With just a few months left until the U.S. presidential election, U.S.-China relations are one of the biggest foreign policy issues that candidates Donald Trump and Kamala Harris will need to address in their policy platforms. While domestic issues are taking center stage in the election, other countries like China are closely watching the Trump-Harris race to predict what the next four years of U.S. policy might look like. What is China’s view of the U.S. presidential election, and what are potential implications for U.S.-China relations?
In an interview filmed on August 7, 2024, Neysun Mahboubi shares his experience discussing the U.S. election with Chinese counterparts, and what Chinese society and elites may be watching for in the Trump-Harris contest.
Speaker
Neysun Mahboubi
Neysun A. Mahboubi is Director of the Penn Project on the Future of U.S.-China Relations at the University of Pennsylvania, where he teaches various courses related to Chinese history, law, and policy. He is also a Non-Resident Senior Fellow with the Asia Program at the Foreign Policy Research Institute. Previously he was a Research Scholar of Penn’s Center for the Study of Contemporary China, and he continues to host the CSCC Podcast. He is also a Research Affiliate of the Penn Program on Regulation, for whom he hosts the Law & Governance series.
He frequently comments on Chinese law and policy developments and U.S.-China relations for various media outlets, including most recently WBUR’s Here & Now, the Sinica Podcast, Bloomberg TV, CGTN America, and KQED’s Forum. He has taught also at Princeton University’s School of Public & International Affairs, the University of Connecticut School of Law, and Yale Law School.