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2. Emerging Powers and the Future of American Statecraft
- Author:
- Christopher S. Chivvis and Beatrix Geaghan-Breiner
- Publication Date:
- 04-2024
- Content Type:
- Special Report
- Institution:
- Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
- Abstract:
- The structure of international politics is changing in ways that are not fully appreciated in Washington. The United States has paid a great deal of attention to the rise of China in the last decade but much less to emerging powers whose rise will also shape the operating environment for American statecraft. No single emerging power will have an impact tantamount to China’s, but they will have a significant impact collectively due to their geopolitical weight and diplomatic aspirations. America has limited ability to influence the trajectory of these emerging powers, identified in this report as Argentina, Brazil, India, Indonesia, Mexico, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Thailand, and Türkiye. They have taken stances that contrast or directly clash with U.S. positions on China and on Russia over the past few years. Nearly all have voiced concerns about Washington’s approach to the war in Ukraine, even as they criticized Moscow’s invasion. Almost none would line up with the United States in a confrontation with China. Instead, they are likely to pursue highly self-interested foreign policies. Washington should expect that they will increasingly challenge some of its policies, sustain relationships with its adversaries, and press their own agendas on the global stage. The emerging powers’ statecrafts are shaped in large part by their drive for economic security. But their geographies, different preferences for world order, domestic politics, and defense relationships also play a role. Concerns about the strength of democracy in other countries, which has played an animating role in U.S. foreign policy for decades, are a lower priority for them, no matter how democratic they are. It will be a mistake for the United States to frame its relations with these emerging powers primarily as part of a competition for influence with China and Russia, however tempting it may be to do so. These powers are not swing states that will tilt decisively toward either side in a global great power competition. Most will resist any efforts to bring them into a U.S.-led camp as in the Cold War. Trying to make them do so would also risk strategic overreach by embroiling the United States too deeply in the emerging powers’ domestic politics or by expending its resources in pursuit of building ties that never materialize. A better approach for the United States would be to focus on negotiating interest-based deals with emerging powers while cordoning off areas of disagreement. These might include tailored market access and investment agreements, agreements on technology manufacturing, energy transition initiatives, efforts to combat deforestation, efforts to build public health infrastructure, and infrastructure investments. It would be wasteful of the United States to offer these countries security guarantees, but in some cases providing security assistance can serve its interests. Washington should accept that most of these countries will maintain close diplomatic, economic, and sometimes security relationships with China and probably Russia. Over the longer term, it will serve U.S. interests to strengthen the sovereignty of emerging powers when possible and cost-effective to do so. This will provide a bulwark against the undue expansion of China’s power and influence and help ensure that, even if they do not side with the United States, they are not drawn closely into the orbit of its major geopolitical competitors. Strengthening emerging powers’ sovereignty will also help boost their development as constructive powers with a stake in sustaining a peaceful world order conducive to global economic growth.
- Topic:
- Foreign Policy, Sovereignty, Strategic Competition, and Emerging Powers
- Political Geography:
- Africa, Russia, China, Middle East, Asia, Latin America, and United States of America
3. Tracing the Roots of China’s AI Regulations
- Author:
- Matt Sheehan
- Publication Date:
- 02-2024
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
- Abstract:
- In 2021 and 2022, China became the first country to implement detailed, binding regulations on some of the most common applications of artificial intelligence (AI). These rules formed the foundation of China’s emerging AI governance regime, an evolving policy architecture that will affect everything from frontier AI research to the functioning of the world’s second-largest economy, from large language models in Africa to autonomous vehicles in Europe. U.S. political leaders often warn against letting China “write the rules of the road” in AI governance. But if the United States is serious about competing for global leadership in AI governance, then it needs to actually understand what it is competing against. That requires examining the nuts and bolts of both China’s AI regulations and the policy process that shaped them. This paper is the second in a series breaking down China’s AI regulations and pulling back the curtain on the policymaking process shaping them. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the Chinese government started that process with the 2021 rules on recommendation algorithms, an omnipresent use of the technology that is often overlooked in international AI governance discourse. Those rules imposed new obligations on companies to intervene in content recommendations, granted new rights to users being recommended content, and offered protections to gig workers subject to algorithmic scheduling. The Chinese party-state quickly followed up with a new regulation on “deep synthesis,” the use of AI to generate synthetic media such as deepfakes. Those rules required AI providers to watermark AI-generated content and ensure that content does not violate people’s “likeness rights” or harm the “nation’s image.” Together, these two regulations also created and amended China’s algorithm registry, a regulatory tool that would evolve into a cornerstone of the country’s AI governance regime. Contrary to popular conception in the rest of the world, China’s AI governance regime has not been created by top-down edicts from CCP leadership. President Xi Jinping and other top CCP leaders will sometimes give high-level guidance on policy priorities, but they have not been the key players when it comes to shaping China’s AI regulations. Instead, those regulations have been the product of a dynamic and iterative policymaking process driven by a mix of actors from both inside and outside the Chinese party-state. Those actors include mid-level bureaucrats, academics, technologists, journalists, and policy researchers at platform tech companies. Through a mix of public advocacy, intellectual debate, technical workshopping, and bureaucratic wrangling, these actors laid the foundations for China’s present and future AI regulations. This paper traces the progression of these regulations through the “policy funnel” (see figure 1) of Chinese AI governance. For both recommendation algorithms and deep synthesis rules, the initial spark for the regulation came from long-standing CCP concerns about the creation and dissemination of online content. For the former, the rise of the algorithmically driven news app Toutiao threatened the CCP’s ability to set a unified narrative and choose which stories are pushed to readers. In the case of deep synthesis, online face swap videos grabbed the attention of the Chinese public and led government regulators to consider the threat of deepfakes. Over the course of 2017–2020, these concerns made their way through China’s bureaucracy. Regulators took a series of stopgap measures in specific applications, while also tasking policy analysts and government-adjacent technical organizations with exploring different regulatory interventions.
- Topic:
- Science and Technology, Governance, Regulation, and Artificial Intelligence
- Political Geography:
- China, East Asia, and Asia
4. Political Drivers of China’s Changing Nuclear Policy: Implications for U.S.-China Nuclear Relations and International Security
- Author:
- Tong Zhao
- Publication Date:
- 07-2024
- Content Type:
- Special Report
- Institution:
- Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
- Abstract:
- The message from Chinese officials has become increasingly clear: the United States and China should first stabilize their political relationship before taking on nuclear issues.
- Topic:
- Nuclear Weapons, International Security, Bilateral Relations, and Decision-Making
- Political Geography:
- China, Asia, and United States of America
5. How DiDi Chuxing Adapts to Latin America’s Era of Digital Platforms
- Author:
- Omar Manky and Natalia Mogollón
- Publication Date:
- 07-2024
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
- Abstract:
- The Chinese ride-hailing app has acclimated remarkably well to local conditions, challenging simplistic narratives about the entry of Chinese companies into the region.
- Topic:
- Science and Technology, Economy, and Digital Platforms
- Political Geography:
- China and Latin America
6. Transatlantic Policies on China: Is There a Role for Türkiye?
- Author:
- Sinan Ülgen and Temur Umarov
- Publication Date:
- 10-2024
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
- Abstract:
- Türkiye is an important transatlantic actor in Sino-Western competition. It can add value to Western efforts aimed at synchronizing policies toward a rising China. And yet, at present, Ankara’s policies on China are not harmonized with those of its partners in the West.
- Topic:
- Foreign Policy, Transatlantic Relations, Strategic Competition, and Regional Power
- Political Geography:
- China, Turkey, Middle East, and Asia
7. Cooperation Between China, Iran, North Korea, and Russia: Current and Potential Future Threats to America
- Author:
- Christopher S. Chivvis and Jack Keating
- Publication Date:
- 10-2024
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
- Abstract:
- Each one of these states threatens U.S. interests. Yet they are far from a coherent bloc and largely pose threats independent of one another.
- Topic:
- Security, Foreign Policy, and Regional Cooperation
- Political Geography:
- Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea
8. Negotiating the India-China Standoff: 2020–2024
- Author:
- Saheb Singh Chadha
- Publication Date:
- 12-2024
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
- Abstract:
- India and China have been engaged in a standoff at their border in eastern Ladakh since April–May 2020. Over 100,000 troops remain deployed on both sides, and rebuilding political trust will take time.
- Topic:
- Security, Bilateral Relations, Territorial Disputes, and Borders
- Political Geography:
- China, South Asia, India, and Asia
9. African Media Cultures and Chinese Public Relations Strategies in Kenya and Ethiopia
- Author:
- Hangwei Li and Yuan Wang
- Publication Date:
- 02-2023
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
- Abstract:
- China has become a global power, but there is too little debate about how this has happened and what it means. Many argue that China exports its developmental model and imposes it on other countries. But Chinese players also extend their influence by working through local actors and institutions while adapting and assimilating local and traditional forms, norms, and practices. With a generous multiyear grant from the Ford Foundation, Carnegie has launched an innovative body of research on Chinese engagement strategies in seven regions of the world—Africa, Central Asia, Latin America, the Middle East and North Africa, the Pacific, South Asia, and Southeast Asia. Through a mix of research and strategic convening, this project explores these complex dynamics, including the ways Chinese firms are adapting to local labor laws in Latin America, Chinese banks and funds are exploring traditional Islamic financial and credit products in Southeast Asia and the Middle East, and Chinese actors are helping local workers upgrade their skills in Central Asia. These adaptive Chinese strategies that accommodate and work within local realities are mostly ignored by Western policymakers in particular. Ultimately, the project aims to significantly broaden understanding and debate about China’s role in the world and to generate innovative policy ideas. These could enable local players to better channel Chinese energies to support their societies and economies; provide lessons for Western engagement around the world, especially in developing countries; help China’s own policy community learn from the diversity of Chinese experience; and potentially reduce frictions.
- Topic:
- Development, Media, Public Relations, and Engagement
- Political Geography:
- Kenya, Africa, China, and Ethiopia
10. How Indonesia Used Chinese Industrial Investments to Turn Nickel into the New Gold
- Author:
- Angela Tritto
- Publication Date:
- 04-2023
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
- Abstract:
- China has become a global power, but there is too little debate about how this has happened and what it means. Many argue that China exports its developmental model and imposes it on other countries. But Chinese players also extend their influence by working through local actors and institutions while adapting and assimilating local and traditional forms, norms, and practices. With a generous multiyear grant from the Ford Foundation, Carnegie has launched an innovative body of research on Chinese engagement strategies in seven regions of the world—Africa, Central Asia, Latin America, the Middle East and North Africa, the Pacific, South Asia, and Southeast Asia. Through a mix of research and strategic convening, this project explores these complex dynamics, including the ways Chinese firms are adapting to local labor laws in Latin America, Chinese banks and funds are exploring traditional Islamic financial and credit products in Southeast Asia and the Middle East, and Chinese actors are helping local workers upgrade their skills in Central Asia. These adaptive Chinese strategies that accommodate and work within local realities are mostly ignored by Western policymakers in particular. Ultimately, the project aims to significantly broaden understanding and debate about China’s role in the world and to generate innovative policy ideas. These could enable local players to better channel Chinese energies to support their societies and economies; provide lessons for Western engagement around the world, especially in developing countries; help China’s own policy community learn from the diversity of Chinese experience; and potentially reduce frictions.
- Topic:
- Development, Industrial Policy, Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), Investment, and Innovation
- Political Geography:
- China, Indonesia, and Asia