Sunday Times 2
Prof Neil DeVotta dissects ‘US-China rivalry’ at RCSS dialogue
View(s):Professor Neil DeVotta has said the recently announced US National Security Strategy 2025 downplays the hitherto supposed threat from China, needlessly disparages Europe, and unduly emphasises the Western Hemisphere while aping Russian talking points and disregarding US soft power. He said President Trump has had a destabilising effect on US politics and foreign relations, which has created new security imperatives to the Global South.
Professor DeVotta, a Sri Lanka born scholar who teaches at Wake Forest University in North Carolina, made these observations when he addressed the ‘RCSS Strategic Dialogue – 2’ on the theme “The US-China Rivalry and Implications for the Indo-Pacific”, on December 9 at the Board Room of the RCSS in Colombo. Moderated by the Executive Director of the RCSS Amb (Retd) Ravinatha Aryasinha, it brought together serving and retired senior public servants, diplomats, military officials, academics, heads of research institutes and civil society representatives. Opening the session Amb Aryasinha noted that it would be best to evaluate US and China relations by analysing the ‘big picture’ as opposed to focusing on the relationship through a Sri Lankan or South Asian prism.
Prof DeVotta observed that this is not the first time the US has perceived a threat to its global dominance since especially 1945. A similar threat was perceived of the Japanese 35 years ago, but this threat was diluted due to the unanticipated events that derailed the Japanese economy. However, the present rivalry with China challenges US dominance over the past 80 years and has led to an apparent ‘security dilemma’ with the US viewing China at different times as a competitor, adversary and threat, and China being fully convinced that the US seeks to prevent it becoming a superpower. Prof DeVotta, echoing others who have suggested the US should help facilitate the peaceful rise of China so as to avoid the so-called ‘Thucydides trap’, said that any war between the two countries would be disastrous for them and the global economy.
As for China, he said that while it developed within the US-led post-WWII international order, it now wants to write the rules governing international relations. Being ahead or on par with the US when it comes to renewables, AI, telecommunications and high-voltage transmission lines, China understandably feels it has a right to be a leader as opposed to a follower of rules dictated by western powers.
However, China’s burgeoning technological prowess masks numerous challenges facing the country. This is evident by the large amounts of people and money moving out of China even as the country, overall, seems stuck in a ‘Middle Income Trap’ that prevents its per capita GDP rising to developed country levels. The country’s apparent neo-totalitarian trajectory, epitomised by the Great Fire Wall and the widespread use of facial recognition technology to control citizens’ activities, has made China more authoritarian than it was 15-20 years ago. Scholars have suggested that China has reached peak power and would therefore try to act aggressively, especially against Taiwan, before its relative power wanes.
Prof DeVotta did not see much prospect for the BRICS at this stage, noting that the larger the grouping gets the more unwieldy it is going to be, which will suit the US.
During the near 3-hour session, participants raised questions on the domestic resistance to President Trump’s approach in the US itself – with concerns on the rising costs of living due to increased tariffs, potentially catastrophic costs of the escalation of an arms race with China and a Taiwan conflict, and on immigration policy. Aspects of external resistance discussed centered on the effect on economies due to increased tariffs and the tension between self-restraint and the exercise of power.
There was also push back on dismissing entities like BRICS, arguing that hedging strategies and the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) framework deserve re-consideration rather than rejection, particularly as countries search for alternatives in the current geopolitical flux. A critical observation was made that the behavior of both China and the US cannot be viewed in isolation, and it was pointed out that we have moved beyond the end of ideology into new terrain – where each fed on the other. Trump’s approach was said to have profound destabilizing effects on Europe and the broader global order, suggesting that current disruptions represent not just individual policy choices but a fundamental systemic crisis in the American system itself, pushing the world toward uncharted territory.