlook (ONSO). Climate security was thus integrated into China’s political discourse as a key component of ecological and common security, leading to a period of China-U.S. cooperation during the Obama administration. Similarly, in the United States, climate policy has been cemented in security planning and assessment of various federal agencies. The U.S. security sector seems to be largely unaffected by the White House decision to withdraw from the Paris Agreement. A growing number of Americans treat climate change as a security threat and many U.S. states and cities, in collaboration with business leaders, have taken on a role in international climate diplomacy. Combined with existing intergovernmental collaborative projects, robust market forces and innovative local initiatives will continue to push China-U.S. climate cooperation forward. As a necessary step to sustain its ties with the United States on climate issues, the Chinese government needs to propose a renewed bilateral framework on energy and environment cooperation under the China-U.S. Comprehensive Economic Dialogue.

As China projects itself as an emerging donor of development aid, its development cooperation with Africa has garnered unprecedented attention from the world. While China is faced with many challenges in aid practices in Africa despite its remarkable achievements over the past decades, both developed countries and African countries set high expectations for China’s potential contribution. Against this backdrop, it is crucial for China to enhance trilateral cooperation with developed donors and share experience with them on how to manage aid programs. Based on successful cooperation in the past, China-U.S.-Africa trilateral cooperation will not only strengthen China-U.S. bilateral ties, but also improve China’s overall aid effectiveness to Africa. In the future, China should initiate more development cooperation programs and work to create a coordinating mechanism with the United States in areas of their common understanding and interests; it should also go beyond traditional means of assistance and try to get involved in the U.S.-led public-private partnership (PPP) projects.

Since the normalization of China-U.S. relations in 1979, there have been various disputes and friction between both countries. But their common interests far outweigh their differences and win-win cooperation has been the defining feature of the bilateral relationship. Over the past four decades, both countries have benefited enormously from their stable and healthy interactions, which contribute to peace, stability and prosperity of the world. However, the Trump administration has deliberated major shifts to the U.S.’ China policy, labeling China as a “revisionist power” and “strategic rival” while setting many barriers to trade, economic, technological, educational and cultural exchange and cooperation. Despite the ongoing transformation of the strategic relationship between both countries, China and the United States are unlikely to enter into a “de-coupling” or a new Cold War. Faced by growing strategic uncertainties, it is still possible for both countries to maintain a generally stable relationship based on their vast common interests. For China, it is important to exercise utmost strategic patience and stamina to ease friction and manage competition with the United States while also promoting the positive aspects of their bilateral relations.

The Trump administration has waged a technological war against China due to the differences between China and the United States in political values and geopolitical pursuits, as well as their rivalry on regional and global arenas. The United States regards itself as being on the moral high ground in the existing international order and intends to force China to abandon its policies in high-tech industries and technology transfer from foreign enterprises, in order to maintain its global supremacy. With a zero-sum mentality, the Trump administration is trying to use the leverage of advanced science and technology to maximize benefits for the United States in trade with China. Its tech war attempts against China mainly include trade sanctions, investment control, export control, and restrictions on the exchange of technological personnel. These moves will further harm China-U.S. security relations as well as their science and technology cooperation and undermine the regional situation and global science and technology governance. In order to promote sustainable global development and strategic stability, both sides need to undertake more effective efforts to manage their strategic competition, build a more balanced and mutually beneficial relationship in high-tech industries, and expand the space for cooperation in the field of global science and technology governance.

Since the establishment of the China-U.S. diplomatic relationship, think tank exchange between both countries has undergone four phases, from very limited communication in the early years to a growing number of mutual visits, co-organized conferences and events, joint research projects, as well as representative offices or joint research/teaching programs set up in the past decade. China-U.S. think tank exchange plays a unique role in enhancing mutual understanding and mitigating distrust between both countries, thus contributing to bilateral strategic stability and closer cooperation. Under the Trump administration’s trade war and decoupling attempts toward China, however, bilateral think tank exchange has experienced a significant decline over the past few years, marked by increasing restrictions on each other’s visits, less willingness of some think tanks in such exchange, and more hardline policy stance on each other, especially from the American side. At this difficult time for China-U.S. relations, bilateral think tank exchange should be encouraged and strengthened so as to help bring the bilateral relationship back on track.

This article examines the status politics in Chinese foreign policy and its implications on China-U.S. relations. The analysis of status recognition and the role it plays in Chinese diplomacy reveals the motivating factors behind China’s quest for respect in the international arena and the centrality of national identity in China’s status aspiration. Viewed from the socio-psychological perspective, China’s tenacious struggle to gain a prominent international status is a social action aimed at forging its identity security, whereby the Chinese “self” will interact on equal terms with the foreign “other.” Based on the argument, this paper compares Chinese and American role conceptions and dissects the status dilemma between the two powers by exploring the dynamics of disrespect in their status relations. The two nations’ distinctive self-role conceptions and their role expectations of the interacting parties have led to a widening gap between China’s international status that entitles it to equal treatment and the one accorded by the United States. The disquieting condition of this status dissonance has motivated Beijing to disrupt the asymmetric hierarchy wherein it used to exhibit deference to Washington. The effort of the established hegemon in upending the defiance of the status contestant has exacerbated the status dilemma, which has given rise to the current China-U.S. malaise.

China and the United States are among the most important external stakeholders in Africa’s peace, security, and prosperity. The African continent, with some of the world’s fastest-growing economies, an expanding consumer base, and an exploding youth population, has recently witnessed intensifying China-U.S. competition. In economic and trade terms, the United States is playing catch-up as Beijing has long ago overtaken Washington as the continent’s largest trading partner and investor. While China regards Africa’s adherence to the “One China” principle as the only political prerequisite for its engagement with the continent, the United States views greater democracy and rule of law in Africa as in the best interests of both. China’s security presence in Africa pales in comparison with that of the United States, as Washington boasts an extensive network of military bases on the continent while Beijing’s peace and security engagement mainly involves multilateral UN peacekeeping operations and bilateral security cooperation, such as arms sales and training programs. However, growing China-U.S. competition does not necessarily crowd out shared interests or preclude closer coordination in specific areas, for example, market development, infrastructure building, anti-piracy, health capacity-building, and so on. By fending off a senseless ideological contest, respecting each other’s core interests in Africa, accommodating Africans’ development aspirations and security concerns, Beijing and Washington can find more common ground than many believe.

This paper takes the social unrest in 2019 as a case study and identifies three factors that contributed to the radicalization of social protests in Hong Kong: globalization, digitalization and the U.S. meddling in Hong Kong affairs. First, with the deepening of globalization, the worsening of social-economic conditions had bred populism among the youth. Second, digital technologies and social media platforms also made it easy for young people in Hong Kong to protest in a more covert and radical way. Third, the U.S. support for the Hong Kong opposition leaders added fuel to the radicalization of youth protesters. All these factors finally led to radicalized social protests in Hong Kong. Nevertheless, following the implementation of the National Security Law in Hong Kong SAR, violent activities were largely stopped and social order was gradually restored.