The Foreign Affairs Interview

Why America Shouldn’t Underestimate Chinese Power


Listen Later

For years in U.S. foreign policy circles, discussions of China focused on its growing wealth, power, and ambition, and the fear that it would supplant the United States.

But a few years ago, the conversation took a sharp turn. Rather than fixating on China’s rise, most analysis began to focus on the country’s stagnation and even decline. There were good reasons for this: disappointing post-COVID economic growth, dire demographics, and a foreign policy alienating much of the world. And so a new consensus took hold—that a weakened China might not overtake the United States after all.

In a new essay for Foreign Affairs, Kurt Campbell and Rush Doshi argue that this new consensus dangerously underestimates Chinese power and the challenge it represents for U.S. foreign policy. Washington, they warn, is missing Beijing’s key strategic advantage—an advantage that only a new approach to alliances will offset. As they write, if America goes it alone, “the contest for the next century will be China’s to lose.”

Campbell is the chairman and a co-founder of The Asia Group and served as deputy secretary of state and Indo-Pacific coordinator at the National Security Council during the Biden administration. Doshi is an assistant professor at Georgetown University and director of the China Strategy Initiative at the Council on Foreign Relations, and served as deputy senior director for China and Taiwan affairs at the National Security Council during the Biden administration. They joined Dan Kurtz-Phelan on April 14 to discuss the sources of Chinese power, what U.S. observers of China get wrong, and whether the Trump administration has an endgame in its confrontation with Beijing.

You can find sources, transcripts, and more episodes of The Foreign Affairs Interview at https://www.foreignaffairs.com/podcasts/foreign-affairs-interview.

...more
View all episodesView all episodes
Download on the App Store

The Foreign Affairs InterviewBy Foreign Affairs Magazine

  • 4.7
  • 4.7
  • 4.7
  • 4.7
  • 4.7

4.7

342 ratings


More shows like The Foreign Affairs Interview

View all
The Truth of the Matter by CSIS | Center for Strategic and International Studies

The Truth of the Matter

281 Listeners

War on the Rocks by Ryan Evans

War on the Rocks

1,073 Listeners

Foreign Policy Live by Foreign Policy

Foreign Policy Live

588 Listeners

Russian Roulette by Center for Strategic and International Studies

Russian Roulette

141 Listeners

ChinaPower by CSIS | Center for Strategic and International Studies

ChinaPower

200 Listeners

The President’s Inbox by Council on Foreign Relations

The President’s Inbox

700 Listeners

The Trade Guys by CSIS  |  Center for Strategic and International Studies

The Trade Guys

148 Listeners

Net Assessment by War on the Rocks

Net Assessment

401 Listeners

The Asia Chessboard by Center for Strategic and International Studies

The Asia Chessboard

102 Listeners

Babel: Translating the Middle East by Center for Strategic and International Studies

Babel: Translating the Middle East

92 Listeners

The Rachman Review by Financial Times

The Rachman Review

134 Listeners

Pekingology by Center for Strategic and International Studies

Pekingology

129 Listeners

Global Security Briefing by The Royal United Services Institute

Global Security Briefing

15 Listeners

Ones and Tooze by Foreign  Policy

Ones and Tooze

342 Listeners

NatSec Matters by Beacon Global Strategies LLC

NatSec Matters

188 Listeners