Decoding US–China Strategic Competition: Comparative Leverages and Issue Selection

Abstract

Abstract This article attempts to explore why the USA and China have competed on some issues but not on others and why, in such instances, the USA has gone on the offensive. To answer these questions, we conceptualise strategic competition and propose a strategic competition theory that explains—through a number of descriptive variables, and taking into account political leaders’ ideological preferences—great powers’ issue selection. To examine the selection of issues amid US–China strategic competition, we choose nine issues that are to the USA’s advantage and four issues that are to China’s advantage. We then assess the respective values of the issues’ explanatory variables, which results in a ranking of the leverages in the USA’s and China’s respective toolkits. In comparing the two countries’ bargaining chips and the Trump and Biden administrations’ specific evaluations of those of the USA, we argue that (1) both countries have behaved rationally in their competition; (2) the ideological preferences of political leaders have influenced the USA’s issue selection; and (3) the USA has taken the offensive because the leverage ratio is in the USA’s favour. We further explore the prospects of US–China strategic competition and call for an issue-specific approach to foreign policy research.