Odd Lots - Zichen Wang's Exit Interview From America

Episode Date: June 20, 2025

Zichen Wang is the writer of the Pekingnology newsletter, which translates important speeches and articles from China into English, and contextualizes them for Western readers. Over the past year, he's been a master's degree student at Princeton University, although he's recently returned home to resume his career at a think tank in China. His stint in the US obviously came at a very interesting time, both due to the rising US-China tensions, and also the growing restrictions on Chinese students in the US. So before making his trip back home he joined us for another episode of Odd Lots. We discussed his experience here in America, his assessment of the state of US-China relations, and what his message will be upon his return to China. Only Bloomberg.com subscribers can get the Odd Lots newsletter in their inbox — now delivered every weekday — plus unlimited access to the site and app. Subscribe at bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlotsSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Thanks for listening to Odd Lots. Follow the show on Amazon Music for more future episodes or just ask. Alexa, play the Odd Lots podcast on Amazon Music. Bloomberg Audio Studios. Podcasts Radio News. Hello and welcome to another episode of the Odd Lots podcast. I'm Joe Wisenth. And I'm Tracy Allaway. Tracy, we're recording this June 5th. President Xi Jinping and President Trump just held a phone call. Wouldn't you like to be a fly on the wall for that conversation? I would. I don't know what that means. Markets moved on it. I'm always surprised how hard it is to set a phone. Just pick up the phone. But I'm always little surprised that these are like bigger news. It should be noted that this was reported first by the Shenhua News Agency out of China. And there was a headline that the news agency specified that the phone call was at Trump's request. They made a point of saying that.

I still have this image of Trump sitting in the Oval Office by the phone just like twiddling his thumbs waiting for Xi Jinping. to call, like hoping, is he going to call me? Should I wait two days? Should I wait three days before responding? That kind of thing. There was a Allsia Journal article I saw from a few weeks ago, which made the observation, which I had not realized outside of the September 11th terrorist attacks, there's never been a contact between the U.S. and China that was initiated by China, which I hadn't realized before. I assume it's true. So Xi Jinping is sitting in his office, twiddling his thumbs, waiting for Trump. Okay. And then he decided, but he decides to either take the call. Anyway, all of this sort of speaks to the fact, you know, we sort of are confused by all this,

and there's still just so much that I think Americans in particular, but I'm sure it goes in both directions, like genuinely don't understand about the other country. And given a time of increased tension, obviously the trade war heightened geopolitical concerns, it's not great. I think it would be better, even if we sort of accept the premise of there is this very intense competition that the two countries and the populations and the governments and the people go into governments, just know more about how they work. Absolutely. Have you ever read an English translation of the way China academics write and talk about American society and American politics?

I should read this. It's really, really interesting. You should send me some links. Yeah, okay, I will. But I know a person who has done this and translated it and done the work, and he will definitely send you some links. So I am very excited to say that we have a, and I think it should be a special episode. We've talked to him on the podcast before. we're going to be speaking with Zishan Wong. He is the author, the creator of the pekinology

substack, which essentially looks at public comments from officials, academics, leaders in China, and then writes about them and translates them for an American audience and actually helps an American audience understand like what this sort of like public discourse is. And anyway, over the last year, he's been getting his master's degree in public policy at the Princeton school of public and international affairs. So he's been in Princeton over the last year. But he's going back to China and he's going to return for where he was working at the think tank, the center for China and globalization. Right. So this is his exit interview from America, basically. When I heard that he was leaving town, I was like, let's do an exit interview. And of course,

the other added context, which I think is very relevant here, is that this comes a time of extreme scrutiny on the mere existence of Chinese students at American universities, particularly out of the Trump administration, it's an American export. U.S. universities and there's this major crackdown. We've seen all these concerns about visas, et cetera. So there's a perfect time to do this exit interview. So Zishan, thank you so much for coming on the podcast. Well, thank you for having me here back again. You run a great newsletter, and we had a great episode with you. And as a student in the U.S., you're sort of situated at a very interesting time. But let's like back up, Like, what prompted you to come to the U.S. to study in the first place? I mean, you did this program at Princeton. How come?

Before coming to the mid-career Mastering Public Policy Program at Princeton School of Public International Affairs, formerly known as the Woodrow Wilson School, I'd already be working for 13 years. So I was like at the middle of my professional trajectory, and I were thinking about getting another advanced education. And of course, the United States is the top destination. One other thing is that to the credit of Princeton, the policy school offers fully funded education. So that means they examine all the tuition and the healthcare coverage. No export revenue for us. Yes, exactly. In this case, yes. And also a living stipend. And so I turned down some other offers from the UK, from Singapore, and came here.

And also, as you correctly mentioned at the very beginning, you know, China-U.S. relations is perhaps the most consequential bilateral relations. For someone whose past career was in journalism and Nangamdo Think Tank, I couldn't think of a better place to be here in the U.S. But, you know, here we are, and I feel like being overwhelmed by all these news. So on that note, was the plan always to go back to China after you completed your degree, or is this something new? That was like 80 or 19 percent of my plan, mainly for personal reasons. But also, I think the political atom sphere is a bit overwhelming. I did have some kind offers from potential employers here, but I decided against them. The State Department announced actually they are going to aggressively revoke Chinese students' visas,

as well as impose further scrutiny on future Chinese students' visa applications. Let's say I stay for one more year, I would be O.P.T or CPD, which is a post-training upon graduation from a U.S. college, but that status would be linked to your student visa, your F-1 visa. So the potential consequences for Chinese students is not just currently enrolled students, but also other people who are on OBT-C-B-T status here. Out of curiosity, is Princeton providing guidance on visas? Because I can only imagine being a college student and having to deal with immigration issues on top of everything else.

In light of what happened at Harvard, let me think of a way of not putting Princeton in jeopardy again. I think, I'm not just me, but everyone else did get some emails from, you know, sort of guidance from the university, which says it took notice of reasoned news and it is offering resources, basically, I guess, you know, counseling as well as potential legal resources for people to not to be against the administration, but to comply with all the laws and regulations in this country. This was a one-year program, obviously, say, versus 10 years ago, the sort of level of suspicion and anxiety about the presence of a lot of Chinese students at American universities has grown quite a bit.

What about even in the last year, how do things feel shifted? And when you talk to other Chinese students, you know, is it just like noise coming out of D.C.? Or does it change the campus environment? Well, I think it definitely has already had a shilly, in fact. And, I mean, for me personally, I feel very welcomed. And I feel all the hospitality and warmth from my American professors, you know, school administrators and the prison community of neighbors and my local friends. But for, you know, most of the Chinese students who are currently in this situation are perhaps too scared to speak up. And especially after the news last week, I think they are under a bit of stress because, The announcement out of the State Parliament is very broad. It doesn't use very exact language to ascertain who will exactly be in trouble. There are currently, I think, 270,000 Chinese students here in the United States.

China is the second largest origin of international students here in the U.S. And so... Where's the first? India. So for many years, China was the largest source of international students here in America, but that number has come down since bilateral relations worth it. The United States has a proud history of welcoming Chinese students who come to the United States. In the beginning of the 20th century, when China was still governed by the Qing Dynasty,

there was this boxer indemnities. Basically, the compensation is paid by then Qing Dynasty to various Western powers. And at that time, the U.S. was kind enough and smart enough to turn those compensations into a scholarship program. which seeded... This was part of their like money diplomacy of the early 1900s, right? Well, before Joseph Nye created the concept of soft power and the U.S. has been practicing that. So they ceded a top university in Beijing and sponsored a 1,300 Chinese students to come to the United States. And after the bilateral ties were established, you know, since the two countries normalized their diplomatic relations, Republican and Democratic presidents both welcomed Chinese students.

There was this very famous episode where Chinese top leader, Deng Xiaoping at the time, asked if he could send something like 5,000 Chinese students to the U.S. And President Carter, according to his own recollections, he responded that, well, tell him, tell Deng Xiaoping to send 100,000 students to America. I also read President Ronald Reagan actually received the Chinese students and made remarks in some sort of reception welcoming them. And let's remember, that was a time when China was much less open and dynamic than it is today. So what is happening is really unfortunate. I think because of this long history, many Chinese took for granted the opportunities to come here and

study in America if they are good enough to be offered an admission letters. But the larger background is, of course, I guess, globalization, because for many, many years, people just believe, you know, everyone is going to be more connected and we will benefit from more people to people exchanges, from commerce, from, you know, research collaborations. But unfortunately, that era seems to be ending right now. Well, it may have begun to be ending quite a few years ago. Joe, just as an aside, there's a really good book called Fortunate Sons about some Chinese students who were sent to a Connecticut school in, I think, the late 1800s. Oh, I'd love to read that. It's really good. I read it when I bought that house in Connecticut to try to bridge the gap, I guess, between Hong Kong and where I was living.

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Saturdays and Sundays starting at 7 a.m. Eastern. Make us part of your weekend routine on Bloomberg television, radio, and wherever you get your podcasts. I wanted to ask, what's the difference or differences from your perspective in terms of what you would learn in a public policy degree in China versus a public policy degree at some place like Princeton? Well, that's a very good question. I think there is this key difference. For example, policy schools are mostly for early career and mid-career professionals in public service sector. And here, I think, for example, at Harvard Kennedy School, at the Jackson School of Global Affairs, at Yale, at Princeton's Beer, they are offered full-time. And that's because not just the U.S., but also many governments across the world, they have the flexibility to allow their people to basically take a year or two years off their professional career and come here.

But back in China, I think many of those programs are taught as a part-time process, although like they are labeled a full-time process. Because I think sometimes the rigidity of personnel management system means that it's very difficult for people to basically leave work for a year or two and get a full-time education at, you know, maybe Qinghua and PKK University. And also here in the U.S., I think the policy schools benefit greatly from, first of all, former policymakers, like retired, former assistant secretary of state. And so here we have like many very good practitioners who are becoming, you know, teachers. We have, for example, at Princeton's

beer, some former Biden administration officials who just exited the administration. Well, I think in Chinese universities, to be fair, I haven't gone to those policy schools, but that would be rare. And secondly, this place benefits from a much broader, well, I guess. this is a toxic world now, diversity here now. For example, my class is highly international. Like over half of the classmates are international students and also the faculty members. Some of them even come from foreign governments. I really benefited from the global perspectives I get from Princeton here. What did you do for undergrad? Well, I went to a Chinese college and majored in finance, actually. I don't know much about Chinese universities. The only thing I ever hear these days

about Chinese universities is usually in the context of tech competition and the number of STEM graduates. And you hear a lot about the number of hundreds of thousands of STEM graduates and the advantages that sheer scale confers. You know, when I think of American universities, they're STEM, but I also think a lot about the heavy importance on liberal arts degrees and literature and history, and people can go on to, you know, careers in tech and finance, even from a history degree. Can you compare and contrast to that sort of like intellectual environment at the Chinese colleges in terms of the non-technical fields? Well, this is something I think that has been observed and they talked about in the past few years when people compare, you know, Chinese and American universities, but also between Chinese and I guess Indian universities. Because based on what I read, which may not be like very accurate, it's like India also trains a lot of like lawyers and, you know, social sciences majors.

But the general perception is that the Chinese colleges and universities are training many more STEM grads. And, you know, in semiconductor related, you know, mechanical engineering. But not everyone's a STEM grant, right? Yeah, of course. I mean, this is just what everyone's talking about these days because of this anxiety about tech competition. Oh, yeah, that's correct. And almost all universities in China are state wrong. All the Ivy Leagues are privately run universities here in the U.S.

Maybe because I think China is still, to some extent, a transition. economy. So China initiated its reform and opening up in 1978, but before that it was a totally planned economy where the government basically tells everyone what to do, you know, in their schools and in their professional journeys. And based on those, you know, paradigms, a lot of Chinese universities are set up like to train people in a specific field. For example, there is this Beijing Aeronautics University, which basically trains people, you know, in space, related technology and maybe rocket science. And then there is also comprehensive universities. But for many years, there was this maybe legacy China learned from the Soviet Union to have

specialized colleges and universities in training STEM grads. And also, you know, China has 1.4 billion people. It is now the second most populous country on Earth. So naturally you would see, you know, there are just many, many more Chinese students there. And the Chinese, you know, the Chinese They put heavy emphasis on science and technology. Can I share with one detail with you? Because I graduated from finance and I went on to join a news agency in China. You're at Shenhua. Yes, the same news agency. And my mother used to tell me, why don't you learn something real? Like finance and journalism, they are not like real professional.

Well, I guess I didn't test very well in China's college and trans examination. For many years, there was this quote in China, and I think it still rings true, and it maybe it rains even truer today. Well, in Chinese, it's called Schia al-Shuly Hua. Like, if you learn mathematics and physics and chemistry, you can go everywhere and do well. And that is still on many Chinese minds. And so, for example, in AI, I think Jensen Huang of Invadia, he said like a few weeks ago, I think he was citing Marco Polo a think tank here, formerly affiliated with, the Palson Institute is that 50% of the global AI talent is Chinese, or maybe having some

sort of Chinese heritage. So that does speak to the enormous training capacity of the Chinese education system, and which also makes many people wonder here. You know, AI is going to shape everything in the future, and the two countries seem to be locked in a competition, that the U.S. really want to shut out such a large talent pool in AI. And these students can, Chinese students, you know, after completing their undergrad degrees, they come to the United States. They contribute to meaningfully to groundbreaking research. And I think this is one thing that many people have a, maybe an inaccurate understanding of how graduate level education, especially in STEM fields work. This is not an extractive process. It's not that, you know, Chinese, Indian, you know, students from global South come to the U.S. universities.

they learned, they sat in classrooms, they learned from their American professors and peers, and then they leave and brought the knowledge back with them. That's not the case. Yes, they benefit enormously from the education system here, which is just spectacular, but they make meaningful contributions in conducting research, in collaborating with their American peers and professors. They stay in labs for days and months, which would result in papers in top American journals. They actually contribute to the creation of knowledge and the sharing of knowledge here. They contribute in the process. It's a symbolic process, not an extractive process. So by having them here and some of them, you know, would remain here legally, I should say, you know, to work in the U.S., become entrepreneurs and

researchers and American taxpayers to pursue their American dreams. And some of them would leave the U.S. and go back to China, India and, you know, everywhere on earth. And they would become, you know, informal ambassadors of American openness, of American. inclusiveness of American hospitality, and they would serve as one of the defense lines in terms of China-U.S. relations as decreasing mutual strategic misunderstanding and the miscalculations. So this is truly something very important in my mind. And I'm really sadden to see, you know, the crackdown Chinese students to come to the United States. When you go back to China, what nice things are you going to say about America? Well, the first thing I would tell them is

I have the enormous privilege of coming to odd lots on Princeton. I'm Bloomberg, I'm sorry. And that's really a... That's the first thing. Okay, what's number two? Well, number two is I think I benefit a lot from all the critical discussions on colleges. It's not just pro-Trump or against Trump. We have very different views on all sorts of subjects.

Some professors are rightfully worried about, for example, rule of law here, but we have also some classmates who have faculties who are very sympathetic to what the broader Republican agenda is doing here in the United States. So I think this clash of different ideas, the market of free ideas is something really stimulating for me personally. And the other reason is that, for example, I'm fully funded by Princeton Speer here. And so I benefit truly from the the hospitality and the generosity of the American people here. Princeton is the private universities, the money coming in from private donations. I'm truly grateful for that.

And I don't think like any other country on the earth simply has the financial capacity to do something like that. So this is something really should be cherished here. I will certainly carry all these lessons and appreciations back to China. We started this conversation talking about deterioration. curating U.S.-China relations, and I don't think anyone would disagree with that premise. But the question I wanted to ask you is, as someone who's worked in both Chinese and Western institutions, or at least studied at a Western institution, what do you think is the biggest misunderstanding between the U.S. and China? What's the biggest sticking point?

You mentioned the sub-sec I did technology and all those, for example, I also had a privilege of being invited to some of the major think tanks here to share my views with fellow think tank analysts and former government officials. I think if I really want to summarize, like what I've been doing is to normalize China. Because China has a vastly different political system from the United States, from all the major Western industrial economies, I think people fundamentally see China as a different beast. But China also has politics. The Chinese government has many government departments, ministries, they compete with one another. There is politics between different departments, politics between different people inside one government department.

The Chinese make five-year plans and they seem to be implementing that quite well, for example, made in China 2025, come into mind. But sometimes they are also very short-sighted. The Chinese have good accomplishments. They also make stupid mistakes. That's just human. nature. What are some examples of short-sighted? Because Americans love to go to China, and then they come back and they say, they think it's centuries unlike us who just think, you know, it's these very cliches, these very cliched commentary that you just hear over and over again, it's like, we just think about the next quarterly estimate or hitting the next GDP. When you say, obviously, any society is going to be richer than the sort of cliche tropes that, you know, when you look back at decisions,

Because as you mentioned, it seems like the main in 2025 stuff worked out really well. But where do you see it breaking down at times? For example, let's talk about EVs, right? You know, the electric vehicles. So everyone now knows that China is leading on EVs. And people talk about BYD, about, you know, Xiaomi, the former smartphone maker turned automobile maker. And it seems like, you know, Ford and other U.S. auto giants are falling behind.

So many people attribute to some sort of Chinese state subsidies and industrial strategy. But bear also in mind that before this EV boom, there were like a dozen Chinese automobile makers. Almost all of them were state-run automobile companies. Because China implemented this, when foreign carmakers come to China, you have to form joint ventures with Chinese partners. And in many cases, the Chinese partners have to be in control of foreign. 51% of the joint venture. But all these Chinese state run automobile giants are actually falling behind now. What you are seeing in the EV boom in China, the names coming to mind are all very new private

run Chinese automobile makers. They didn't exist. They didn't benefit from the sort of state monopoly or preferential loans and maybe land and all these in-kind subsidies for those. They basically partnered with BMW, with all these American and European carmakers. But look, they are falling behind now. Sorry, but on the other hand, I could listen to that story and say, because of this requirement for JVs, the only possibility of actual private automobile development in China was for domestic companies.

And international companies never had that chance to actually sort of be truly autonomous within the Chinese. domestic market, seems like that worked out very well in the grand scheme of things for ensuring that the only companies with complete agility, et cetera, in the Chinese market ended up being Chinese. Well, first of all, that could be some sort of a good policy advice for the Trump administration, I guess, and also maybe European governments. And secondly... I'm very down with, please bring BYD in a JV or something like that. I wanted BID Gigafactor in Georgia or something like that.

I've said that before. Anyway, keep going. What I was trying to say is the resistance. discrepancy with, you know, all the power of industrial strategies. But at the same time, it's the private ingenuity of the innovation, of the hard work of the private Chinese companies, which have somehow come out atop. All the states around companies, they are falling behind, at least in the automobile sector. And that shows that I think people tend to see China as a country with the Communist Party of China sitting atop, the state tells everyone what to do and

marshalling all the resources. But it is also at the same time just a spectacularly competitive and innovative place where private ingenuity and hard work really plays a very big rule. There is this say in China, you know, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 basically says, you know, over half of the GDP, of the taxation, of the new employment are all created by private companies. And so that's something when Americans perceive China, they think of just one very coherent, I don't know, Bechmanth, where, you know, there is this larger central brain telling everyone to do everything else. And yes, the Chinese government, the Communist Party of China enjoys enormous power in shaping the Chinese society compared with Western powers.

But do not discount. And actually, I think much more emphasis. should be put on the non-state part of the Chinese society. You mentioned your mom thinking that doing finance and journalism was not very valuable. And one thing you sometimes hear is that China places greater importance or value on people studying STEM going into tech. And I guess I'm curious how much has that changed over the years. Like if I was a high school student in China in, I don't know, the 1990s, would I be encouraged to be a doctor or a lawyer or a teacher or would I be encouraged to go into tech? Like basically, how has that culture of which subject is most valued changed over time? You are very sharp-eyed.

I think if it was in the 1990s, people wanted to go to, I don't want to name names, like certain finance schools in China. And after graduation, like they would want to walk in Goldman Sachs. And Morgan Stanley, that's like the top jobs. Maybe when I graduated from college in 2011, that's still the case, what the people wanted to do. Because it makes huge money. It makes very big money. But especially in the past decade, I think, I'm sure you have reported this, there is large cuts to the income, to the wages of Chinese financial engineering.

And even when it comes to the Internet sector, Facebook now known as meta and all those booms, they contribute to consumer internet. That was the thing in China as well, like Alibaba and Tencent. What they do is they popularize some technologies which makes lives much easier for everyday consumers and also businesses. But in a sense, I think now more value is put into the sort of technologies that would really boost productivity in, you know, industrial process. For example, even doctors and hospitals can identify certain diseases. It's not just, you know, I can go out and get a delivery much easier from a restaurant.

So the term technology, I think, has taken on a new meaning. And if I can make a recommendation, there is this Dan Wang, who I think is in year-law. You don't need to recommend Dan Wong to the odd-law. audience. We've had a month several times. I'm sure we'll do a big thing when his book comes out. Both Tracy and I have copies of it on our desk. You should go pre-order it on Amazon right now. So basically, I think China is wishing to make basically these hard technologies more sexy than, you know, just joining a tech firm. It's interesting. It sort of feels this is becoming an international phenomenon that everyone is getting very anxious about their country's capacity to do. quote hard tech. You are returning to China and you're going to go back to the think tank, the

Center for China and Globalization. It's interesting. I'm looking at the controversy section in the Wikipedia page for it. And Marco Rubio, who's now the Secretary of State in 2018, he actually blasted your school. He blasted the Woodrow Wilson School for inviting a scholar from the CCG. And he said there were ties to the Chinese Communist Party. And CCG, according to Wikipedia, is a member of an alliance of think tanks coordinated by the international department of the Chinese Communist Party that support the Belt and Road initiative, which we've talked about on the show. Now, granted, your situation strikes me as a little bit unique because most students coming to the U.S. from China are not going to a public policy school in a one-year funded thing.

Why shouldn't American lawmakers, however, be concerned about training many of the next generation of leaders in a country that is perceived to be a major rival and doing work with them and training them and AI and all of these things that there is so much sort of almost everyone accepts that there is going to be some degree of either geopolitical and business competition. First of all, about the Wikipedia page you just mentioned. I know, it's very thorough research I do here.

I click out a link and I scroll to the controversy section. But I wanted to, you know, I saw it. both your think tank and the Wilson School have come under controversy for connections. The joke I typically make in this sort of conversations is that, well, I came from the state ground news agency. I was a proper Chinese government personnel. And now people would characterize me as some sort of, you know, the term United Front. That's like semi-government. You're done greeting me. Like I was the proper Chinese government for 11 years. And I, I, I I left in October 2022. And if we have time, I'd be happy to dive into the details of, you know,

the difference between a government-run think tank and a non-governmental think tank in China. But to your larger point is that there is this term which says keep your friends close and keep your enemy closer. I'm not sure exactly if China and the U.S. are enemies at the moment. But just from that insight, I think it would be very beneficial for the U.S., especially policy schools, but also other social sciences and universities to try to have Chinese contributions, to have Chinese students' presence here, so that when push comes to shove, they have someone to call, they know what the Chinese are really thinking about. And that is, I think, one of the tragedies from the crackdown on, for example, Harvard and

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Subscribe today, wherever you get your podcasts. Bloomberg Surveillance, Essential Listening, each and every business. You mentioned that there's a difference between properly state-run think tanks and non-state run think tank. I think in the U.S. there is a perception, and this actually goes back to the talking about companies, including car companies, et cetera. There is a perception that there's actually no private companies, that implicitly even the private companies, the BYDs, etc., are at some level, you know, at the beck and call of the state, and some more literally than others. Eva Doe's incredible book about Huawei talks a lot about.

about there's a Communist Party leadership within the company. It engages in making sure it's members who are employees of the company and engage in more moral behavior and aren't doing things like gambling, et cetera. Why shouldn't we think that every country within China, regardless of how it's incorporated, answers up to political leadership in Beijing? I think on a macro level, I do not see a drastic difference between, for example, a U.S. president wants to have like invidia or Apple to become the dominant forces in the world. And from the Chips Act, from the Inflation Reduction Act to offering, you know, general subsidies

to American companies. In China, there is this support for Chinese companies. But in many cases, not from the very start. It's like, you know, Huawei started very little and it was competing with with European telecom vendors at the very beginning. And for many years, you know, China Mobile, China Unicom, all the state telecommunication firms, they just wanted the equipment from the European suppliers. That's a credible story. Yeah. And Huawei had to go to the European markets to increase its customers, numbers, and revenue. And after a few years, and especially when the industry became more strategic. And then the Chinese government would, you know, take a look at of the potential players and believe, oh, this is perhaps an industry that's

going to be of strategic value in the future and would provide some sort of assistance to them. But I wouldn't think that there is a CCP committee overseeing Huawei on a daily basis, telling them, you know, this is something you should do in Southeast Asia, and this is something you should work on in Africa. And if that were the case, Huawei wouldn't be where it is today, which is also why I sincerely believe the U.S. persecution of Huawei and other probably private Chinese companies is a strategic mistake because these companies were on their way to making China more dynamic, more private, having more private elements in the Chinese society, to have more international exposure,

to allow people to have a career path, a meaningful one, a financially rewarding one outside the apparatus. These companies are helping China to become more open, more aligned with international standards. So these are positive forces from a market perspective that would help align China with the globalization process, with the so-called rule-based international order. And this is also the reasons, for example, the U.S. has imposed many export controls and has, for example, sanctioned Russia and other states and companies that are deemed hostile to U.S. national interests. And many of the Chinese private companies are, well, silently just abide by all these sanctions because they want to globalize. They want to have markets and partners and suppliers across the world. But I guess, This is the year 2025. There is no way to turn around this phenomenon, I guess. Well, on this note, this actually leads into a question I wanted to ask,

and I think this will be the last question from me. But one of my pet theories right now is that the U.S. is starting to look a lot more like China, and China is starting to look a lot more like the U.S. So just recently, for instance, you've seen Chinese policymakers try to boost consumer spending, which is a page out of the U.S. playbook after financials. crisis. They've been enhancing their social safety net, which again, kind of looks American, although you can debate how strong the American social net is. America, meanwhile, has been making more strategic investments in certain industries. Industrial policy has become a thing again.

China is liberalizing part of its market. The U.S. says it's going to keep Chinese investors out of its market. It feels like they're taking on each other's characteristics. to some degree. I guess my question is, would you agree with that? And I have to say, Michael Pettis did not agree with me, but a couple others, Victor Schwetz over at McCory, agreed with me. And then right after I wrote my piece about this, there was a big foreign policy article basically saying the same thing. So I would love to get your opinion. Well, I think I've heard the term called beating China by becoming China. And I do think that the United States has its legitimate interests in strengthening its supply chains, in safeguarding the resilience of its

industries. Like, I totally understand that the U.S. doesn't want to rely 100% on PPEs during COVID. It wants to ensure a certain level of self-reliance when it comes to manufacturing capacity, maybe onshore or maybe friendly shoring, like in its allies, you know, transatlantic allies. I get that. And I think when it comes to China, what you were mentioning, and I guess maybe Michael Padis doesn't fully agree is that many people believe the process in China of showing up the consumer spending, strengthening the social safety net, that should be accelerated. That should go much faster than it is happening today because, you know, the Chinese government, they have officially, according to their policy papers, recognizes that in the Chinese minds it's not about basically

learning from an American way of establishing a social safety net, maybe from the Europeans, I guess. But because it is fundamentally helpful and beneficial for the Chinese society, for the Chinese people to have a relatively robust healthcare coverage insurance so that they could spend money on more iPhones and other consumer electronics, this is fundamentally good. something good. It's not about learning from the rest of the world. But on the phenomenon, you just mentioned that there is this some sort of convergence. I do hope they converge on being more open, being more humane, I'm being more humanitarian, being more, you know, hospitable to people, to persons. And if I may have some sort of last word on this, I'm really sad and

And sometimes I'm angry that it's the students, they are at their early 20s or maybe like 19 years ago. They are being made points in this game. Come on, they are innocent. These strategic rivalry, yes, take all your measures against the military industrial complex and even maybe Huawei's. But leave the people alone from this. And let's, you know, people to people exchangeers and student exchanges happen. And this will try to safeguard the long-term stability of the two countries. because, I mean, as competitive, as hawkish as the U.S. Trump administration hopes to be in China,

although I haven't read the latest read out of the phone call, but nobody wants the two countries to go to war. And to just prevent something catastrophic against that, we need people to people, you know, dialogues. And the Chinese leaders have been receiving U.S. guests. For example, the vice president of China recently, just I think yesterday or today, received the U.S. non-governmental players in China. The Chinese leaders met, for example, John L. Thornton, the former CEO of Goldman Sachs. They met Graham Allison, the founding dean of the Harvard Kennedy School. So you have many news in China from Chinese leaders receiving non-governmental guests from the U.S., officially reported in China, legitimizing the non-governmental visits from the U.S.

to China. But the other way around, I don't see any news, even under Biden administration, that the U.S. government openly receives, you know, non-governmental visitors, scholars, entrepreneurs, and the Chinese, you know, for example, Xi Jinping met with, you know, dozens of U.S. companies and Western and European company CEOs. So in that thing, the Chinese legitimizing the Western interactions coming into China, but unfortunately, I'm not seeing any of that here. Here, what we have is, like, delegitimizing any Chinese government and non-governmental people coming here. And I think I've heard that, you know, the U.S. government is also meeting with non-governmental Chinese actors, scholars, well, working in state-round universities and think tanks. But they're not saying anything about that. And that's not something very good, I think. Zishuan Wang. Thank you so much for coming on odd laws. Thank you for doing your, I guess it, interview with us. This is really fascinating. Really glad we got to chat before you left town.

and I hope we continue reading your work. I hope you're going to keep doing a pecanology. Yes, definitely. That's fantastic because I think for a lot of us here, it's a very useful resource, those of us who don't speak Chinese or those of us who don't know who the names that we should actually be paying attention to. So really appreciate it and safe travels home. Thank you.

I'm truly grateful for the opportunity. Thank you to Tracy and John. And I hope maybe not just for me, but for Chinese students, it's audios, not goodbye. Real quickly, has there been a change in perception, the desirability of coming here? If the Chinese students don't face the restrictions, they certainly still want to come here. Thank you so much. Thank you. My pleasure. First of all, really enjoyed that conversation.

It is hard for me, you know, this sort of really aggressive attempt to no longer have American universities be a sort of destination for many of the world's most talented individuals. goes, it's hard for me to imagine that not being sort of like a pretty big hit to both the U.S. economy and it's just sort of like standing in the world. Yeah. So Zishan's point about, well, you know, Chinese students who come to America for their education, they largely go back to China with fond memories of America. I think the idea that America wouldn't value that is really indicative of how much less we seem to be valuing soft power nowadays. It seems like that kind of diplomacy just isn't,

isn't as popular as it once was. And so you're seeing people like the Trump administration say, like, well, why should we be doing this? We don't get anything out of it. But then people like Zichenne will say, well, you actually do get something out of it. You get better relations and you get that sort of cultural understanding and that soft diplomacy. I do wonder the degree to which the American public has been sold on the benefits of so-called soft power, right? So like a lot of people would say, oh, American influence abroad, American ideals, what America stands for for freedom in so many other countries, or maybe did up until recently. I know global perceptions have changed, etc. But then I think, you know, maybe there is another argument that's like, oh, that's great

that all these countries see as a beacon of freedom or whatever. What do I get out of that? How does that benefit me? And I think when you look at some of the political turns, perhaps the case hasn't been made to the U.S. public in a very compelling way from the people who believe in sort of liberal internationalism that the average citizen in the U.S. actually should care at all about how the rest of the world views us. Look, everyone needs to travel more if they can. That's what I say. You need to go to a place that loves America and then you need to go, I don't know, to the Middle East or something and talk to someone that hates America and see what the difference is. There's a big difference. This is a really good perspective intake. Okay. Shall we leave it there? Let's leave it there.

This has been another episode of the All Thoughts podcast. I'm Tracy Allaway. You can follow me at Tracy Allaway. And I'm Jill Wisenthall. You can follow me at the stalwart. Follow our guest, Zishan Wong. He's at Zishan Wong here and check out his pecanology substack. I do hope he sustains it upon return to China.

Follow our producers, Carmen Rodriguez, at Carmen Armin, Dashel Bennett at Dashbot and Kilbrooks. Kail Brooks. For more oddlots content, go to Bloomberg.com slash oddlots. We have a daily newsletter and all of our episodes. And you can chat about all of these topics 24-7 in our Discord. Discord.g.g. slash oddlots. And if you enjoy Oddlots, if you like it when we conduct exit interviews with Chinese students studying at Princeton, then please leave us a positive review at your favorite podcast platform. And remember, if you are a Bloomberg subscriber, you can listen to all of our episodes, absolutely ad-free. All you need to do is find the

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