Compendium of Recommendations on China Policy for the Biden Administration
Gage Skidmore/Shutterstock
Introduction
In recent years, U.S.-China relations have become increasingly competitive, with areas of confrontation rapidly expanding at the expense of traditional areas of cooperation. The incoming Biden administration must address this hostile climate with new thinking that realistically assesses threats to national security while remaining open to opportunities for further engagement with China to revitalize this crucial bilateral relationship. The Wilson Center and the U.S.-China Business Council have jointly created the Compendium of Recommendations on China Policy for the Biden Administration to renew the national debate and help the incoming administration navigate the policy options at its disposal. Neither Wilson Center nor the U.S.-China Business Council claim ownership of the materials provided herein and nor do they necessarily endorse the perspectives provided. Each item is compiled impartially with the aim of broadening foreign policy discussions and charting a new direction for American diplomacy. It is our goal that this platform will become a point of reference for policymakers and the general public alike. Neither Wilson Center nor the U.S.-China Business Council claim ownership of the materials provided herein and nor do they necessarily endorse these perspectives. Each item is compiled impartially with the aim of broadening foreign policy discussions and charting a new direction for the country. It is our goal that this platform will become a point of reference for policymakers and the general public alike.
Methodology and Sourcing
All documents included in the final Compendium of Policy Recommendations for the Biden Administration on China are publicly available and hosted on the websites of their respective issuing organizations or affiliated individuals. Where necessary, phone calls and email exchanges have been made with these entities for purposes of verification or clarity on key points of policy.
The information included in the Compendium of Policy Recommendations for the Biden Administration on China is presented with the following category breakdowns
| Document Type | Organization Type |
|---|---|
| Policy Memo | Think Tank |
| Analytical Op-Ed | NGO |
| Press Release | Lobbying Organization |
| Report | Private Corporation |
| White Paper | Labor Association |
| Public Speech | Trade Association |
| Other | Government Entity |
Acton Institute
What to do About China?
(https://blog.acton.org/archives/115895-what-to-do-about-china__trashed-2.html)
Document Type: Analytical Oped
Organization Type: Think Tank
Summary: Author Samuel Gregg sets out a three-step plan for addressing the China challenge.
Key Policy Recommendations:
- Avoid taking on a mercantilist foreign in its bid to counter Beijing’s influence.
- Distinguish legitimate economic activities from those which are illegitimate.
- Begin a serious national discussion on which products and services genuinely have a national security dimension and abstain from elastic definitions that would reinforce cronyism and excessive government intervention in the economy.
American Enterprise Institute
The Biden China Cabinet
(https://www.aei.org/foreign-and-defense-policy/the-biden-china-cabinet/)
Document Type: Analytical Oped
Organization Type:Think Tank
Summary: Recommendations for the Biden campaign through an economic lens.
Key Policy Recommendations:
- Promote financial transparency to counter China.
- Reform export control to aid technological competition with China.
- Ensure the National Security Council has economic expertise to oversee China policy.
Asia Society
Meeting the China Challenge: A New American Strategy for Technology Competition
Document Type: Report
Organization Type: NGO
Summary: A new report that sets out broad policy objectives for the incoming U.S. administration in four domains of science and technology: (1) fundamental research, (2) 5G digital communications, (3) artificial intelligence, and (4) biotechnology.
Key Policy Recommendations:
- Bolster U.S. innovation capabilities through measures ranging from increased funding for fundamental research to selective upgrading of the American production system.
- Preserve as many of the benefits of an open, ethical, and integrated global knowledge system and innovation economy as possible.
- Tailor targeted risk management measures to address current and future security threats.
Aspen Institute
U.S. Foreign Policy in 2021: Five Priorities for a Progressive Transatlantic Agenda
Document Type: Policy Memo
Organization Type: Think Tank
Summary: In the coming year, the United States and Europe may have an opportunity to overcome the China challenge by advancing a renewed and progressive transatlantic relationship.
Key Policy Recommendations:
- Create a strong democratic playing field for competing with China.
- Advance technology for free societies through standard-setting and joint-research initiatives.
- Enforce anti-corruption measures to strengthen democracy in the transatlantic community.
- Broaden the transatlantic economic agenda beyond trade to focus on digital issues and regulatory harmonization.
Atlantic Council
H.R. McMaster to Biden: Don’t let up on Competition with China
Document Type: Public Speech
Organization Type:Think Tank
Summary: Speaking with CNN National Security Correspondent Vivian Salama during an Atlantic Council Front Page event on November 24, McMaster warned the incoming Biden administration that China will attempt to demonstrate its willingness to engage with the United States on a range of international issues as the new U.S. president takes office. “Don’t fall for it,” McMaster advised.
Key Policy Recommendations:
- Form a “D10” coalition of democracies to coordinate responses on China.
- Compete within international organizations to ensure they are not co-opted to serve the Chinese Communist Party’s interests.
- Revitalize international partnerships to work together in addressing the China challenge.
Bipartisan Policy Center
Cementing American Artificial Intelligence Leadership: A.I. Research and Development
(https://bipartisanpolicy.org/report/ai-research-development/)
Document Type: Report
Organization Type: Think Tank
Summary: In order to compete with China in emerging technology fields such as A.I., the U.S. must embark on a radical new policy direction.
Key Policy Recommendations:
- Incentivize private sector R&D.
- Work with allies to advance A.I. research and development.
- Promote A.I. standards to ensure these technologies remain safe, secure, reliable, and conform with national values.
Brookings
Future of U.S. Policy Toward China (https://www.brookings.edu/multi-chapter-report/the-future-of-us-policy-toward-china/)
Document Type: Report
Organization Type: Think Tank
Summary: A comprehensive monograph forming a roadmap for U.S.-China policies on issues from climate change and trade, to human rights and strategic interests in the Indo-Pacific.
Key Policy Recommendations:
- Refrain from public attempts to drive a wedge between the Chinese people and the ruling Communist Party until the administration has a robust grand-strategy and vision for what would follow.
- Avoid crude and xenophobic generalizations about Chinese society.
- Take a gradualist approach to restoring dialogue with China rather than a broad “back to normal” public appearance.
- Work with allies to coordinate policies on China and regain their trust by showing Washington’s commitment to American leadership on the world stage.
- Take a seven-step plan in working with China and the world to address Covid-19: (1) avoid the blame game; (2) refund the WHO; (3) exchange best practices with China; (4) work with China to build medical infrastructure and increase medical capacity in the developing world; (5) prepare mass manufacturing of vaccines regardless of which countries they originate in; (6) work with the IMF and Paris Club and press China to coordinate its debt relief to the developing world; (7) diversify suppliers of critical medical equipment.
- Place climate change front-and-center of American foreign policy and work with China on the issue.
- Compete with China in international forums to advance the primacy of human rights.
- Be deliberate and methodological in making any adjustments to America’s force posture in the Asia-Pacific.
- Clearly communicate expectations in the South China Sea and develop a pragmatic approach that emphasizes a return to legal precedent and international norms.
- Adopt a national standard on privacy and data security and launch a multilateral digital trade initiative with international partners.
- Seek Chinese “buy-in” to ensure productive legal cooperation.
China’s System of Repression in Xinjiang: How it Developed and how to Curb it (https://www.brookings.edu/research/chinas-system-of-oppression-in-xinjiang-how-it-developed-and-how-to-curb-it/?preview_id=1050569)
Document Type: Report
Organization Type: Think Tank
Summary: Since 2016, an intensified regime of technologically-driven mass surveillance, internment, indoctrination, family separation, birth suppression, and forced labor has implicated the provinces and municipalities of eastern China that fund the Xinjiang gulag through the Pairing Assistance Program, as well as potentially thousands of Chinese and international corporations that directly and indirectly supply and benefit from the system.
Key Policy Recommendations:
- Clearly articulate intended aims with regard to policy positions on Xinjiang, namely: closing reeducation camps, and eliminating “pre-criminal” profiling of minorities.
- Work with civil society to publicly report on the supply chains of companies engaged in mass surveillance in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR).
- The Uyghur Human Rights Policy Act of 2020 and the Tariff Act of 1930 should be resolutely applied to address the issue of forced labour in the XUAR.
- Promote State Department-run Track 1 dialogues and develop an allied set of principles and goals for countering the global expansion of China’s surveillance approach, as well as proposing alternative surveillance technology standards at the United Nations’ International Telecommunications Union.
Democracy First: How the U.S. Can Prevail in the Political Systems Competition with the CCP
Document Type: Policy Memo
Summary: This policy brief examines the role of U.S. democracy promotion in America’s broader China strategy. It examines how China’s malign influence tactics corrode democracy in target countries, explains the impact on U.S. interests, and then provides recommendations for using U.S. support for democracy to secure American objectives and compete with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
Key Policy Recommendations:
- Expedite the formalization of the D-10 as a forum for leading democracies to coordinate policies for democracy-promotion.
- Rely on a mix of assistance and diplomacy to make countries more resilient to CCP coercion.
- Remain vocal in championing the advantages of liberal democracy over authoritarianism, while remaining frank that it is a work in progress.
Business Roundtable
Addressing China’s Trade Practices
(https://www.businessroundtable.org/policy-perspectives/trade-international/addressing-chinas-trade-practices)
Document Type: Policy Memo
Organization Type: Nonprofit
Summary: Business Roundtable urges policymakers to preserve and fully implement the Phase One Agreement and partner with U.S. allies and trading partners to press for further structural reforms in China. Policymakers should develop a strategy that resolves economic issues while enabling long-term American competitiveness and access to customers in China.
Key Policy Recommendations:
- Fully implement the Phase One agreement to realize its benefits and advance additional negotiations that further reduce tariffs and barriers to trade.
- Remove restrictions on digital trade, including allowing the free flow of data and eliminating “secure and controllable” requirements.
Carnegie-Tsinghua Center for Global Policy
Practical Way to Promote U.S.-China Arms Control Cooperation
Document Type: Report
Organization Type:Think Tank
Summary: The strategic competition between China and the United States is likely to remain intense for the foreseeable future. Arms control offers a way to help contain its severity and manage its consequences, while reducing the economic burden of defense spending for both countries in the aftermath of a global pandemic and the worst recession in decades.
Key Policy Recommendations:
- Integrate nuclear and outer space arms control efforts.
- China and the United States should jointly examine the issue of entanglement between nuclear and non-nuclear military technologies.
- The United States should start a dedicated engagement program with China on arms control verification.
- Unilaterally, or together with Russia, the United States should brief China on existing U.S.-Russia confidence-building measures.
CATO Institute
U.S. Policy Options Toward China: An Appraisal
(https://www.cato.org/cato-journal/fall-2020/us-policy-options-toward-china-appraisal)
Document Type: Report
Organization Type:Think Tank
Summary: We may or may not be moving into a “great power competition,” but regardless, the state of the U.S.-China relationship will be a crucial factor in international relations and governance for decades to come. How the U.S. government responds to the Chinese government’s actions is a key element affecting that relationship.
Key Policy Recommendations:
- Focus on expanding cooperation with allies rather than sanctioning rivals.
- China’s bad behaviour should be jointly condemned with allies, but it should be criticised diplomatically, with statements backed by facts.
- The movement of people between the United States and China should continue to flow.
- Set a better example in the world with improved domestic and international behavior.
Center for a New American Security
Charting a Transatlantic Course to Address China
(https://www.cnas.org/publications/reports/charting-a-transatlantic-course-to-address-china)
Document Type: Report
Organization Type:Think Tank
Summary: There is now fertile ground for transatlantic cooperation on everything from reducing dependency on Chinese trade and investment to setting global norms and standards for the future. Yet, despite this convergence of views and interests, there is still no roadmap for how such cooperation should progress.
Key Policy Recommendations:
- Strengthen U.S. and European competitiveness and engage Europe at all levels.
- Coordinate or adopt common policies with allies.
- Broaden alliances to include Australia, Japan, Taiwan, India and South Korea.
- Remain open to opportunities for engagement with China.
Council on Foreign Relations
Implementing Grand Strategy Toward China
(https://www.cfr.org/report/implementing-grand-strategy-toward-china)
Document Type: Report
Organization Type:Think Tank
Summary: The Trump administration recognized the China challenge, but the U.S. still needs a grand strategy. Blackwill recommends decisive action, sustained diplomacy, collaboration among branches of the U.S. government, and working with allies in Asia and Europe, among other approaches.
Key Policy Recommendations:
- Build the greatest possible sustained collaboration between the executive and legislative branches to meet the China challenge.
- Enact a technology control regime to limit China’s theft of U.S. intellectual property.
- Launch a national private and public initiative to develop artificial intelligence (A.I.) technologies, robotics, quantum computing, semiconductors, and biotechnology in the military and civilian domains of government, the private sector, and academia.
- Intensify diplomatic, economic, and security ties with its allies and partners in Asia and Europe.
- Strengthen military power projection in Asia, shifting resources from European and Middle Eastern theaters.
- Refrain from advocating regime change.
- Respond to Chinese cyberattacks with stiff economic sanctions and focused, proportionate, offensive cyber operations.
- Ramp up efforts to counter Beijing’s influence operations within the United States.
- Develop a more robust economic presence in Asia and work with regional partners to coordinate policies that counter Chinese geoeconomic coercion.
- Initiate an extended conversation with the Russian government on world order and the security of Europe and Asia.
- Initiate bilateral talks with China over the future of the South China Sea, with the aim of preventing further militarization.
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Mapping the Future of U.S.-China Policy
(https://chinasurvey.csis.org/policy-recommendations/)
Document Type: Report
Organization Type:Think Tank
Summary: This report advances 10 policy positions for the incoming U.S. administration to adopt in order to compete more effectively with China.
Key Policy Recommendations:
- Articulate clear and achievable objectives on China.
- Harness the growing international criticism of China to inoculate societies against CCP coercion.
- Adopt a robust and multilateral approach to technology competition with China.
- American research, innovation, and academic exchange must not be placed under unnecessary and counterproductive risks.
- Restore deterrence in the western Pacific.
- Form an international coalition to coordinate human rights policies.
- Seek to find areas of cooperation with China that serve American interests.
- Work to regain trust among traditional U.S. allies.
- Democratize national dialogue on China and seek input from key stakeholders when formulating the next National Security Strategy.
- Resume strategic dialogue with China.
Addressing Forced Labor in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region: Toward a Shared Agenda
Document Type: Report
Organization Type: Think Tank
Summary: The forced labor of ethnic and religious minorities in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR), as part of a broader pattern of severe human rights abuses, is a significant and growing concern that demands the attention of governments and private-sector actors across the world. This brief explores what the XUAR produces, the sectors that are implicated, the resulting sourcing challenges, and the opportunities for collective action to be explored in further research.
Key Policy Recommendations:
- Exert leverage to end forced labor and include diplomacy and ongoing dialogue; leverage related to the Olympic Games taking place in Beijing in 2022; and punitive tools such as bans on imports of goods produced with forced labor.
East-West Center
Biden Administration Faces Daunting Task of Rebuilding U.S. Economic Diplomacy
Document Type: Analytical Oped
Organization Type: Research Institute
Summary: Author Marcus Noland sketches a broad foreign policy agenda for the incoming Biden administration.
Key Policy Recommendations:
- To remain outside the Comprehensive and Progessive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership creates an opening for China to take the lead in rule-setting. The U.S. must re-engage Asian allies with renewed vigor to counter Beijing.
- Work with other key players on climate change and improve U.S. standing on the issue.
Foreign Policy Research Institute
The China Challenge After 2020
(https://www.fpri.org/article/2020/12/the-china-challenge-after-2020/ )
Document Type: Analytical Oped
Organization Type: Think Tank
Summary: A set of policy recommendations for the incoming administration to effectively compete with China.
Key Policy Recommendations:
- Pursue diversified coalitions based on strategic interests: For example, an alignment aimed at defending the sea lanes through the South China Sea would include the United States, Australia, Japan, perhaps Singapore, plus Britain, France, and even Germany. A coalition focused on cybersecurity in Europe would have a different composition.
- Form coalitions for democracy promotion, and a wider coalition of nations concerned about Chinese hegemony. A key challenge for the administration will be distinguishing between these two agendas.
Freedom House
Policy Recommendations: China
(https://freedomhouse.org/policy-recommendations-china)
Document Type: Policy Memo
Organization Type:NGO
Summary: A set of policy recommendations for the incoming administration to advance human rights in China.
Key Policy Recommendations:
- Prohibit the export to Hong Kong of U.S.-made security equipment that could be used by Hong Kong police to commit violence against protesters.
- Impose targeted sanctions on perpetrators of violence against protesters in Hong Kong.
- Ensure full enforcement of the Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act.
- High-level officials in the administration and U.S. Congress should make frequent public statements and private appeals to Hong Kong and Chinese counterparts.
German Marshall Fund
Biden and What to Expect from an “Ally-centered” China Policy
(https://www.gmfus.org/blog/2020/12/16/biden-and-what-expect-ally-centered-china-policy)
Document Type: Analytical Oped
Organization Type:Think Tank
Summary: Author Andrew Small sets forth a broad agenda for a more ally-centered U.S. foreign policy to effectively compete with China.
Key Policy Recommendations:
- The U.S.-China relationship needs to be sufficiently stable to navigate hot-button issues without risk of escalation and maintain a few limited areas of cooperation.
- The U.S. must stray away from the unilateralism of the Trump era and take a more multilateral approach to the China challenge.
Heritage Foundation
Solutions 2020: China
(https://www.heritage.org/solutions/)
Document Type: Policy Memo
Organization Type: Think Tank
Summary: The Heritage Foundation provides a broad overview of policy recommendations for the incoming administration, including on U.S.-China competition.
Key Policy Recommendation:
- Engage China economically while defending American interests at home and abroad.
- Recommit to building and maintaining alliances.
Hoover Institution
Decision 2020 Report: Competing on a Fair Playing Field with China
(https://www.hoover.org/news/decision-2020-report-competing-fair-playing-field-china)
Document Type: Research Compendium
Organization Type: Think Tank
Summary: The sixth edition of the Decision 2020 report highlights Hoover fellows’ research and analysis on the People’s Republic of China’s superpower ambitions and how the United States should protect and advance its interests in its relations with the PRC.
Key Policy Recommendation:
- Promote transparency as a safeguard against manipulation.
- The U.S. government and research institutions—especially think tanks—should demand equal access in China and place restrictions on Chinese scholars unless this condition is met.
- Emphasize constructive engagement and reciprocity.
Hudson Institute
Hong Kong Will Test Biden’s China Strategy and Democracy Promotion
Document Type: Analytical oped
Organization Type:Think Tank
Summary: The Biden administration’s handling of Beijing’s crackdown on Hong Kong’s autonomy is a bellwether of the incoming administration’s new-and-improved China Policy.
Key Policy Recommendation:
- Enhance democracy promotion and respond to the silencing of pro-democracy lawmakers in Hong Kong.
- Seek to build alliances to counteract China’s international influence.
- Provide Hong Kongers with safe refuge.
- Use economic incentives and disincentives, including the use of targeted sanctions, to exert leverage on China.
- Reassure Taiwan that America will not allow it to become the next Hong Kong.
Human Rights Watch
U.S. President Should set Human Rights Foreign Policy
(https://www.hrw.org/news/2020/11/10/us-president-should-set-human-rights-foreign-policy#)
Document Type: Policy Memo
Organization Type:NGO
Summary: The United States should place human rights at the center of its international strategy.
Key Policy Recommendation:
- Use of targeted sanctions against foreign officials and others who have engaged in serious human rights abuses, including through robust and expansive use of the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act.
- Recommit to multilateralism and put human rights at the forefront of the administration’s international engagement.
National Committee on U.S.-China Relations
Rising to the China Challenge: Renewing American Competitiveness in the Indo-Pacific
(https://www.ncuscr.org/event/china-challenge-indo-pacific)
Document Type: Panel Discussion
Organization Type: Nonprofit
Summary: The National Committee hosted a virtual event with Ely Ratner, who presented recommendations to address the critical areas of U.S. policy toward China that could be more consistent, coordinated, and productive.
Key Policy Recommendation:
- Restore U.S. competitiveness in the international arena and advance alternatives to China’s vision of the future.
- Rely on multilateralism instead of seeking unilateral solutions to the China challenge.
Paulson Institute
Henry M. Paulson, Jr., Proposes Policy of “Targeted Reciprocity” Toward China
Document Type: Speech
Organization Type: Think Tank
Summary: In this speech, Henry M. Paulson Jr., lays out his recommendations for President-elect Biden’s China policy, arguing that competition without unnecessary confrontation should be the goal.
Key Policy Recommendation:
- Join with leading economies—Japan, the EU, the UK, South Korea, and Australia—to leverage a coordinated policy to upgrade the global trading system and its governing bodies, like the World Trade Organization (WTO).
- Jointly bring commercially viable clean energy technologies to the scale necessary to address climate change. The U.S. is the country with the most clean-energy patents, but China is the country most likely, and with the greatest need, to commercialize and deploy these technologies at scale.
- Initiate a comprehensive new round of bilateral negotiations with China.
Paul Tsai Center at Yale
Future of U.S. Policy Toward China (https://www.brookings.edu/multi-chapter-report/the-future-of-us-policy-toward-china/)
Document Type: Report
Organization Type: Research Institute
Summary: A comprehensive series of reports forming a roadmap for U.S.-China policies on issues from climate change and trade to human rights and strategic interests in the Indo-Pacific.
Key Policy Recommendations:
- Refrain from public attempts to drive a wedge between the Chinese people and the ruling Communist Party until the administration has a robust grand-strategy and vision for what would follow.
- Avoid crude and xenophobic generalizations about Chinese society.
- Take a gradualist approach to restoring dialogue with China rather than a broad “back to normal” public appearance.
- Work with allies to coordinate policies on China and regain their trust by showing Washington’s commitment to American leadership on the world stage.
- Take a seven-step plan in working with China and the world to address Covid-19: (1) avoid the blame game; (2) refund the WHO; (3) exchange best practices with China; (4) work with China to build medical infrastructure and increase medical capacity in the developing world; (5) prepare mass manufacturing of vaccines regardless of which countries they originate in; (6) work with the IMF and Paris Club and press China to coordinate its debt relief to the developing world; (7) diversify suppliers of critical medical equipment.
- Place climate change front-and-center of American foreign policy and work with China on the issue.
- Compete with China in international forums to advance the primacy of human rights.
- Be deliberate and methodological in making any adjustments to America’s force posture in the Asia-Pacific.
- Clearly communicate expectations in the South China Sea and develop a pragmatic approach that emphasizes a return to legal precedent and international norms.
- Adopt a national standard on privacy and data security and launch a multilateral digital trade initiative with international partners.
- Seek Chinese “buy-in” to ensure productive legal cooperation.
Peterson Institute for International Economics
Memo to the Biden administration on how to advance economic talks with China
Document Type: Policy Memo
Organization Type: Think Tank
Summary: The foundation of U.S. strategy should be a comprehensive program of economic renewal that maintains American technological leadership, rather than a defensive strategy that seeks to slow China’s technological and economic rise.
Key Policy Recommendation:
- Focus economic negotiations on one or two high-priority topics where there is at least some indication of Chinese receptivity.
- Coordinate, to the maximum extent possible, with U.S. allies and partners.
- Avoid a high-cost, low-benefit policy of economic decoupling from China.
Rhodium Group
The Biden-Trump China Toughfest
(https://rhg.com/research/biden-trump/)
Document Type: Analysis
Summary: This short analysis questions toughness on China as an end-in-itself and seeks to offer a corrective.
Key Policy Recommendation:
- Avoid imitating industrial policies like China’s and instead adopt an active role that fosters innovation without stifling it.
- Resume role as a global leader.
- Re-emphasize a commitment to peaceful competition that is well-below the threshold of armed conflict.
- Provide adequate offramps to conflict should China seek options to reconverge with liberal economies in its pursuit of prosperity.
Retail Industry Leaders Association
Statement on Reports of Forced Labor in Xinjiang
(https://www.rila.org/focus-areas/public-policy/statement-on-reports-of-forced-labor-in-xinjiang)
Document Type: Joint Statement
Organization Type: Trade Association
Summary: A joint statement from the Retail Leaders Association and partner organizations on the issue of Xinjiang forced labor and global supply chains.
Key Policy Recommendation:
- Engage a multi-stakeholder working group to develop and deploy a collective approach that accurately assesses the problem of forced labor.
Semiconductor Industry Association
U.S. Semiconductor Leadership: A Policy Platform
(https://www.semiconductors.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/SIA_PolicyPlatform_Final.pdf)
Document Type: Policy Memo
Organization Type: Trade Association
Summary: To preserve U.S. leadership and prevent the erosion of its innovation and manufacturing base, Congress and the administration must enact bold policies to help ensure America continues to lead the world in semiconductor research, design, and manufacturing.
Key Policy Recommendation:
- Enact legislation to provide targeted grants and an investment tax credit to spur the construction of new onshore advanced semiconductor research, design, and manufacturing facilities.
- Avoid policies which would completely “decouple” the two economies since this would inflict great harm on the U.S. semiconductor industry, workforce, and the global economy as a whole.
- Work with its allies to adopt a strong, durable, and targeted multilateral regime to protect sensitive technologies, intellectual property, and the rule of law.
- Adopt, implement, and fund a coordinated, whole-of-government national strategy for leadership in the technologies of the future, including A.I., quantum computing, 5G/6G, and others.
SEMI
Trade
(https://www.semi.org/en/global-advocacy/trade)
Document Type: Policy Memo
Organization Type: Trade Association
Summary: SEMI’s core trade principles include the protection of intellectual property rights, the reduction and elimination of tariffs, the harmonization of global technology standards, and a transparent, rules-based global trading system that fosters fair competition and market access for all companies in the semiconductor supply chain. These principles should guide U.S. policy on China.
Key Policy Recommendation:
- Implement the U.S. - China phase-1 agreement to increase Intellectual property rights (IPR) protection for the semiconductor industry.
Software Alliance (BSA)
Priorities in U.S.-China Technology, Trade, and Security
(https://www.bsa.org/files/policy-filings/bsatransitionall.pdf#page=20)
Document Type: Policy Memo
Organization Type: Trade Association
Summary: The U.S. is engaged in parallel processes to reevaluate both the trade and the national security implications of the U.S.-China relationship.
Key Policy Recommendation:
- Develop and strengthen strategic partnerships.
- Ensure the security of supply chains.
Stimson Center
Needed: Restoration of U.S. Credibility in the Indo-Pacific Region
(https://www.stimson.org/2020/needed-restoration-of-u-s-credibility-in-the-indo-pacific-region/)
Document Type: Analytical Article
Organization Type: Think Tank
Summary: The U.S. needs to demonstrate that when it talks about the strategic significance of the Indo-Pacific region, it means it.
Key Policy Recommendation:
- Regain the trust of allies and stop publicly criticizing them.
- Revitalize multilateral forums to pursue a more effective agenda on China.
Toy Industry Association
Join the Fight on Tariffs
Document Type: Policy Memo
Organization Type: Trade Association
Summary: The Toy Association continues to advocate against the threat of tariffs on toys made in China. Duties on toys would cause significant harm to U.S. consumers and quality American jobs in the toy sector.
Key Policy Recommendation:
- End tariffs on products manufactured in China.
UCSD 21st Century China
Meeting the China Challenge: A New American Strategy for Technology Competition
Document Type: Report
Organization Type: Research Institute
Summary: A new policy report on Meeting the China Challenge: A New American Strategy for Technology Competition is the culmination of over a full year’s deliberation and study by the bipartisan Working Group on Science and Technology in U.S.-China Relations. It sets out broad policy objectives as well as specific recommendations for the new U.S. administration in four domains of science and technology: fundamental research, 5G digital communications, artificial intelligence and biotechnology.
Key Policy Recommendation:
- Bolster innovation capabilities through measures ranging from increased funding for fundamental research to selective upgrading of the U.S. production system.
- Preserve as many of the benefits of an open, ethical, and integrated global knowledge system and innovation economy as possible.
- Use of targeted risk management measures to address current and future security threats.
U.S.- China Economic and Security Review Commission
2020 Annual Report to Congress
(https://www.uscc.gov/annual-report/2020-annual-report-congress)
Document Type: Congressional Report
Organization Type: Government
Summary: Topics this year include China's view of strategic competition with the United States; China's promotion of alternative global norms and standards; China's strategic aims in Africa; vulnerabilities in China's financial system and risks for the United States; U.S.-China links in healthcare and biotechnology; China's growing power projection and expeditionary capabilities; Taiwan; Hong Kong; and a review of economics, trade, security, political, and foreign affairs developments in 2020.
Key Policy Recommendations:
- Adopt the principle of reciprocity as foundational in all legislation bearing on U.S.-China relations.
- Direct the U.S. Department of State to produce an annual report detailing China’s actions in the United Nations and its subordinate agencies that subvert the principles and purposes of the United Nations.
- Expand the authority of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to monitor and take foreign government subsidies into account in premerger notification processes.
- Amend the Immigration and Nationality Act to clarify that association with a foreign government’s technology transfer programs may be considered grounds to deny a nonimmigrant visa if the foreign government in question is deemed a strategic competitor of the United States, or if the applicant has engaged in violations of U.S. laws relating to espionage, sabotage, or export controls.
- Consider enacting legislation to make the Director of the American Institute in Taiwan a presidential nomination subject to the advice and consent of the United States Senate.
- Identify and remove barriers to receiving United States visas for Hong Kong residents attempting to exit Hong Kong for fear of political persecution.
U.S. House of Representatives China Task Force
China Task Force Report
(https://www.scribd.com/document/478104010/China-Task-Force-Report)
Document Type: Report
Organization Type: Government Entity
Summary: The China Task Force (CTF) conducted an extensive survey of U.S. interests relating to the People’s Republic of China, to clarify the scale and urgency of the threat of the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) global malign behavior and develop a specific and actionable response plan.
Key Policy Recommendation:
- Conduct a whole-of-government information campaign to counter CCP propaganda.
- Evaluate whether crimes against the Uyghurs constitute genocide.
- Call for greater transparency within the UN and WHO to hold China accountable.
- Adopt a whole-of-government approach to determining the risk posed by Chinese 5G systems to international security.
- Strengthen the Development Finance Corporation and Export Import Bank to counter the BRI.
- Ensure PRC companies are held to the same disclosure standards as their U.S. counterparts when listing on U.S. stock exchanges.
United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations
The United States and Europe: A Concrete Agenda for Transatlantic Cooperation on China
Document Type: Report
Organization Type: Government
Summary: U.S. Senator Jim Risch (R-Idaho), chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, today published a majority report entitled “The United States and Europe: A Concrete Agenda for Transatlantic Cooperation on China.”
Key Policy Recommendation:
- Invigorate partnerships in Africa and the Indo-Pacific.
- Confront the security implications of the PRC’s strategic investments in energy, transport, and digital infrastructure through “One Belt, One Road” (OBOR).
- Address anti-competitive trade and economic practices.
- Protect the integrity of international organizations and fend off malign influence.
Related Program
Kissinger Institute on China and the United States
The Kissinger Institute works to ensure that China policy serves American long-term interests and is founded in understanding of historical and cultural factors in bilateral relations and in accurate assessment of the aspirations of China’s government and people. Read more
