Commentary
Matt Sheehan
{
"authors": [
"Matt Sheehan"
],
"type": "commentary",
"centerAffiliationAll": "dc",
"centers": [
"Carnegie Endowment for International Peace"
],
"collections": [
"Dynamic Technology Risks in Asia",
"China and the World"
],
"englishNewsletterAll": "asia",
"nonEnglishNewsletterAll": "",
"primaryCenter": "Carnegie Endowment for International Peace",
"programAffiliation": "AP",
"programs": [
"Asia"
],
"projects": [],
"regions": [
"United States",
"China"
],
"topics": [
"Technology"
]
}
Source: Getty
Commentary
How China Became an Innovation Powerhouse
And what the United States must to do retain its competitiveness.
By Matt Sheehan
Published on Jan 10, 2023
Conventional wisdom often suggests that technological breakthroughs proliferate in an environment of free markets, free speech, and democracy. In short, if you want to innovate, you need to operate like the United States. But over the past twenty years, China has transformed from a technological backwater into an innovation powerhouse.
Today, China directly competes with the United States on key emerging technologies, such as artificial intelligence and quantum computing. And it has managed to accomplish this feat even as its government has tightened controls on markets, speech, and politics.
In this video, I argue that three main factors have turbocharged China’s rise as a technological powerhouse: a large, semi-protected market; ties with researchers and companies around the world; and waves of financial, human, and physical capital invested in promising fields like AI. To keep the United States competitive, Washington should explore certain elements of China’s strategy, including a willingness to experiment with pro-innovation policies and an ability to accept a certain amount of “waste” when catalyzing technological upgrading.
More on China and technology:
About the Author
Matt Sheehan
Senior Fellow, Asia Program
Matt Sheehan is a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, where his research focuses on global technology issues, with a specialization in China’s artificial intelligence ecosystem.
- Trump’s AI Order Won’t Stymie U.S. Competition with China
- China Is Worried About AI Companions. Here’s What It’s Doing About Them.Article
Scott Singer, Matt Sheehan
Recent Work
Carnegie does not take institutional positions on public policy issues; the views represented herein are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of Carnegie, its staff, or its trustees.
More Work from Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
- The Bigger Problem with the U.S.-Kenya Ebola DealCommentary
Washington’s transactional foreign policy is making it indistinguishable from Beijing’s, with consequential implications for African agency.
Jane Munga
- Board Up Donald Trump’s Failed Board of PeaceCommentary
What is behind Marco Rubio’s announcement that the body is now an international nongovernmental organization?
Zaha Hassan
- Retreat, Rebel, Replace, or Reform? Making Sense of Multilateralism Under Trump 2.0Paper
The conventional narrative of the second Trump administration simply repudiating multilateralism is incomplete. The record to date is far more mixed and varies across issue areas and institutions.
Gustavo Romero, Stewart Patrick
- From Trade Dependence to Geopolitical Leverage: The EU in an Era of Weaponized InterdependencePaper
As geopolitical rivalry weaponizes global supply chains, the EU’s true vulnerability lies in emerging-risk imports. For these goods, suppliers are growing more concentrated, substitution more difficult, and political risk is looming.
Sinan Ülgen
- Reimagining Disaster Response in the Age of Chaotic AusterityArticle
It’s the early days of a new architecture for disaster recovery. Now is the time to build a better, more adaptive funding ecosystem.
Sarah Labowitz, Katie Mears
