Late last month at a security forum in Washington, DC, Kiron Skinner, Director of Policy Planning for the US Department of State, described today\u2019s US-China conflict as \u201ca fight with a really different civilization and a different ideology, and the United States hasn\u2019t had that before.\u201d As a trial balloon, this apparent attempt to define the Trump administration\u2019s confrontation with China did not fly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
By framing the creeping cold war between the US and China as a clash of civilizations, Skinner \u2013 whose position was once held by luminaries such as George Kennan, Paul Nitze, Richard N. Haass, and Anne-Marie Slaughter \u2013 was being neither original nor accurate. The political scientist Samuel P. Huntington developed the concept more than a quarter-century ago, and the Communist Party of China itself is an ideologically bankrupt entity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Worse, Skinner\u2019s full remarks were freighted with racial overtones. Unlike America\u2019s competition with the Soviet Union, which she described as, \u201ca fight within the Western family,\u201d the rivalry with China supposedly represents \u201cthe first time that we will have a great power competitor that is not Caucasian.\u201d Never mind that the US fought Japan in World War II.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
One hopes Skinner\u2019s talk of a clash between Caucasian and non-Caucasian civilizations was just a slip of the tongue. Those who would intentionally traffic in such ideas must know that they could lead not just to the economic or military defeat of one side, but to the destruction of an entire society. How policymakers frame the US-China conflict will have far-reaching implications, and the US must demonstrate that its policies are motivated by a higher moral purpose if they are to gain wider international support.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Most commentators see the US-China conflict as a struggle between an incumbent power and its most plausible challenger. The two countries appear to be falling into the proverbial \u2018Thucydides Trap\u2019, a self-fulfilling prophecy in which a hegemon\u2019s fear of being supplanted leads it to act in such a way as to precipitate a war for global dominance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And yet, even if today\u2019s conflict is being driven by a zero-sum quest for power, that should not be the US\u2019s sole consideration. Given the threat of civilizational collapse posed by climate change, the Trump administration\u2019s focus only on US interests appears selfish and irresponsible to the rest of the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The fact is that most of the world \u2013 including a sizable share of Americans \u2013 has no interest in being plunged into another cold war just to preserve US hegemony. If the US government wants to garner international support for countering Chinese power and influence, it must make a more compelling case.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This shouldn\u2019t be all that difficult, given that the rise of China under a one-party dictatorship threatens not just American hegemony but the rules-based international order. Rather than framing the conflict as a race war, then, the US should focus on the Chinese threat to global institutions, which, by extension, is a threat to many other countries\u2019 growth and stability.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Whatever its flaws, the US-led international order offers far more benefits to other countries than any conceivable alternative system could. Indeed, during the Cold War with the Soviet Union, the US enjoyed widespread international support precisely because it was leading a defense of that order. And since the end of that conflict, most of the world has either welcomed or accepted American hegemony, on the tacit understanding that the US would continue to uphold the liberal framework.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sadly, that condition no longer holds. US President Donald Trump\u2019s administration has unabashedly championed an \u2018America First\u2019 foreign-policy agenda, alienating traditional allies and alarming the rest of world for the sake of narrow political objectives. It is no exaggeration to say that Trump\u2019s misguided policies pose as great a threat to the liberal order as China does.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Trump administration may continue to believe that US power on its own is enough to vanquish China. But going it alone will prove costly, and the chances of success would be much higher if the US were to marshal the support of its friends and allies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The latest failure to reach a trade deal suggests that the US-China cold war is escalating to the next stage. Sooner or later, the Trump administration will realize that it actually needs the support of its allies to prevail against the Chinese.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When that day comes, it would do well to abandon talk of civilizational conflict and racial rivalry, and instead offer a morally justifiable case for confronting China. The US is the traditional defender of the liberal order; it needs to start acting like it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u00a9 Project Syndicate<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Recent remarks by a senior Trump administration official suggest that the United States\u2019 current approach to China is dangerously misconceived. The rise of China under a one-party dictatorship should be met with a united front in defense of the liberal order, not talk of a clash of Caucasian and non-Caucasian civilizations.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1032,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[882],"country":[71,221],"authors":[],"class_list":["post-1031","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-macroeconomics","tag-882","country-china","country-united-states-of-america"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n