U.S.— China Strategic Competition 2050: Implications for the future international system and order Kyushu National Museum Seungpo Sohn

Korea University

Introduction

Amidst the relative decline of U.S. hegemony along with the faltering European economy, a consensus seems to have been reached among the western elites: the liberal international order is in crisis. There existed three historical moments that in fact, foreboded this predicament in 2008, 2016 and 2020 respectively. The first is the 2008 financial crisis that not only devastated the U.S. economy but triggered the outbreak of European debt crisis. This discombobulation discredited the reliability of western capitalist model among the underdeveloped countries and engendered confidence in Chinese political leaders of their 6. U.S.— China Strategic Competition 2050: Implications for the future international system and order_Kyushu National Museum

domestic political model. The second is the concurrence of Brexit from the European Union and the election of Donald Trump as the president of the United States in 2016 which impaired the liberal international order from its very within. The Trump administration’s decision to drop out of the Paris Climate Agreement, pursue protectionist trade policy and prioritize alleged American interests at the expense of its traditional allies epitomize his anti-liberal policies. The last is the coronavirus pandemic in 2020. The failure in World Health Organization (WHO) in promptly tackling the global health crisis and the nationalistic behaviors states manifested in securing vaccines speaks to the retraction of liberal international order. Additionally, the stark contrast in Western countries’ mismanagement of the pandemic with the Chinese government in terms of its casualties have come to embolden China of its political model. This self-assurance was then, often translated into diplomatic adventurism that makes many to doubt the peaceful rise of China.

When authoritative institutions estimate China to overtake the U.S. economically by approximately 2030, the kind of international order that will unfold with Chinese supremacy deserves much scholarly analysis(Hawksworth and Chan, 2015; Dadush and Stancil, 2010; CEBR, 2020). To be more specific, whether China would overturn the current U.S. led liberal international order and even, engage in a hot war need to be examined. In the first part, I discuss two major approaches in assessing the nature of the rise of China. Secondly, I lay out future predictions projected respectively by the two approaches along with their limitations. Lastly, I suggest the need for a multi-lensed perspective and end with a short-term and long-term prospect on the future of U.S.- China competition and international system.

Engagement vs Containment

Although it is difficult to subsume the diverse academic debates revolving the rise of China into two categories of engagement and containment, it still offers us a vantage point in readily understanding the discussions hitherto advanced.

Engagement

From Nixon’s détente to Clinton’s “integrate but hedge” and Obama’s “constructive engagement,” the U.S.’s foreign policy vis- à-vis China rested on the idea that the country will politically liberalize as integration to the international order proceeds. It was based on the foundational belief that China would gradually 6. U.S.— China Strategic Competition 2050: Implications for the future international system and order_Kyushu National Museum

evolve into a democratic state with the burgeoning middle class and eventually, transform into a responsible stakeholder in the international stage. As rightly suggested by Elizabeth Economy, “engaging China equated with changing China (Bitonus, Price and Economy, 2020).”

It was the liberal school of international relations (IR) that provided academic discourses for the thirty years of engagement. The liberal institutionalists contended the rise of China would not result in the collapse of the liberal international order as China has been one of the greatest beneficiaries of the U.S. led international order. China is one of the five permanent members of the Security Council, United Nations, and a member of the World Trade Organization with the rights to fully take advantage of the Dispute Settlement Procedures (DSP). Considering that China owes much of their meteoric economic growth to the liberal international order that underwrites principles of non-discrimination and free trade, it is nonsensical to assume that China would seek for global hegemony and upend the status-quo. In short, any efforts to upset the liberal institutions would only adversely affect herself.

One of the most profound of the liberal institutionalist scholars is John Ikenberry who proposed to accommodate China within the Western order (Ikenberry, 2008). Only through reinvestment and engagement that facilitates Chinese integration can the Western order persist to survive even after the fall of U.S. unipolarity. In other words, the liberal international order will survive despite shrinking U.S. leadership for the rising “rests” are already too deeply embedded in the existing international order (Ikenberry, 2018). When traditional “power transition” that involves destructive wars is unthinkable in the age of nuclear, the future of liberal internationalism hinges upon whether the U.S. and its old allies can reform the existing institutions to reflect the changes in the distribution of power in an increasingly multipolar world (Ikenberry 2018). Nye also cautioned U.S. from overestimating the might of China and claims the containment model is not the proper strategy for one who lacks intent for global hegemony (Nye 2015, 2017). Rather, he maintains that the two giants have much to gain from cooperation than conflict, particularly in transnational issues of global capital market, climate, cyber-terrorism and the pandemics. Areas of interdependence such as trade and education –research and talent—further incentivizes the two to coordinate their policies in producing international public goods rather than focusing on balancing against the ascending China (Nye 2013, 2020).

Although it is true that the advent of China’s new paramount leader, Xi Jinping, heralded an era of reinforced 6. U.S.— China Strategic Competition 2050: Implications for the future international system and order_Kyushu National Museum

political grip of the Communist Party with strengthened social censorship, Nye warns the deleterious effects of exaggerated fear. Ungrounded fears would only increase the chances of bilateral relation culminating into the “Thucydides Trap.” This in part, reflects the confidence in national power of the United States as Nye predicts the unipolarity of U.S. in the realm of military to persist for a while. The U.S. still enjoys unmatched financial power with dollar functioning as the world’s dominant reserve currency and boasts its geographical advantages with friendly neighbors and demographic strengths with rising working forces. Also, U.S. stands at the forefront in the development of key technologies—bio, nano, and information— while its cultural glamor attracts global talents. Observing that China, despite being the second largest economy, suffers from great income disparity, geo-political insecurity, poor soft-power and aging population, U.S. would continue to function as a global unipole. Thus, it is not “Thucydides Trap” that we should be wary of, but the “Kindleberger Trap” that America should heed more where China refuses to contribute to an international order (Bitonus, Price and Nye, 2020). Containment

It was Graham Allison who popularized the term “Thucydides Trap,” which refers to a situation where an emerging power seeks to displace the established great power as regional/international hegemon (Allison, 2017). The Greek historian, Thucydides, attributed the Peloponnesian war to two causes: the rise of new power and the fear that it instills in pre-existing hegemon. The historical analysis from the Harvard Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs demonstrated 12 of 16 cases in which a rising power confronts a ruling power ended in bloodshed warfare. Although four of the cases eschewed conflicts, it required painstaking efforts of adjustment, coordination, and adaptation on both part of the challenger and the challenged. Frustrating is the fact that the ascendance of China is likely to follow the past trajectories that resulted in conflicts when observing the absence of reflection and communication between the two parties (Allison, 2015).

While Allison cautiously left room for a possibility to avoid U.S.-China rivalry from intensifying into a war through means of communication, Mearsheimer adamantly insisted the return of Great Power Politics—Realpolitik—based on balance of power. This means that the liberal international order will be 6. U.S.— China Strategic Competition 2050: Implications for the future international system and order_Kyushu National Museum

replaced with a realist international order as the economic dynamism from globalization turned China into a superpower, seriously eroding the unipolar supremacy of the United States (Mearsheimer 2019). He notes letting China to grow as potential competitor of U.S. through its accession to the WTO was a major mistake of U.S. foreign policy. It has thus, become natural to assume that a severe security competition between China, who achieved regional hegemon in East Asia, and the U.S.(Mearsheimer, 2010).

Against this backdrop, voices for a change in American foreign policy towards China have been made that demands U.S. to discard their “hopeful thinking” of Chinese democratization and adopt tougher strategy by recognizing China as a strategic rival. Aaron Friedberg, for example, called for enhanced balancing, constrained engagement and increased domestic welfare as countervailing strategies to the increasingly assertive China(Friedberg, 2018). Robert Blackwill added the optimism that prevailed in the White House during the past two decades and the ensuing misunderstandings of China’s ambition to become a hegemon in Asia, and in time the world, ranks one of the most damaging U.S. foreign policy errors since the end of World War II (Blackwill, 2019). He argued the Trump administration’s turn from past engagement to containment deserves credit in recognizing the rise of China as a threat to U.S. national vital interests. It was in this context that the Council on Foreign Relations (CFC) released a Special Report that points out how the past efforts to embrace China within the international order have come to intimidate the U.S. primacy in Asia—and consequentially of the world— and that a major revision to the grand strategy of U.S. foreign policy is necessary (Blackwill, 2015). In betrayal of a longstanding wish of the White House in morphing China into a responsible stakeholder of international order, the primary foreign policy objective of Beijing now lies in weakening the military alliances of U.S. in Asia, undermining American authority, confidence and legitimacy in international order and ultimately challenging the American global hegemony. This led the government of the United States to prescribe China as a revisionist power, perceiving her as a threat with a deliberate intention to capsize the U.S. led liberal international order (United States, 2017).

Limitations of Liberal and Realist Ideas

The current scholarly discussions on the nature of the rise of China and its implications on the international order, although 6. U.S.— China Strategic Competition 2050: Implications for the future international system and order_Kyushu National Museum

entail partial truths, fail to capture the whole picture of U.S.-China relations. Dogmatic focus on purely liberalist or realist view hampers one from confronting the complex reality but leads one to a parochial ed understanding of the bilateral relations. In short, both the liberal and realist discourse result in simplistic projections of future international order and distribution of power.

First, perceiving the increasing assertiveness of China, it is naïve for the liberalists to think that China lacks capability or is absent with the desire to assume global hegemony and upend the liberal international order. Lee, Kuan Yew has elucidated this point clearly that “it seems certain that China’s GDP will overtake that of the U.S. within the next decade or two. It is China’s intention to be the greatest power in the world (Lee 2011).” China’s refusal to accept the Hague Tribunal’s South China Sea ruling, continued territorial conflicts with its neighboring states in the South China Sea and the East South China Sea, military confrontations with the U.S. regarding the Taiwan issue, gross violations of human rights committed in Xinjiang and Hong Kong patently speaks on behalf of their antipathy and disaffection to the current international order. As Allison neatly put it, “with the arrival of Xi Jinping, the era of ‘hide and bide’ is over (Allison, 2015).” China has become more repressive in the inside and more expansionist to the outside.

China’s ambition to supplant the U.S. led international/regional regime has been most conspicuous in the realm of economy. The establishment of Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), promotion of Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) and the launch of One Belt One Road initiative all testify to China’s aim to supersede the current economic order.

Nevertheless, it would also be inaccurate, for the realists, to expect the coming of a new Cold War era where containment is the sole policy tool to utilize. I believe the U.S.-China rivalry is distinguished from the past Cold War in four main fronts: 1) an intense ideological competition over the superiority of a state- model is still absent. Although China has recently embarked on a number of projects to enhance its soft-power and national image, the attractiveness of Chinese state model, culture, and idea lags far behind those of U.S. This makes it highly unlikely the formation of two bounded blocs of international order that is led by the U.S. and China respectively; 2) a full-scale arms race in nuclear developments that defined the Cold War era is absent between the U.S.-China relations. The nuclear superiority of the U.S. is rather explicit, suggesting that the unipolarity of U.S. in the realm of 6. U.S.— China Strategic Competition 2050: Implications for the future international system and order_Kyushu National Museum

military would continue for a while despite the increasing multipolarity in the realm of economy (Heginbotham, 2015); 3) the U.S. and China are closely interconnected particularly in areas of trade, finance, and global supply chain while the Soviet Union and the U.S. rarely experienced economic intercourse. Disruptions in global value chains for instance would thus, harm the economy of both countries while China’s dollar trap speaks volumes for bilateral interdependence in global capital market; 4) non- traditional security issues such as climate change demands that the two collaborate. Failure to work together would only give birth to a catastrophic outcome that will seriously disfigure the civilizations humanity have constructed .

Future Projection

Then, what kind of future would unfold in coming decades? I suggest that a complex international order would emerge where aspects of conflict, competition and cooperation all co-exist. By adopting a multi-lensed approach that can envision a concurrence of multitudinous order, it is possible that we project different international system to take place depending on different dimensions of power: military, economy and transnational issues (Nye, 2011).

Primarily, the U.S. unipolarity in the military realm would continue at least until mid-2030’s. Although China would overtake the U.S. in terms of its size of economy, China would need additional time to translate their accumulated wealth into substantial military power. The military modernization project is scheduled to finish in 2035, implying that reaching military power parity with the U.S. would take more time than economy. Research exhibits a blatant asymmetry in nuclear power with U.S. considered to possess 5550 nuclear warheads compared to China’s 350 nuclear warheads (SIPRI, 2021). Furthermore, the military spending of the U.S. and China exhibited a three times difference with the former laying out 778 billion U.S. dollars($) and China investing 252 billion dollars. The U.S. accounted for 39 percentage and China accounted for 13 percentage of the world’s aggregate military expenditure (Silva, Tian and Marksteiner, 2021).

If China succeeds in expanding their nuclear capability up to holding 1000 deliverable nuclear warheads by 2030 as anticipated by U.S. Department of Defense and continue the level of military spending at the current rate of 1.7 percentage of their GDP, it is by 2050 that China would reach a parity in military power with the U.S. (DOD, 2021). This means in other words that 6. U.S.— China Strategic Competition 2050: Implications for the future international system and order_Kyushu National Museum

that a conflicting bipolarity is unlikely to unfold earlier than 2030 where U.S. primacy would last. Areas such as the South China Sea and Taiwan could still function as a flashpoint with the potential of bounded conflict developing into a battle. Tensions would persist yet controlled within a managerial level. It would then be by 2050 where China consummates their project in building an army “that can win” where China would risk military confrontation with the U.S. Thus, to regard China as an imminent military threat capable of challenging the U.S. is an overstatement.

Secondly, it is evident that China would become not only the most important player in the realm of economy but also a rivaling competitor of U.S. trying to institute alternative economic regime. Based on the economic prowess that surpasses that of the U.S., China would not hesitate in continuing and embarking on new bold initiatives to displace the U.S. influence in the region and the world. One Belt One Road initiative and the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) are classic examples of China’s ambition in founding institutions to supplant U.S. hegemon in East Asian economy. Each has been pursuing their own version of regional economic integration at the exclusion of its competitor for control of both membership and the agenda (Hamanaka, 2014). As the economic power of China is expected to achieve parity as early as 2030, a fierce competition over shaping the rules of international commerce would further intensify from intellectual property rights, artificial intelligence technology and the 5G telecommunication technology to securing safe supply chains of semiconductors. The competition would escalate as multipolarity unfolds by 2050 where major players include China, the U.S., India, the EU, Japan, and Brazil.

Lastly, in the realm of transnational issues, the power would be diffused to a magnitude where it is difficult to pinpoint a single major actor by 2050. The U.S and China has already embarked on coordinating their policies in this non-conventional area of power and the European Union is playing a pioneering role in environment. In short, from a status quo of U.S. unipolarity and dominance in every three realms of power, a U.S. unipolarity would persist militarily while a competitive bipolarity would unfold economically, and a more pluralist order would ensue by 2030. By 2050, U.S. military predominance would end and a confrontational bipolarity where China challenges the U.S. would begin while a competitive multipolarity would follow in the realm of economy. The power would be loosely diffused over many countries in transnational issues for it requires participation of 6. U.S.— China Strategic Competition 2050: Implications for the future international system and order_Kyushu National Museum

every member state of United Nations to tackle the problems. The figure below summarizes the points.

Conclusion

Despite flooding literature assessing the nature of China’s rise and the prospects of East Asian regional and international order, dearth in imagination often results in their failures in capturing the complex characters in Sino-U.S. relations. Diverse regional orders and systems will take place simultaneously. A unipolar world system can contemporaneously exist with a competitive multipolarity by dividing dimensions of power. This means that although military primacy of U.S. would survive in the coming decade, U.S. would have to confront fierce competition with China in the realm of economy while concurrently, the two giants would have to coordinate policies to tackle transnational problems. Softpowerand

Transnational

Economy

Technology

Military Issues

and

U.S.Unipolarity

U.S.Unipolarity

U.S.Unipolarity

Status-quo

(2021)

(China-U.S.parity)

increased

Lessened

U.S.Unipolarity

unipolarity

Competitive

Short-term

Bipolarity

(2030) plurality

form

with

of

Diffusion

(China-U.S. parity)

Confrontational

Multipolarity

Competitive

Long-term

Bipolarity

(2050)

ofPower 6. U.S.— China Strategic Competition 2050: Implications for the future international system and order_Kyushu National Museum

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