On Wednesday, October 20th, American and Chinese panelists came together for a US-China Roundtable on Innovation and Competition Legislation: 117th Congress. The event opened with speeches from Dr. Liu Limin and Ambassador Julia Chang Bloch, who both spoke about educational exchanges as a “stabilizing force” in the US-China bilateral relationship. The first section of discussion allowed Professors Robert Sutter and Zhu Feng to share American and Chinese perspectives on the congressional legislation. Professor Sutter shared American concerns about rapid development of the Chinese military, undermining international property rights, and China’s challenges to global governance. Professor Feng countered with the Chinese viewpoint. He expressed concerns that the “anti China” legislation will cause a swing in the minds of young Chinese students, from interest to hatred for America and American culture.

In the next portion of the event, speakers focused on how this legislation will impact higher education and research. Professor Chen Zhimin spoke on how the legislation may decrease the number of Chinese students and faculty allowed to study in the US. The honorable Peter McPherson gave reassurances that the Chinese students are more than welcome, but that the real threat in higher education and research is the taking of intellectual property. Professor Longxuan centered his remarks around three main concerns: investigations into foreign investments in high education, regulations on overseas talent introduction programs, and restrictions on intellectual property transactions. In this sections concluding commentary, Mr. David Goldston emphasized this legislation is not anti China, but aims to create clearer guidelines for US-China educational exchanges and research security.

The remainder of the evening concentrated on what the path forward may look like. Dr. Thomas Fingar shared his viewpoint that the US-China relationship is unlikely to improve in the foreseeable future, but that both countries can take actions to keep the bilateral relationship from getting worse. Dr. Wang Huiyao called himself “cautiously optimistic” about the path forward, while acknowledging the challenges ahead are not few or small. One challenge he believes is unbalanced interest amongst Chinese and American students. He believes Chinese students prefer studying abroad in America, but that the reverse is not true.

In the final moments of the event, there was a consensus amongst all speakers that people to people exchanges are crucial to creating mutual trust and are the foundation of a cooperative US-China relationship.

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Speakers