Scholar's Stage: China↗

The famous “nine-dash line” that marks China’s territorial claims in the South China Sea Source: “ Q&A: South China Sea Disputes .” BBC News. 15 May 2013.

The famous “nine-dash line” that marks China’s territorial claims in the South China Sea Source: “ Q&A: South China Sea Disputes .” BBC News (15 May 2013).

While the sun and moon endure Luck’s a chance, but trouble’s sure, I’d face it as a wise man would, And train for ill and not for good. —A.E.

This post was originally published as part of the Thucydides Roundtable project over at Zenpundit . I encourage you to read all of the posts in the roundtable.

The fundamental difference between the two analysts is their theory of what makes the Communist Party of China tick.

The PLAN destroyer Xi’an berths in Pearl Harbor to take part in the June 2016 RIMPAC exercises. Original Source.

Image Source. F our hundred thousand to one million people in concentration camps.

“You’re ten years younger than I am, Dacha, and so the Master means more to you.

“We must maintain a holistic view of national security. We take the people’s security as our ultimate goal, political security as our fundamental task, and economic security as our foundation.

T wo months ago Qiushi, the central “theory” journal of the Communist Party of China, published a speech originally given by Xi Jinping several days after he was named General Secretary of the...

“ Closed politics cannot be a permanent feature of Chinese society….  We can cooperate with the emerging China of today, even as we work for the democratic China of tomorrow .

O ver at Foreign Policy I have a new column out reviewing Jonathan Ward’s China’s Vision of Victory .

“We should continuously upgrade our understanding of Marxism and maintain steadfast pursuit of the great ideal and goal….

X i Jinping is a Chinese renaissance man. Self-assured, self-possessed, and utterly unflappable, Xi is equally at home on the hearths of struggling farmers and in the greeting halls of foreign...

T oday I came across an article three decades old , penned by Simon Leys in 1990.

T here is a school of international relations theory that advocates judging the relations of states absent speculation on the intentions and plans of its statesmen.

T he folks over at Reason magazine have published an essay by Daniel Drezner titled “ There is No China Crisis .

O ne month ago I announced a series that would investigate “the world that China wants,” using Dan Tobin’s recent congressional testimony and Nadege Rolland’s recent research brief as the foundation...

T wo years ago I translated a major speech of Xi Jinping’s for the magazine Palladium .

T he New York Times reports that the Trump administration is considering proposals to ban all members of the Communist Party of China, and their families, from obtaining a visa to visit the United...

A few months back I promised I would highlight some of the key passages in Dan Tobin’s testimony to Congress, “ How Xi Jinping’s ‘New Era’ Should Have Ended U.S. Debate on Beijing’s Ambitions .

M in Ye’s The Belt Road and Beyond: State-Mobilized Globalization in China 1998–2018 is an interesting, if dense, examination of Chinese development politics.

T he Lowy Institute has a published an interactive debate titled “ China and the Rules-Based Order. ” I participated in the debate and wrote two small essays as a part of it.

I n her 2018 article for The International Journal of Afro-Asian Studies , “ Translating Xi Jinping’s speeches: China’s search for discursive power between ‘political correctness’ and ‘external...

Countries of the Belt and Road. E arlier this month I wrote : I wish less analysts asked, “What did Xi hope to accomplish by creating the Belt and Road?

T here is a grand tradition in American politics of bashing the other side’s nominees.

T he escalating crisis in Sino-Australian relations prompts a new piece. Foreign Policy publishes my latest under the title “ Biden’s First Foreign Policy Crisis is Already Here.

W hat did I get wrong in 2020? What did I change my mind about?

N ow is the proper time for the broader foreign policy community to step back and assess the successes and failures of Trump era diplomacy.

L ast month there was a minor hullabaloo about the latest entry in the “Kennan Sweepstakes,” a long document published by the Atlantic Council titled “The Longer Telegram.” I read it three times.

Image from Robert Haddick, Fire on the Water: China, America, and the Future of the Pacific (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 2014), 60.

Vladislav M. Zubok’s A Failed Empire: The Soviet Union in the Cold War From Stalin to Gorbachev is a surprising counterpart to my essay, “ Culture Wars are Long Wars .

Yesterday the Wall Street Journal published a letter I wrote to their edito r in response to Kevin Rudd’s exposition on Xi Jinping’s “Common Prosperity” campaign: Kevin Rudd argues that China’s...

In the most recent issue of American Affair s , Walter Hudson argues against “the pull of the Cold War analogy.

Desmund Shum is a red billionaire. Red Roulette is his memoir, a tell all expose of his family’s climb to the summits of wealth and the foothills of power.

Image Source Several days ago the U.S.-China Perception Monitor published an essay in both English and Chinese by Hu Wei, a prominent think tanker in Shanghai .

Image Source Xi Jinping regularly exhorts China’s diplomats, propagandists, journalists, writers, filmmakers, and cultural figures to “tell China’s story well.

You may remember a piece I wrote last summer. It was a review of Vladislav Zubok’s book, A Failed Empire: The Soviet Union in the Cold War From Stalin to Gorbachev .

Over at Foreign Affairs , Ryan Hass and Jude Blanchette have published an interesting argument .

Thomas Barnett’s vision of the core and the gap Japan’s 2022 National Security Strategy concludes with a dramatic pronouncement: At this time of an inflection point in history, Japan is finding...

In an essay published in 2018, Geramie Barme recommends observers of US-China relations read through five pieces that Hu Qiaomu and Mao Zedong published in 1949 under the latter’s name.

Xi Jinping’s decision to openly label the United States the source of China’s ills rolled through the newsletters, wire services, and commentators on China this week.

Does China have a plan to save its wobbly economy? In last week’s issue of Foreign Policy I argue that it does —but not the sort of plan most Western economists are comfortable with.

Last month Civic Future invited me to join a panel at their annual policy forum. The topic: what the United Kingdom should do about China.

MANY HAVE TRIED to pin Trump to Heritage’s “Project 2025.” The Trump campaign has not only refused to endorse Project 2025—they have refused to endorse any detailed policy plan whatsoever.

At the Bumla Pass In November 2024, I traveled to India as part of a delegation hosted by the India Foundation . The foundation is a part of the new nationalist establishment steering Indian society.

LAST OCTOBER I published a short breakdown of four geopolitical ‘schools’ that might shape China strategy under Trump.