Image credit: Michael Macdonald / EyeEm / Getty Images
May 13, 2020
The United States Can’t Afford to Turn Away Chinese Talent
Intellectual property theft is a real concern, and China has been the world’s foremost infringer. But a blanket exclusion of Chinese students from U.S. academic and scientific research is not a reasonable response—and risks harming America’s critical comparative advantage: the strength and vitality of its research enterprise and innovation ecosystem. Implementing such a blunt cudgel would undermine the very engine of innovation that it seeks to protect, at a time when the United States is engaged in an ongoing and intensifying competition for global talent.
Certainly, both Republican and Democratic U.S. policymakers are right to be exploring options to take action against technology transfer. China’s party-state has undertaken extensive campaigns of industrial espionage over decades to enable the transfer of critical technologies and the theft of intellectual property from the United States. Such efforts have corresponded with Beijing’s strategic priorities, including self-driving cars and semiconductors. Among a range of tactics, academic exchanges and research partnerships can be leveraged to those ends. Such efforts can bolster China’s military modernization or facilitate party-state coercive capabilities that enable human rights atrocities, thus threatening U.S. security and principles.
Read the full article in Foreign Policy.
More from CNAS
-
Our Military Leaders Need a National Security ‘Fast Lane’ to Compete With China
Commentary
The spy balloon is a wake-up call that highlights the boldness and aggression of China. This should remind Americans to expect more focus and agility from their government’s n...
By General Mike Holmes, U.S. Air Force (Ret.) & Dan Patt
-
Calling Check: Technology Competition with China
Podcast
This week Emily Kilcrease, director of the Energy, Economics, and Security program at CNAS, joins The Asia Chessboard podcast from CSIS for a wide ranging discussion on the i...
By Emily Kilcrease
-
Atomic Strait: How China’s Nuclear Buildup Shapes Security Dynamics with Taiwan and the United States
Reports
This report examines the intersection of China’s nuclear modernization and cross-Strait tensions, especially how they might play out during a crisis, contingency, or conflict ...
By Jacob Stokes
-
Opportunities and Challenges for Trade Policy in the Digital Economy
Congressional Testimony
This hearing addresses digital trade, and I will focus my testimony on the national-security problems in this area posed by China – specifically, concerns about China’s open a...
By David Feith
