The U.S. election is over, and Donald Trump’s pundit-defying victory over Hillary Clinton has stunned and surprised people all over the world. In China — where activity on Weibo and WeChat indicated strong support for Trump among netizens both in China and in the U.S. — are elites and the Communist Party leadership happy with the outcome? Or would they have rather seen a Clinton victory, preferring the familiarity and stability that a Hillary Clinton administration would have represented, despite the almost-universal view in China of the former secretary of state as an unalloyed liberal interventionist who hammered China relentlessly on human rights?
And what will the Trump victory mean for U.S.-China relations? Will Trump’s fiery anti-China rhetoric on the campaign trail translate into actual policy? Will he hew to his promise to declare China a currency manipulator on his first day in office? Will he go through with threats to slap heavy tariffs on Chinese imports? And will Trump, who as a candidate was highly equivocal on his support for American allies in the western Pacific, give China a freer hand in the region?
Finally, how will the Trump victory impact views on democracy? Will it, as James Palmer has suggested, take some of the shine off the city on the hill for young people who admired American democracy — or will it reinforce the idea that the U.S. electoral system really does express the “will of the people”?
Isaac Stone Fish, who has written recently about the U.S. election from the Chinese perspective, joins Kaiser in a conversation about these topics and more. Isaac is a senior fellow at the Asia Society’s Center on U.S.-China Relations and formerly served as Asia editor at Foreign Policy. He spent election night with a Chinese constitutional law professor, who by 11 p.m. was comforting a horrified Isaac about the strength and resilience of American democracy.
Recommendations:
Isaac: The music of Leonard Cohen — “like bathing in whiskey,” says Isaac. Check out David Remnick's profile of the poet, writer and singer in a recent issue of The New Yorker. Also, an alternative pronunciation of the word melancholy.
Kaiser: Romance of the Three Kingdoms Podcast, by John Zhu — an excellent retelling in colloquial English of the Chinese classic of warfare, heroism, strategy and betrayal by Luo Guanzhong, based on the translation by Moss Roberts.
China’s Ukraine conundrum, with Evan Feigenbaum
Biden's China policy needs to be more than "Trump lite:" A conversation with Jeff Bader
Veteran diplomat Bill Klein recalls the turbulent Trump years at the U.S. Embassy in Beijing
What China is reading and why it matters: A conversation with author Megan Walsh
China's ideological landscape, with Jason Wu
Why the law matters in China, with Jeremy Daum of Yale's Paul Tsai China Law Center
Personality and political discontent in China, with Rory Truex
Dan Wang on China in 2021: "Common prosperity," cultural stunting, and shortcomings of the "modal China story
Mental models for understanding complexity, with Anthea Roberts and Nicolas Lamp
The sociologist watching the China-watchers: A conversation with David McCourt
Damien Ma of MacroPolo on China's economic and political outlook
The investigative team from MIT Technology Review that found major flaws with the DoJ's China Initiative
FOCAC 2021 in Dakar, Senegal, and B3W — the U.S. counter to China's BRI?
Sinica presents the best of China Stories 2021
Revisiting the Red New Deal, with Lizzi Lee and Jude Blanchette (live at NEXTChina 2021)
The Carter Center's survey on Chinese perception, with Yawei Liu and Michael Cerny
Peter Hessler live at the NEXTChina 2021 Conference in New York
Psychologist George Hu of the United Family Mental Health Network on mental health in China
The worldview of Wang Huning, the Party's leading theoretician
Bonus Episode: Introducing the China Sports Insider Podcast
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