The COVID-19 Effect: US-China Narratives and Realities

The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated geopolitical tensions between the United States and China while restricting policy dialogues, amplifying extreme sentiments, and sidestepping rational observations The outcomes are extremist and divided narratives, emphasizing China's triumphalism on one hand and inherent weaknesses on the other Under such narratives, China's policy voices and actions in combatting the pandemic and economic fallout were under-studied and discounted, with harmful impacts on the US response to the virus, economic recession, and shifting globalization This paper studies China's official statements, research reports, and scholarly opinion networks in 2020 and finds that, though there were various policy discussions, the general argument was for expanding China's globalism during and after the pandemic Meanwhile, China's policy actors--national agencies, local governments, and state-owned enterprises (SOEs)--strive to continue globalization and adapt to new realities after COVID-19 This article first discusses the effect of COVID-19 on US-China relations, focusing on the gap between narratives and realities It then synthesizes the US narratives on China in 2020, highlighting their extreme and divided nature