Have you made a case elsewhere why a more conciliatory approach to China is the way to go? It's not obvious to me. I get that in order to deal with global challenges like GW and AI we need to cooperate with China. But the current stance does not preclude cooperation on these issues, just like during the US-USSR Cold war there was cooperation on a range of issues.
I would say the core problem is the increasing militarization of US-China ties. You note that the US and USSR cooperated on certain issues in the first Cold War, but most of those forms of cooperation were minimalistic and military-focused (e.g. SALT, the ABM Treaty). The only outright cooperation I can think of was the joint US-Soviet effort to put a stop to the Suez Crisis in 1956. Meanwhile, US-Soviet tensions helped spark proxy wars the world over and almost devolved into nuclear war on several occasions.
A difficult aspect of this is that it's fundamentally about grand strategy, which is an oversimplified discipline by definition. But focusing on competition (and often military competition), as Biden and Trump have both done, will genuinely preclude cooperation in other areas, as we've seen repeatedly in recent years. We have to be pragmatic and understand that China's rise is happening, so we're better off seeking a modus vivendi in which we can build trust and work together on existential issues like climate and AI development.
I would add that there are plenty of ways to do this without just giving up on East Asia as a region, even in a military sense. Rising powers want more flexibility than they had in the first Cold War, and they'd rather not have to choose between working with the US or China. On the military front, America could shift its approach to East Asia into an offshore balancing/ deterrence by denial strategy (which would be less threatening to China but also cheaper and less likely to lead to crises). Here's a detailed version of that argument that got a wide reading in the Pentagon in 2022: https://quincyinst.org/research/active-denial-a-roadmap-to-a-more-effective-stabilizing-and-sustainable-u-s-defense-strategy-in-asia/
Hi Conor does this argument from Quincy get into the fact that much of the wealth in the us comes from the fact that we are the global reserve currency? I'd imagine that trying to cut china off from key aspects of our own markets will just push them into developing work arounds that effectively mean we have nothing to offer them- I'm referring to semi conductor production lithography machines, and operating systems (something huawei has seemed to be able to produce on their own now). In such a case the us financial system will see less capital from china flowing through its system which I think will probably only weaken the us economy.
Hi Connor (and sorry for misspelling your name earlier). Werner article is interesting, but it raises many questions. If I understand him correctly, he believes that the root cause of the tension is essentially economic and the need to be the top dog when it comes to economic issues, i.e. a zero-sum approach. He argues that a more cooperative approach would give rise to a non-zero sum situation, a win-win, but the current climate of animosity makes it all but impossible. This assumes 1. that it is about the economy, not security (probably right, but also Taiwan, other disputed territories, etc, the geo-politics may be largely economically motivated but assumes a life of its own, and Taiwan is something else entirely), and 2. that there is a non-zero sum scenario. Not all scenarios have a non-zero sum approach, if resources are inherently limited, for example. Cooperation is also risky as it risks empowering a rival who may still opt for a winner-takes-all when they feel confident enough to. Is it obvious that there is a real window for an enduring non-zero sum relationship with China? Bear with me, I am no expert and you probably have more important things than educating a random subscriber.
This is in regard to your podcast with Nathan Labenz.
Nathan said he was open to any ideas from anywhere in regard to how to stop the conflict with China.
Robert, I could see that you were perplexed, and you reluctantly agreed to any idea from anywhere.
Your hesitation was probably because you knew I was listening.
So here it is again, give more power to the people because our leaders, as you have said, keep driving us into conflict.
Do you really think the people of this world will push for more conflict?
A database of public opinion will change the way the west approaches this problem, and China will have a dilemma on how to handle their populous trying to access this method of displaying their opinions. I am confident the Chinese people will find a way to have their voices heard through our system.
Here’s some simple math, that everybody seems to get wrong.
Two people are smarter than one as a general concept . Four people are smarter than two. 10 people are smarter than four.
Now, for some reason, everyone has concluded that when you go over the Dunbar number of a couple of hundred people, or more, everyone becomes stupider. The larger, the group, the stupider they are.
People are based this on observation, and that’s where they make the mistake.
I’m here to tell you that it’s a measurement problem that cannot be observed based on the information that we have today. We are only working with the measurement tools that we have, and everyone refuses to consider new measurement tools for the fear that once they open that Pandora’s box, they’ll never be able to close it again.
If this is not in fact, true, show me how the math works that when you go over 100 people everyone gets stupider. please explain this to me Robert.
They know the right questions they just don’t know the right answers
China is certainly the number one threat to US world hegemony. On which the material standard of living of the top 20% of the US population depends. Which controls state policy and state propaganda (aka "public diplomacy"). Unfortunately, America has inherited the worst of the European spirit: The idea that we are superior and therefore entitled to exploit everyone else. - Whereas China, I kid you not, is moved by the Taoist spirit.
One of your podcasts, you said (paraphrasing here) that it’s unclear whether transformational figures are truly transformational or if they just inhabit the zeitgeist of the time. I’m of the opinion, here as with many other things, it’s the latter. I think we’ll be waiting a long time if expect our nonzero wold of peace to come from political leaders, so, by necessity, we need to put more emphasis on systems.
Work arounds by DP-governed states may be increasingly attractive when national politics become dysfunctional. Here is an example from Nature:
"US and China can keep climate dream alive
When US President-elect Donald Trump chose to exit the 2015 Paris climate agreement and disengage with China during his first term, it left a void. “California stepped in to help fill it,” note five authors including former California governor Jerry Brown and Zhenhua Xie, the former special envoy on climate change of the People’s Republic of China. In 2017, Brown met with President Xi Jinping and signed a series of climate and energy-focused agreements between California and several of China’s national agencies and provincial governments. It’s one example of how provinces, states, cities — and non-state actors such as businesses and academia — can maintain positive momentum on clean energy and climate action in the two countries, argue the authors."
Have you made a case elsewhere why a more conciliatory approach to China is the way to go? It's not obvious to me. I get that in order to deal with global challenges like GW and AI we need to cooperate with China. But the current stance does not preclude cooperation on these issues, just like during the US-USSR Cold war there was cooperation on a range of issues.
I have not made a detailed version of that argument, though Jake Werner of the Quincy Institute lays out a strong version of it here: https://quincyinst.org/research/a-program-for-progressive-china-policy/#h-introduction
I would say the core problem is the increasing militarization of US-China ties. You note that the US and USSR cooperated on certain issues in the first Cold War, but most of those forms of cooperation were minimalistic and military-focused (e.g. SALT, the ABM Treaty). The only outright cooperation I can think of was the joint US-Soviet effort to put a stop to the Suez Crisis in 1956. Meanwhile, US-Soviet tensions helped spark proxy wars the world over and almost devolved into nuclear war on several occasions.
A difficult aspect of this is that it's fundamentally about grand strategy, which is an oversimplified discipline by definition. But focusing on competition (and often military competition), as Biden and Trump have both done, will genuinely preclude cooperation in other areas, as we've seen repeatedly in recent years. We have to be pragmatic and understand that China's rise is happening, so we're better off seeking a modus vivendi in which we can build trust and work together on existential issues like climate and AI development.
I would add that there are plenty of ways to do this without just giving up on East Asia as a region, even in a military sense. Rising powers want more flexibility than they had in the first Cold War, and they'd rather not have to choose between working with the US or China. On the military front, America could shift its approach to East Asia into an offshore balancing/ deterrence by denial strategy (which would be less threatening to China but also cheaper and less likely to lead to crises). Here's a detailed version of that argument that got a wide reading in the Pentagon in 2022: https://quincyinst.org/research/active-denial-a-roadmap-to-a-more-effective-stabilizing-and-sustainable-u-s-defense-strategy-in-asia/
Hi Conor does this argument from Quincy get into the fact that much of the wealth in the us comes from the fact that we are the global reserve currency? I'd imagine that trying to cut china off from key aspects of our own markets will just push them into developing work arounds that effectively mean we have nothing to offer them- I'm referring to semi conductor production lithography machines, and operating systems (something huawei has seemed to be able to produce on their own now). In such a case the us financial system will see less capital from china flowing through its system which I think will probably only weaken the us economy.
Hi Connor (and sorry for misspelling your name earlier). Werner article is interesting, but it raises many questions. If I understand him correctly, he believes that the root cause of the tension is essentially economic and the need to be the top dog when it comes to economic issues, i.e. a zero-sum approach. He argues that a more cooperative approach would give rise to a non-zero sum situation, a win-win, but the current climate of animosity makes it all but impossible. This assumes 1. that it is about the economy, not security (probably right, but also Taiwan, other disputed territories, etc, the geo-politics may be largely economically motivated but assumes a life of its own, and Taiwan is something else entirely), and 2. that there is a non-zero sum scenario. Not all scenarios have a non-zero sum approach, if resources are inherently limited, for example. Cooperation is also risky as it risks empowering a rival who may still opt for a winner-takes-all when they feel confident enough to. Is it obvious that there is a real window for an enduring non-zero sum relationship with China? Bear with me, I am no expert and you probably have more important things than educating a random subscriber.
Thanks a lot, Conor, for the answer and the links. I will read them and if I have something to say further, will do it after that.
This is in regard to your podcast with Nathan Labenz.
Nathan said he was open to any ideas from anywhere in regard to how to stop the conflict with China.
Robert, I could see that you were perplexed, and you reluctantly agreed to any idea from anywhere.
Your hesitation was probably because you knew I was listening.
So here it is again, give more power to the people because our leaders, as you have said, keep driving us into conflict.
Do you really think the people of this world will push for more conflict?
A database of public opinion will change the way the west approaches this problem, and China will have a dilemma on how to handle their populous trying to access this method of displaying their opinions. I am confident the Chinese people will find a way to have their voices heard through our system.
Here’s some simple math, that everybody seems to get wrong.
Two people are smarter than one as a general concept . Four people are smarter than two. 10 people are smarter than four.
Now, for some reason, everyone has concluded that when you go over the Dunbar number of a couple of hundred people, or more, everyone becomes stupider. The larger, the group, the stupider they are.
People are based this on observation, and that’s where they make the mistake.
I’m here to tell you that it’s a measurement problem that cannot be observed based on the information that we have today. We are only working with the measurement tools that we have, and everyone refuses to consider new measurement tools for the fear that once they open that Pandora’s box, they’ll never be able to close it again.
If this is not in fact, true, show me how the math works that when you go over 100 people everyone gets stupider. please explain this to me Robert.
They know the right questions they just don’t know the right answers
China is certainly the number one threat to US world hegemony. On which the material standard of living of the top 20% of the US population depends. Which controls state policy and state propaganda (aka "public diplomacy"). Unfortunately, America has inherited the worst of the European spirit: The idea that we are superior and therefore entitled to exploit everyone else. - Whereas China, I kid you not, is moved by the Taoist spirit.
One of your podcasts, you said (paraphrasing here) that it’s unclear whether transformational figures are truly transformational or if they just inhabit the zeitgeist of the time. I’m of the opinion, here as with many other things, it’s the latter. I think we’ll be waiting a long time if expect our nonzero wold of peace to come from political leaders, so, by necessity, we need to put more emphasis on systems.
Work arounds by DP-governed states may be increasingly attractive when national politics become dysfunctional. Here is an example from Nature:
"US and China can keep climate dream alive
When US President-elect Donald Trump chose to exit the 2015 Paris climate agreement and disengage with China during his first term, it left a void. “California stepped in to help fill it,” note five authors including former California governor Jerry Brown and Zhenhua Xie, the former special envoy on climate change of the People’s Republic of China. In 2017, Brown met with President Xi Jinping and signed a series of climate and energy-focused agreements between California and several of China’s national agencies and provincial governments. It’s one example of how provinces, states, cities — and non-state actors such as businesses and academia — can maintain positive momentum on clean energy and climate action in the two countries, argue the authors."
Nature | 10 min read