Trump's Trials - How the relationship between the U.S. and China has changed under Trump

Episode Date: May 15, 2026

NPR's Steve Inskeep talks with Chinese scholar Da Wei about the history of the U.S.-China relationship and how it has changed under President Trump. Support NPR and hear every episode of Trump's Terms sponsor-free with NPR+. Sign up at plus.npr.org.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

You're listening to Trump's terms. I'm Scott Detrow. Every episode, we bring you one story from NPR's recent coverage of the 47th president. With a focus on ways his administration is pushing the boundaries of presidential power. Here's the latest from NPR. From NPR news, I'm Steve Inskip in Beijing. Each time we've visited China in recent years, we've checked in with a Chinese scholar named Da Wei. He's at Tsinghua University, which is a school founded with American support back in 1911. Dawei's area of study is the United States, which he often visits. He teaches classes

on America to students who sometimes include Americans. We talked this week to get his Chinese perspective on U.S.-China presidential summits. He divides them into three eras. The first began when President Richard Nixon visited Beijing. I mean, China, U.S. was in the 1970s. We were in the Cold War, so we together coping with the threat from Soviet Union. So you can read those anti-Higemony expression in the communique in 1970s. Against Soviet hegemony. It's not that the U.S. and China were allies, but for a minute they were on the same side. It was not because we like each other or we are like each other. It's because we have common threat. So that's the first section. The second section was

after the, particularly from the early or mid-90s during the Clinton administration. We step into a time now we call neoliberal globalization or hyper-globalization. So the tariff should be low, the non-tariff barrier should be low, and we should encourage capital, technology, personal, information

to flow freely worldwide. So in that context, China, US was the largest developing country and the largest developed country. The two countries become very supplementary to each other, and we were very interdependent. You're weaving your fingers together to show how that, yeah. Exactly. And actually, it was not true that at that time, everything was okay. We have a lot of problem during 1990s and the

first decade of this century, I mean, between China and the U.S. But we have so-called the ballast towards economic relations. So that's 1990s and 2000s. But now I think that and probably if you ask me to draw a lie. It's hard to draw a lie, clear line, but I will say maybe 2017. About the time President Trump came last time to China. Yeah, exactly. But at that time, we compare the visit, President Trump's visit in 2017. I will say that's still, we were still at the end of the era of globalization nine years ago. So China and the U.S. complain a lot to each other. And the U.S. complained that the U.S. does not have a leveled playfield.

China also complained to the U.S. that why you always try to interfere my reform, my policy, I have my own speed, I have my own pace, I will control that. So at that time we have a lot of dissatisfaction towards each other. But that was a happy pain of the globalization, I will say. A happy pain is what you said. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So there's happiness from prosperity, but pain because people can see this going a little wrong.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But then from time. 2018, I think we had a strategic competition. And after 90 years, 80 years, I gradually realized that we are in a new order. It's not a globalization time. Now, we don't have a clear definition. How should we define today's order? But I will say it's basically it's a nationalist era.

The U.S. want to bring back the manufacturing jobs to the U.S. and want to build a war to prevent illegal immigrants, visible, invisible wars. And China have very similar goal. Our goal is national rejuvenation. So these two goals, you know, ironically, very, very similar. National rejuvenation, actually, it's make China great again. Make America great again is American rejuvenation. Right?

So we have very similar goal. How much of this is substance as opposed to style? The United States and China have had all these disagreements, and yet they continue doing hundreds of billions of dollars of business with each other every year. That's true. You know, this connectivity, I think, is still there. What disappeared is the assumption behind this, beneath this. I mean, in the past, you believe that you can, unconditionally be interdependent with other countries. So that's, that was the assumption in 1990s. And we believe economic growth is the highest or the priority, top priority of all the

governments. We want to improve the social welfare, make people rich. But today, I think all major countries have more complicated goals. Of course, we still want economic growth, but people think of jobs in the United States. We are thinking the divide of different social class. And in China, we think a lot about our industrial safety. Can you control your own supply chain? We also think a lot about the environment. So I think it is true that we have bid the fairware to the old hypercaloization, and we are moving to a more complicated

and also more secure economy of the world. The idea of nationalism, as you describe it, I suppose, is to make your country more independent and in that way, if it's correct, more secure. But let me ask about the flip side. Are there ways that each country feels more isolated, to you. Definitely. To be honest, I, as someone grew up in, you know, 1990s, 80s, 90s, I miss that time. But the problem is once this process start, all we can say, so long as one country, one major

player start that process, we cannot stop it. So it's like, you know, if one country started the process of securitization. Other country feels that if I don't securitize my economic relations, I will suffer. So then they followed. So this is tragic, but it's already happened. So I think all the countries feel more isolated, as you said. I totally agree. It's not a very enjoyable experience, but this is a reality.

So I always tell my colleagues here, we should not be too nostalgic, to the old time. Yeah, we all miss that, definitely. But it's useless to be nostalgic. You need to face the reality. Today, we are facing this world. Then we need to spend more time on how to manage this more chaotic, isolated, fragmented world. I think this is the goal. Dawei, it's always a pleasure to see you. Thank you so much. Thank you. Before we wrap up a reminder, you can find more coverage of the Trump administration on the NPR Politics Podcast, where you can hear NPR's political reporters break down the day's biggest political news with new episodes every weekday afternoon. And thanks, as always, to our NPR Plus supporters who hear every episode of the show

without sponsor messages. You can learn more at plus.npr.org. I'm Scott Detrow. Thank for listening to Trump's terms from NPR.