#14 China Scholar Insights: The Prospect of China-U.S. Relations

The relationship’s stability hinges on maintaining bounded competition amid ongoing tensions.

Chenghao Sun

WANG JINGYI

Yutong PEI

, and 5 others

Oct 02, 2025

Welcome to the 14th edition of China Scholar Insights!

China Scholar Insights is a feature aiming to provide you with the latest analysis on issues that Chinese scholars and strategic communities are focusing on. We carefully select commentary and highlight key insights. Questions and feedback can be directed to sch0625@gmail.com

I’m SUN Chenghao, a fellow with the Center for International Security and Strategy (CISS) at Tsinghua University, Council Member of The Chinese Association of American Studies, a visiting scholar at Paul Tsai China Center of Yale Law School in 2024 and a Munich Young Leader 2025. ChinAffairsplus is a newsletter that shares Chinese academic articles. This newsletter was co-founded by my research assistant, ZHANG Xueyu, and me.

China Scholar Insights on China-U.S. Relations

Background

China-U.S. relations have been in a phase of intensified strategic competition since the late 2010s, marked by offensive U.S. measures—including tariffs and technology restrictions—and China’s emphasis on resilience and self-reliance. Despite structural interdependencies, bilateral tensions continue to evolve within a fragile and competitive landscape.

Summary

The U.S. employs measures such as tariffs, tech decoupling, and supply chain exclusion to limit China’ s influence, prompting China to pursue strategic defense through innovation and the assertion of its sovereignty. Despite confrontational tactics, dialogue continues in areas like trade and military communication, reflecting shared interests in avoiding open conflict. Complete decoupling remains unfeasible due to deeply intertwined economies. Sustainable engagement requires balancing competition with cooperation over global issues such as AI governance and climate change.

Insights

LU Chuanying: Virtual Geopolitics

Digital Space: Beyond Geography, Still Political

Although digital space transcends physical boundaries, Joseph Nye notes that “data does not flow in a vacuum.” Nations maintain significant control over infrastructure, data, and algorithms, ensuring that international politics remains influential.

From Collaboration to Confrontation

The relationship between China and the U.S. has evolved from cooperation to competition. The 2013 Snowden incident accelerated China’s focus on cyber sovereignty, while Huawei’s rapid development of 5G and AI breakthroughs prompted U.S. containment efforts extending to computing power, algorithms, and data governance.

The U.S. has implemented targeted policies across multiple domains: restricting Chinese data access and investments, controlling AI algorithm exports, limiting chip and EDA tool sales, and excluding Chinese providers from critical infrastructure through initiatives like the “Clean Network” program.

China balances its assertion of its sovereignty with innovation, advocating for “cyber sovereignty” while expanding digital openness. It leverages vast data resources and application scenarios to advance AI in vertical domains like smart manufacturing and fintech.

The Limited Efficacy of U.S. Policies

U.S. measures have failed to stifle China’s progress. Open-source AI models compete effectively with proprietary systems, while chip restrictions have accelerated China’s semiconductor autonomy efforts.

Cooperative Imperative

This rivalry is not zero-sum. Deep interdependence persists; U.S. firms need China’s market and supply chains, while China requires global expertise. Transnational challenges like climate change and cybercrime necessitate bilateral cooperation. Sustainable development requires that major powers balance competition with collaboration to prevent fragmented ecosystems and preserve global innovation.

WU Xinbo: The Rhythm of China-U.S. Relations in the Trump 2.0 Era Lies with China

Starting with Trump’s return to office, U.S.–China relations can be divided into three phases.

Phase One: Trump Revives the Tariff War

Trump sought to pressure China by imposing additional tariffs to gain concessions. China retaliated with its own tariffs and, more significantly, with non-tariff measures like a ban on rare-earth exports, targeting U.S. weaknesses.

At the start of the year, Washington assumed China’s export-dependent, decelerating economy would force it to yield and that its retaliatory capacity was limited. It was based on these beliefs that Trump restarted the tariff war on his second day in office. The outcome quickly proved both assumptions wrong.

Phase Two: Negotiating Amid Confrontation

The second phase, from the Geneva talks on May 10th through August, saw both sides shift towards negotiation despite the standing tariffs. Three rounds of talks in Geneva, London, and Stockholm yielded tangible results, including tariff reductions and the suspension of some non-tariff measures. This also reshaped Washington’s strategy toward Beijing. Beyond trade, a June 5 presidential phone call and a July meeting between Foreign Minister Wang Yi and Secretary of State Rubio expanded U.S.-China engagement from economics into broader diplomacy.

Phase Three: Talking and Acting

The third phase, expected after September, will center on Trump’s visit to China and a presidential summit. The summit is expected to foster a new consensus, which could in turn help build a broader bilateral framework. Unlike Trump’s previous issue-specific focus, this framework should be comprehensive, covering trade, diplomacy, security, law enforcement, and cultural exchange. If successful, it would provide stability amid uncertainty, reopen dialogue across fields, and elevate U.S.- China relations beyond earlier confrontations to a more constructive and stable stage.

China’s Shift: From Reactive to Proactive Leadership

During his first term, Trump largely dictated the pace of U.S.-China relations, with China adopting a reactive stance to tariff measures and negotiations. However, since February, China has increasingly steered the trajectory of the relationship, operating on its own terms. This shift suggests that the future of U.S.-China relations may depend less on Trump and more on Beijing, signaling a fundamental rebalancing of power.

ZHOU Bo: “Trust but Talk”: How to Manage China-US Strategic Competition

Making China-US “copetition” Manageable

The China-US relationship requires managing “copetition”—a combination of cooperation and competition—rather than pure rivalry. Unlike the Cold War era, today’s lack of clear spheres of influence and the existence of nuclear parity increases risks. Preventing competition from sliding into confrontation requires sustained dialogue and practical confidence-building measures.

Aiming for Mutually Assured Coexistence

Mutually assured coexistence should replace mutually assured destruction as the guiding principle. This can be achieved through enhanced communication channels, military confidence-building measures, and cooperation in areas of common interest to shoulder major powers’ international responsibilities.

Trust but Talk

“Trust but talk” represents a more suitable paradigm than the Cold War’s “trust but verify.” Regular high-level military communication, active use of existing hotlines, and direct communication between pilots and sailors are essential to prevent misunderstandings. These mechanisms must move beyond routine exchanges to become meaningful dialogues—avoiding misunderstanding and miscalculations.

Preventing Accidents at Sea and in the Air

Close encounters between US and Chinese naval and air forces require improved crisis management protocols and better implementation of safety measures. While different interpretations of international law persist, both sides share a fundamental interest in preventing accidents. Reestablishing crisis communication working groups remains crucial.

Avoiding Conflict in the Taiwan Strait

Taiwan represents the most sensitive issue that could trigger direct conflict. Maintaining the integrity of the “One China” principle is essential to prevent Beijing from concluding that peaceful reunification is impossible. Restraint in arms sales and military exchanges with Taiwan is necessary to avoid escalation.

Cooperate Wherever Possible

Three key areas offer potential for cooperation: establishing AI safety standards with human oversight in nuclear systems, developing cybersecurity protocols to protect critical infrastructure, and pursuing collaboration in space exploration. Discussing no-first-use nuclear policies could als enhance strategic stability.

Shouldering Major Power Responsibilities

Joint leadership is needed on global issues, including preventing nuclear proliferation in Iran while opposing unilateral military action, advancing the two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and supporting efforts to achieve peace in Ukraine through multilateral initiatives rather than NATO-centric approaches.

DA Wei: Strategic Decoupling and Its Implications for China-U.S. Relations

China-U.S. relations in Trump’s second term sit in a fragile stalemate: full economic decoupling is unrealistic, but strategic and psychological decoupling is deepening. After the “Liberation Day” tariff announcement on April 2^nd, 2025, both sides imposed tariffs on the other (as high as 145 percent for the US and 125 percent for China), then resumed talks in Geneva, London, and Stockholm, with a possible leaders’ summit later this year. Any progress will likely be narrow and technical, while the risk of renewed escalation remains high.

Coupling: Then and Now

From the 1980s to the 1990s, the two economies were tightly “coupled”: China pursued integration with the United States; Washington viewed China as central to the “Asia–Pacific century.”Over the past eight years, the trade war and tech controls have eroded trust. In Washington, a tough-on-China line is nearly a bipartisan consensus; in Beijing, expectations that the US will “reverse course” have faded, shifting debate toward resilient adaptation within a prolonged competitive environment.

A Strategic Reorientation

In his second term, Trump has extended tariff pressure beyond China, signaling economic nationalism and prioritizing domestic industry. This intersects with Biden-era thinking that national security, social equity, and climate can rival pure efficiency. A higher protectionist baseline with the EU, Japan, and the UK fragments supply chains; for China, partial decoupling is hard to reverse, leaving cooperation mainly in less sensitive, rules-based niches.

Growing Confidence in Beijing

Since September 2024, Beijing has used more proactive stimulus while Chinese firms notch advances in AI, robotics, pharma, and defense, bolstering confidence. The “dual circulation” strategy pivots toward domestic demand and tighter innovation–production linkages at home. The July 2025 easing on NVIDIA’s H20 chips is both a bridge and a dependency risk, reinforcing a dual track of conditional openness plus heavier investment in indigenous R&D.

Decoupling and Its Dangers

Strategic and psychological decoupling weakens incentives to compromise; US tariffs on China are unlikely to return to EU/UK/Japan baselines. Security risks have sharpened around Taiwan: if fear of “rupture” with Washington recedes, Beijing may be less restrained, while Trump’s unpredictability complicates signaling. In Taipei, sharper rhetoric raises three-way miscalculation risks, making hotlines, operational transparency, and clear red lines vital.

Upside to Strategic Reset?

Despite its costs, decoupling can impel structural reform, productivity gains, and tighter alignment between innovation and the domestic market. China’s depth of manufacturing supports an inward re-linkage of innovation, production and demand, ideally with less over-securitization of economic and tech policy. A pragmatic approach is “macro decoupling, micro connectivity”: accepting system-level barriers while preserving civilian and market ties (in standards, public health, climate and academia) and building crisis-reduction mechanisms so competition remains bounded and predictable.

WANG Jisi: China–U.S. Relations Will Not Return to the Past, and May Even Worsen

China–U.S. relations have entered a stage of enduring strain, characterized by profound erosion of trust and the likelihood of further deterioration before any potential stabilization. The cooperative frameworks of earlier decades will not be recovered, and that the best attainable outcome in the coming years may be a managed rivalry in which both states avoid direct conflict, particularly war. The trajectory of this relationship will depend not only on foreign policy choices but equally on the domestic political dynamics of both countries.

Insufficient Cultural Exchanges and Resulting Gaps Between the U.S. and China

Engagement should not be limited to so-called “pro-China” figures. Even critics of China deserve exposure to Chinese perspectives. Moreover, although there are elite-level dialogues between the U.S. and China, our limited contact with ordinary Americans results in cultural gaps and prevents us from understanding U.S. society more broadly.

Cultural and religious differences further complicate mutual perceptions. Many Chinese underestimate the significance of religion in shaping American worldviews, including attitudes toward human rights and minority issues, while Americans often struggle to grasp what constitutes the shared values of Chinese society. This asymmetry exacerbates mutual misunderstanding and mistrust.

Cold War-Style Competition May Revive under the U.S.-China Power Transition

On broader strategic questions, clear historical precedents for a U.S.–China power transition are evident. Unlike the peaceful shift of hegemony from Britain to the United States, China-American rivalry may more closely resemble the protracted Cold War competition. It is doubtful that either side would collapse, yet domestic fragilities in both states could prove destabilizing. Concerning Taiwan, it is almost impossible for the issue to be reduced to transactional bargaining, emphasizing its intractable strategic nature.

Embrace a Global Outlook even if China-U.S. Relations Cannot Revert to Earlier Levels of Engagement

Furthermore, China’s global role cannot be defined solely through the prism of U.S. relations. An isolationist or self-sufficient mindset is not a suitable model of development. Instead, China should advocate an outward-looking approach that deepens connections with Europe, the Global South, and neighboring states. Engagement, adaptation, and openness to change are prerequisites for China’s continued modernization.

Reflecting on generational perspectives, many younger Chinese underestimate the gravity of bilateral tensions. Students should cultivate a global outlook while carefully weighing the uncertainties of future educational and professional exchanges with the United States. Ultimately, China-U.S. relations are unlikely to revert to earlier patterns of engagement and may worsen before improving, making sustained dialogue and cultural exchanges essential for managing rivalry in a turbulent international order.

Conclusion

China-U.S. relations have shifted toward prolonged strategic competition rather than cooperation. While deep distrust persists, both sides must reinforce the importance of communication, manage risks, and identify pragmatic areas of collaboration to prevent escalation. The relationship’s stability hinges on maintaining bounded rivalry amid ongoing tensions.