We are pleased to present the 16th issue of John Lukacs Analyses on Global Affairs:2025/16. Trump 2.0 from the Perspective of Chinese Experts: Implications for Bilateral Relations and the World Order.
Key insights from this analysis include:
- Based on Chinese expert assessments, Trump’s second presidential term represents both a challenge and a strategic opportunity for China.
- The term increases economic and political uncertainty, while also providing Beijing with space to strengthen its global role, provided it maintains strategic composure.
- Chinese experts point out that in recent years China has reduced its previous unilateral dependencies, creating a strategic stalemate that, in principle, provides an opportunity to stabilize bilateral relations.
- Trump’s foreign policy accelerates the erosion of the US alliance system, which primarily provides opportunities for China in the Indo-Pacific region.
- The U.S. questioning of Western-origin norms and rules enables China to act as an active rule-maker in global governance, offering the Global South an alternative, development-oriented model.
- Instead of the previously reactive, defensive posture, China now proactively shapes its communications and narratives, thereby reinforcing its image as a responsible and stable great power, while simultaneously intensifying great power competition within this sphere.
You can read the full paper on the John Lukacs Institute website.