A New World Order: China and the Geopolitical Landscape

Global world order is shifting. The last four decades have seen a marked rise in the economic power of China and a simultaneous weakening in the stability of liberal democracies the world over. The outlook for the 2020s appears rife with uncertainty.

We kicked off our NOW conference in San Francisco with two China experts in conversation about the changing geopolitical landscape and the future of U.S.-China relations--covering topics that included Xi Jinping's vision, the rise of national security over economic interests, multinational business engagement in China, Taiwan, and more.

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Guests

Andy Browne

China Hub Director, Brunswick Group

Andy leads Brunswick’s China Hub, working closely with colleagues in China and globally, including the firm’s Geopolitical practice, to advise clients on China-related issues. Prior to joining Brunswick, Andy ran the editorial program at the Bloomberg New Economy Forum, a platform set up by Michael Bloomberg, the three-term mayor of New York City, to connect CEOs and government leaders from emerging and developed economies. Andy spent 35 years working in Asia, latterly as a China Editor and Columnist for the Wall Street Journal. He started his career in journalism in 1982 at the South China Morning Post in Hong Kong, before moving to Reuters News Agency where he spent 20 years running news bureaus in Taipei, Shanghai, Beijing and Seoul, before becoming Asia Pacific News Editor in Singapore. Andy also spent two years as a Partner in Brunswick’s Beijing office between 2007 and 2009. Andy won the Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting in 2007 as part of a team of Wall Street Journal reporters in Beijing and shared an Overseas Press Club award for business reporting on China in 2011. Andy was also a guest commentator on NBC’s coverage of the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics. He received a BA in Chinese Language and Literature from the University of Leeds.

Elizabeth Economy, Ph.D.

Senior Fellow, Hoover Institution

Elizabeth Economy is the Hargrove Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. From 2021–2023, Economy served as a senior foreign advisor (for China) in the Department of Commerce for the current administration. Economy was previously at the Council on Foreign Relations, where she served as the C.V. Starr senior fellow and director for Asia Studies for over a decade. Economy is an acclaimed author and expert on Chinese domestic and foreign policy. Her most recent book is The World According to China (Polity, 2022). She is also the author of The Third Revolution: Xi Jinping and the New Chinese State, (Oxford University Press, 2018; Thai edition, 2018; Chinese (Taiwan) edition, 2019), which was shortlisted for the Lionel Gelber Prize, a prestigious literary award for foreign affairs books. Her other books include By All Means Necessary: How China's Resource Quest is Changing the World (Oxford University Press, 2014; Vietnamese, 2019) with Michael Levi, and The River Runs Black: The Environmental Challenge to China's Future (Cornell University Press, 2004; 2nd edition, 2010; Japanese edition, 2005; Chinese edition, 2011). The River Runs Black was named one of the top 50 sustainability books in 2008 by the University of Cambridge, won the 2005 International Convention on Asia Scholars Award for the best social sciences book published on Asia, and was listed as one of the top ten books of 2004 by the Globalist as well as one of the best business books of 2010 by Booz Allen Hamilton's strategy+business magazine. She also coedited China Joins the World: Progress and Prospects (Council on Foreign Relations Press, with Michel Oksenberg, 1999) and The Internationalization of Environmental Protection (Cambridge University Press, with Miranda Schreurs, 1997). She has published articles in foreign policy and scholarly journals including Foreign Affairs, Harvard Business Review, and Foreign Policy, and op-eds in the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the Wall Street Journal, among others. Economy is a frequent guest on nationally broadcast television and radio programs, has testified before Congress on numerous occasions, and regularly consults for U.S. government agencies and companies. In June 2018, Economy was named one of the "10 Names That Matter on China Policy" by Politico Magazine. Economy serves on the board of managers of Swarthmore College and is a member of the Aspen Strategy Group. She was also on the advisory council of Network 20/20 and the science advisory council of the Stockholm Environment Forum. She served as a member of the World Economic Forum (WEF)’s Global Agenda Council on the United States from 2014 to 2016 and served as a member and then vice chair of WEF’s Global Agenda Council on the Future of China from 2008 to 2014. Economy also served on the board of the China-U.S. Center for Sustainable Development. She has taught undergraduate and graduate level courses at Columbia University, Johns Hopkins University's Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, and the University of Washington's Jackson School of International Studies. Economy received her BA with honors from Swarthmore College, her AM from Stanford University, and her PhD from the University of Michigan. In 2008, she received an honorary doctor of law degree from Vermont Law School. She lives in New York City with her husband and three children.

Host

James Harding

Editor and Founder, Tortoise Media

James Harding is Co-Founder and Editor of Tortoise. Prior to this, James was the Director of News and Current Affairs at the BBC, the world’s largest news organisation, until January 2018. Prior to that he was Editor of The Times of London from 2007-2012, winning the Newspaper of the Year in two of the five years he edited the paper. He was previously The Times’ Business Editor, having joined from The Financial Times, where he worked as Washington Bureau Chief, Media Editor and China correspondent opening the paper’s bureau in Shanghai in 1996. He is the author of Alpha Dogs – How political spin became a global business and he presented On Background on the BBC World Service with Zanny Minton-Beddoes, editor of The Economist.

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