The relation between China and the United States is arguably the most important bilateral relation in the world today. The U.S. and China are respectively the largest and the second largest economies in the world. They are also respectively the largest and the second largest trading nations in the world as well as each other’s most important trading partner. If China and the U.S. work together as partners towards a common goal, many things are possible. However, there exist significant friction and potential conflict in their economic relations. The large and persistent U.S.-China bilateral trade deficit is one of the problems. It is essential to know the true state of the China-U.S. trade balance before effective solutions can be devised to narrow the trade surplus or deficit. The impacts and potential impacts of the 2018 trade war between China and the U.S. on the two economies are analysed and discussed. The longterm forces that underlie the economic relations between the two countries beyond the 2018 trade war are examined. In this connection, how a “new type of major-power relation” between the two countries can help to keep the competition friendly and avert a war between them is explored. ~~~~~~~~ Lawrence J. Lau’s timely The China-U.S. Trade War and Future Economic Relations is full of careful analysis, penetrating insight and helpful suggestions from the world’s preeminent economist on this relationship. —Michael J. Boskin Tully M. Friedman Professor of Economics, Stanford University Former Chair, U.S. President’s Council of Economic Advisers This sober and systematic study of U.S.-China trade relations and of technological development in the two countries is particularly timely. Lawrence Lau is one of the world’s foremost economists working on these issues. —Dwight H. Perkins Harold Hitchings Burbank Professor of Political Economy, Emeritus Former Chair, Department of Economics, Harvard University This is a timely and penetrating analysis of the China-U.S. trade and economic relations, from its origins to its impacts and to a way forward. —Yingyi Qian Chairman of the Council, Westlake University Former Dean, School of Economics and Management, Tsinghua University Counsellor of the State Council, People’s Republic of China Lawrence Lau’s book on the current U.S.-China trade war is insightful, balanced and comprehensive; rich in data on trade, investment, science and technology. It is essential reading for anyone who wants to get past the headlines. —A. Michael Spence Nobel Laureate in Economic Sciences (2001) Senior Fellow, The Hoover Institution, Stanford University Lawrence Lau brings light in the form of rigorous honest fact-based economic analysis to a subject where most of the discussion has been heated bluster, false claims, and political rhetoric. —Lawrence H. Summers Former U.S. Secretary of the Treasury; Former President, Harvard University There is no topic more important, or more timely, or more urgent, than the China-U.S. trade war. Professor Lau is the ideal person to write about the implications of the China-U.S. trade war and the proposed resolution. —Tung Chee-Hwa Vice-Chairman, Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference National Committee Chairman, China-U.S. Exchange Foundation The history of Sino-American relations, to a great extent, has been a shared history. Lawrence Lau’s timely and penetrating study will tell us it is still in best interest for both countries if they continue to pursue a shared journey and destination instead of parting ways. —Xu Guoqi Kerry Group Professor in Globalization History, The University of Hong Kong Author of Chinese and Americans: A Shared History This beautifully composed book uses nontechnical language to unravel the intricacies of the 2018 U.S.-China trade war, together with its long-term impact. I learned a lot from reading it. —Chen-Ning Yang Nobel Laureate in Physics (1957)

China's entry into the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2001 was heralded as historic, and for good reason: the world's most populous nation was joining the rule-based system that has governed international commerce since World War II. But the full ramifications of that event are only now becoming apparent, as the Chinese economic juggernaut has evolved in unanticipated and profoundly troublesome ways. In this book, journalist Paul Blustein chronicles the contentious process resulting in China's WTO membership and the transformative changes that followed, both good and bad - for China, for its trading partners, and for the global trading system as a whole. The book recounts how China opened its markets and underwent far-reaching reforms that fuelled its economic takeoff, but then adopted policies - a cheap currency and heavy-handed state intervention - that unfairly disadvantaged foreign competitors and circumvented WTO rules. Events took a potentially catastrophic turn in 2018 with the eruption of a trade war between China and the United States, which has brought the trading system to a breaking point. Regardless of how the latest confrontation unfolds, the world will be grappling for decades with the challenges posed by China Inc.

Outright trade war between the world’s two largest economies would be devastating to the working people of both countries, as well as destructive to the future of the entire world economy. The costs of conflict between China and the United States far outweigh the current causes of dispute in their economic relationship. These costs would be both direct, in terms of short-term losses of growth and employment, and indirect, in terms of long-term damage to the world trading system, diminishing investment and efficiency. There are points of genuine dispute between the United States and China over their economic interaction. Even if their economic significance is often exaggerated, these are legitimate points of contention and have to be addressed in a constructive manner. The analyses in this volume aim to contribute to a more reality-based consideration of both countries’ enlightened self-interests, which would yield progress on points of dispute in a manner consistent with keeping the world economy open for business.

An accessible overview of political, economic, and strategic dimensions of global supply chains in a changing global political economy.

This volume explores commercial relations between the United States and China from the eighteenth century until 1949, fleshing out with facts the romantic and shadowy image of "the China trade." These nine chapters by specialists in the field have developed from papers they presented at a conference supported by the national Committee on American-East Asian Relations. The work begins with an Introduction by John K. Fairbank, then moves on to analysis of the old China trade up to the American Civil War, centering on traditional Chinese exports of tea and silk. A second section deals with American imports into China--cotton textiles and textile-related goods, cigarettes, kerosene. Finally, the impact of the trade on both countries is assessed and the operations of American-owned and multinational companies in China are examined. For both the United States and China, the economic importance of the trade proves to have been less than the legend might suggest.

One of the first analyses of the impact of US-China rivalry on the governance of global trade.

This is the first English book on the economic relations between China and Latin America written by Chinese scholars. The authors are all from the Institute of Latin American Studies, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences — China’s premier think tank. By combining empirical techniques and political-economic analysis, it investigates the history of and the outlook for China-Latin America relations. It offers readers insights into the Chinese perspective and an evaluation of the development of the relations between the two parties.

Introduction: America's Business with China -- Founding a Free, Trading Republic -- The Paradox of a Pacific Policy -- Troubled Waters -- Sovereign Rights, or America's First Opium Problem -- The Empire's New Roads -- This Slave Trade of the Nineteenth Century -- A Propped-Open Door -- Death of a Trade, Birth of a Market.

From a Western point of view, the policy of economic engagement with China has failed. A rapid rise in living standards in China has helped legitimize and strengthen the Chinese Communist Party's power. How did Western, market-orientated, property-owning, liberal democracies go from being in a position of complete global hegemony in the early 1990s to the current crisis of confidence and loss of moral foundation? This book tells the story of the most successful trading nation of the early twenty-first century. It looks at how the Communist Party of China has retained and cemented its monopoly on political power since China's accession to the World Trade Organization in December 2001. It is the most extraordinary economic success story of our time and it has reshaped the geopolitics not just of Asia but of the world. As China has come to dominate global manufacturing, its economic power has been translated into political power, and the West now has a global rival that is politically antithetical to liberal values. The supply-side deflation from allowing 750 million low-cost workers into the global trading system combined with the policy of inflation targeting by Western central banks has led to falling real incomes for many in the West and rising asset prices that have benefited the few. Worse still, China's mercantilist model is now held up as a viable economic alternative. To have a fighting chance of protecting the freedoms of liberal democracies, it is of the utmost importance that we understand how the policy of indulgent engagement with China has affected Western society in recent years. Only then can the global trading system be reoriented for the mutual benefit of all nations.

China's extraordinarily rapid economic growth since 1978, driven by market-oriented reforms, has set world records and continued unabated, despite predictions of an inevitable slowdown. In The State Strikes Back: The End of Economic Reform in China?, renowned China scholar Nicholas R. Lardy argues that China's future growth prospects could be equally bright but are shadowed by the specter of resurgent state dominance, which has begun to diminish the vital role of the market and private firms in China's economy. Lardy's book arrives in timely fashion as a sequel to his pathbreaking Markets over Mao: The Rise of Private Business in China, published by PIIE in 2014. This book mobilizes new data to trace how President Xi Jinping has consistently championed state-owned or controlled enterprises, encouraging local political leaders and financial institutions to prop up ailing, underperforming companies that are a drag on China's potential. As with his previous book, Lardy's perspective departs from conventional wisdom, especially in its contention that China could achieve a high growth rate for the next two decades—if it reverses course and returns to the path of market-oriented reforms.