China

Introduction

China, officially the People’s Republic of China (PRC), is a large Asian nation ruled by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) since 1949. Over the course of the latter half of the 20th century, it was integrated into the world system, joining the World Trade Organization and other international bodies. During that period, it grew significantly in power, prosperity, and influence, becoming one of the world’s largest countries and a key cog in the global economy. Under the premiership of its current leader, Xi Jinping, China has become more aggressive in asserting its interests throughout its near-abroad and much further afield. The issue has divided right-wing opinion in the past, but is currently one of the few unifying challenges across much of Western conservatism.

History

Pre-Engagement Period

China has had a long and storied history, being one of the oldest civilizations on the planet. However, the story of conservatism and China really only began after the Second World War. In the late 1940s, the long-running Chinese Civil War between Chiang Kai-Shek’s nationalists and Mao Zedong’s communists came to a close, with the communists forcing the nationalists to retreat to the island of Taiwan. To this day, both factions – which remain in their 1949 geographies – claim to be the rightful government of the whole of historic Chinese territory, mainland and Taiwan. Upon defeating the nationalists, Mao declared the formation of the People’s Republic with himself as ultimate ruler. As the civil war became something of a proxy contest for the nascent Cold War, global factions aligned behind their favored parties. The Soviet bloc welcomed the PRC, while the West remained stalwart allies of the Taiwanese.  

For decades after this contest ended, the battle lines remained stagnant. Still, over this period, the two communist nations had border disputes, fielded nuclear weapons, and competed for favor with the Marxist-adjacent nations of the Third World. The seeds of a Sino-Soviet split were sown.

Era of Engagement

Those seeds ripened during the late 1960s and early 1970s, when the communist powers disagreed on Marxist theory and Mao’s China sought a greater geopolitical role for its own brand of anti-imperialist revolutionary thought. This breach between the two titans of the communist world was exploited by the Republican administration of US President Richard Nixon, mainly driven by his National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger. In a shocking reversal from prior Western and conservative policy, Nixon visited China in 1972, opening a new phase in Sino-Western relations. Within a few years, most nations in the Western bloc had shifted their recognition from Taiwan to China, isolating the island internationally. 

After Mao’s death in 1976, the Chinese Communist Party was taken over by Deng Xiaoping, who sought to reform Chinese economic policy in a more market-based direction. This, combined with the newfound diplomatic recognition, led to a boom in Western investment in the People’s Republic and its fuller integration into the international system. This connection to the West allowed for several significant events in the following decades: the crushing of the Tiananmen Square democracy protests in 1989 – with the tacit support of the West – the transfer of Hong Kong from British to Chinese sovereignty in 1997, and the high-water mark of Chinese integration in 2001, their joining of the World Trade Organization. The majority of Western conservatives saw these developments as positive steps towards a broader liberalization in the nation’s politics, but this was not to be.

Recent History

Over the course of the early 21st century, as China became more enmeshed in the world economic system, it grew in its regional and global ambitions and began to project power more assertively. This has rapidly accelerated and became far more belligerent under the dictatorship of Xi Jinping, who has undoubtedly been the most influential Chinese leader since Deng or even Mao. Since his rise to the top of the CCP in 2012, China has engaged in broad campaigns against the West in a bid to undermine the world system in favor of China’s national interests. 

It has asserted expansive and illegal claims to the territorial waters of other nations, reinforcing these declarations with island construction and paramilitary force. It has engaged in predatory economic policies, built dual-use infrastructure intended for use in conflict, and aided other malign actors in international institutions – including Russia’s war of conquest in Ukraine. It has engaged in a massive campaign of industrial and commercial espionage designed to steal crucial dual-use technologies from Western companies. And it has dramatically augmented its military power with the express aim of subjugating its democratic neighbor, Taiwan. 

This has come in concert with a bolstered campaign of domestic repression. The regime has prosecuted a genocidal campaign against ethnic minorities like the Uyghurs, cracked down on internal dissent in places like Hong Kong, and increased its totalitarian surveillance of the population. These are tactics the CCP has been exporting abroad, seeking to align with other autocratic anti-Western regimes across the world. 

On top of this, China’s role in the genesis of the Covid-19 pandemic is still murky; the regime in Beijing has done everything in its power to stymie neutral investigations of the virus’s origins. At best, China engaged in a massive cover-up of the pandemic’s spread, allowing it to rapidly cross borders and devastate Western nations. At worst, Chinese scientists may have been involved with the creation of the virus in the first place. 

As of early 2024, these trends are only becoming more worrying for the West and the conservatives that have traditionally fought against such malign powers.

Conservative Attitudes toward China

The general recognition of China as a threat to national interests and conservative ideology is widespread across the West, with some geographic distinctions.^[1] Some on the political right dissent from the proposition altogether. Where the majority of the disagreement lies, however, is in the magnitude of the China challenge and how it should be handled.

Dissenters

First, however, there are the overall dissenters, who either see China as none of our business or positively celebrate aspects of its totalitarian regime. These folks fall along the spectrum of populists, Catholic integralists, and reactionaries known colloquially as the ‘New Right’.^[2] They argue that the West should allow China to dominate its near-abroad^[3], sometimes going so far as to advocate a “Chinese-led 21st century”^[4] or extol its authoritarian control.^[5] Others, like former US GOP presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, have declared the defense of Taiwan against Chinese aggression – a popular belief for conservatives – outside of Western interests beyond the island’s semiconductor output.^[6] Some continental European nations led by right-wingers, notably Hungary, have cozied up to China economically and geopolitically.^[7] These are minority positions on China for conservatives, but they are growing in purchase.

Mainstream Conservatives

In the mainstream of the conservative movement, opinions as to just how much of a threat China actually is and how it should be dealt with tend to differ by geography and strand of conservatism. Still, nearly all agree that China is a danger to Western interests, its role in the pandemic deserves greater scrutiny, and its military buildup should be countered.

Geographic Differences

In the Anglosphere, mainstream conservative attitudes towards China vary from semi-wary competition to outright hostility. Some of this is dependent on whether conservatives hold power or sit in opposition to government. In New Zealand, the conservative government has welcomed economic engagement, including via the Belt and Road Initiative, but has signaled some geopolitical suspicion toward Beijing.^[8] Australia’s conservatives – now in opposition – have largely been hawkish on China, particularly in the past five years, banning Huawei, seeking an investigation into Covid origins, and deepening security cooperation with the United States against Beijing’s desires.^[9] The Conservative government in London, however, has been far more conciliatory than their brethren in Canberra.^[10] Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s appointment of Sinophile David Cameron to the post of Foreign Secretary only doubled down on this trend.^[11]

North American conservatives are perhaps the most consistently antagonistic toward Beijing’s aims. One of the few things most American conservatives agree on is the character of the threat to national interests stemming from the Chinese Communist Party and its geopolitical belligerence.^[12] Canadian conservatives have been directly targeted by the regime in Beijing^[13], largely for their strong anti-CCP stance in contrast with the Liberal government of Justin Trudeau.^[14]

Divergent Approaches

Most mainstream conservatives in the West see China as a threat worthy of countering, but the means by which they seek to confront the danger vary significantly, as do the conceptions of the China challenge itself. 

With respect to the various perspectives on the nature of the problem, these differ by whether they conceive China as a part of a broader authoritarian threat to the Western-led world order or if they see Beijing as a threat unto itself, without larger connections. This has become a prevalent issue in the geopolitics of the 2020s, as malign actors other than China – notably Iran and Russia – have behaved belligerently. The more traditional conservatives, represented by former US UN Ambassador Nikki Haley, believe in an “unholy alliance” between these three powers.^[15] In their telling, the dangers posed by these anti-Western powers are deeply linked and one cannot counter China without dealing harshly with its allies. For others, primarily on the populist side of the conservative movement, these are discrete issues and dealing with one successfully may lead to failure with another.^[16][17] This attitude was espoused by Florida governor Ron DeSantis during his 2024 presidential campaign.^[18] Most average conservatives could accept either of these framings, depending on world events. 

There are also divergences on regional focus; some conservatives seek to confront Chinese influence across the world, while others focus specifically on China’s push for regional hegemony in Asia and the Western Pacific. The primacy of the defense of Taiwan is key in this calculation. Some conservative China hawks see Taiwan as the last line of defense against Chinese expansionism, while others see potential lines of defense past the First Island Chain. Some seek to deter the invasion of Taiwan by denial, notably the writer Elbridge Colby, in contrast to those who would try to deter China via punishment. There is also a difference in attitudes when it comes to internal versus external issues with China. The plight of the Uyghur Muslims is a representative example. More traditional conservatives with strong feelings for international human rights and democracy consider the genocidal actions against this minority group to be definitional to the clash between Beijing and the West. For more nationalist conservatives, Chinese interference in Western societies is far more important to deter and counteract. 

Distinctions among mainstream conservatives also arise when it comes to tactics. Most conservative China hawks seek a significant rise in military spending, especially with respect to national navies and nuclear arms, to counter rising Chinese defense budgets. Another majority position is the usefulness of regional allies in the fight against Chinese expansion, but there are dissimilarities on the formality of those alliances and what nations should be courted. Some seek looser, more pragmatic ties with a greater number of countries on specific issues, while others want to have formal alliances covering a wide range of subjects. Given the complex nature of the China challenge, there is a broad spectrum of views on the specifics of alliance structures and strategy. 

Trade policy is a significant factor of divergence as well. There are contrasts on economic decoupling from China, either in whole or in part, and where to invest anew. Populist conservatives want to re-shore manufacturing from China, bringing jobs back to moribund domestic industries. Other decouplers do not place as high a value on these jobs, instead preferring to maintain low consumer costs by shifting production to more aligned nations like Bangladesh, Vietnam, or India. Free market conservatives prefer a regional trade pact meant to isolate China and enhance strategic economic cooperation with friendly partners – the Trans-Pacific Partnership being the main vehicle for this. Although former US President Donald Trump withdrew from negotiations, the deal continued with the other nations involved, often with local conservative support. Populists like Trump prefer to target Chinese trade with punitive tariffs and import controls. There are also varying opinions on China’s Belt and Road infrastructure initiative, both when it comes to participation therein and whether a Western countereffort should be undertaken.

Overall Takeaways

Despite these wide-ranging differences, the majority of conservatives across the West agree that China, led by Xi Jinping’s Communist Party, is a serious threat to economic and national security, if not the Western-led world order as a whole. Most agree wholeheartedly on the need to confront Chinese belligerence, defend Taiwanese sovereignty, and forestall an exclusionary sphere of influence in Asia. Popular positions include stronger investigation of Beijing’s role in the Covid-19 pandemic, military growth to counter Chinese expansion, and reduction of CCP influence in domestic affairs. Of the myriad issues dividing conservatives across the West, China is perhaps the area of greatest concord.