Is China Your Enemy? Explaining American Public Attitudes toward China

• In Event: Public Attitudes on China

Abstract

The US-China relations are the most impactful geopolitical relationship in our era. A peaceful US-China relation helps to reduce human suffering, encourage global economic prosperity, and create more opportunities for solving pressing global collective action challenges such as climate change and food security. Current scholarship and policy discussions on US-China relations focus on debates over (1) revisionist intentions of China, (2) their power comparisons, and (3) the overly pessimistic prediction of an imminent power transition war between them. In this project, I seek to provide a systematic argument and empirical exploration of the transitions between conflict and cooperation in US-China relations. As an initial part of a larger project, this paper focuses on explaining the determinants of American public attitudes toward China. Using extensive survey data over the past five decades, I will demonstrate the public attitudes in the US toward China have always been heterogenous and widely distributed, with significant ups and downs. The rises and falls in public opinion correlate with the conflict and cooperation transitions in US-China relations, based on the public perceptions of the intentions of China. A rich historical analysis of American public attitudes toward China informs a better understanding of the US-China relations.

Author

• Quan Li, Texas A&M University