Avoiding the ‘Thucydides Trap’ U.S.-China Relations in Strategic Domains

As the relationship between China and the United States becomes increasingly complex and interdependent, leaders in Beijing and Washington are struggling to establish a solid common foundation on which to expand and deepen bilateral relations. In order to examine the challenges facing U.S.-China relations, the National Bureau of Asian Research (NBR) and the Institute for Global Cooperation and Understanding (iGCU) at Peking University brought together a group of leading experts from China and the United States in Beijing and Honolulu to develop a conceptual foundation for U.S.-China relations into the future, tackling the issues in innovative ways under the banner of U.S.-China Relations in Strategic Domains. The resultingchapters assess U.S.-China relations in the maritime and nuclear sectors as well as incyberspace andspace andthrough the lens of P2P and mil-to-mil exchanges. Scholars and students in political science and international relationsare thus presented with a diagnosis and prognosis of the relations between the two superpowers.

Introduction Wang Dong and Travis Tanner 1 U.S.-China Relations in the Maritime Security Domain Wang Dong and Christopher Yung 2 Seeking Strategic Stability for U.S.-China Relations in the Nuclear Domain Elbridge A. Colby and Wu Riqiang 3 Reducing and Managing U.S.-China Conflict in Cyberspace Adam Segal and Tang Lan 4 U.S.-China Strategic Relations in Space Brian Weeden and Xiao He 5 Stepping Up Investments in U.S.-China Relations: Making People-to-People Exchange a Strategic Priority Travis Tanner and Zhao Minghao 6 Sino-U.S. Military-to-Military Relations Roy D. Kamphausen with Jessica Drun 7 Sino-US Military Relations: Interests, Challenges, and Solution Xu Hui with Yu Ying Conclusion Wang Dong and Tiffany Ma

Dong Wangis Associate Professor at the School of International Studies and Executive Director of the Institute for Global Cooperation and Understanding (iGCU), Peking University. He has written extensively on U.S.-China relations and China’s foreign policy. Travis N. Tanner is President of the U.S.-China Strong Foundation. Based in Beijing, Mr. Tanner has more than 15 years of experience working on U.S.-China relations. Mr. Tanner is the author, contributing author, or co-editor of numerous publications on the strategic, economic, and political dimensions of the U.S.-China relationship, including five volumes of the Strategic Asia series.