Every China talk in the city of Washington D.C. is about the same thing. On April 7th, USCET hosted a joint event with Young China Watchers, and that event truly caught me in a vengeful mood.
I go to a normal amount of these types of geopolitics/global affairs/free food events, and I have to say that the pickings are somehow better for Russia watchers than they are for China watchers! This, despite the current China fixation. Somehow, most speakers on Russia have some hyper-specific niche or new tidbit to add to the conversation. Often they have written longer monographs on Russia (as with Kennan Institute events), whereas the people brought in to chat about China are usually the authors of shorter pieces, either for news outlets or think tank reports (as with the lineup for this Johns Hopkins SAIS event). Perhaps that explains why the China hands sound so generic.
Because every event from the past month in the China sphere has touched upon the same 4-6 topics, I’ll be posting a longer synthesis of my notes here: The China Debate No One Will Shut Up About
To tide you over, I and some other devious individuals have prepared a ‘China Think Tank Bingo’ card. Feel free to plug these into any Bingo card generator and play along next time you go to a China event.
Cross off a box if:
- Nvidia mentioned
- War in Iran (2026-) mentioned
- Xinjiang is not mentioned
- A panelist says “de-risking” and/or “de-coupling”
- Someone mentions overcapacity, involution/内卷
- A specific university program is mentioned (NYU Shanghai, Duke Kunshan, Hopkins Nanjing Center, etc…)
- Tariffs mentioned
- China’s nuclear weapons buildup mentioned but not discussed for more than two minutes
- Electric vehicles (EVs—but extra points if they use the Chinese terminology of ‘NEVs’)
- One of the panelists currently works at a think tank
- One of the panelists used to work in the US Government
- The CHIPS and Science Act is mentioned
- “We need more people studying and going to China.”
- COVID-19 is not mentioned
- Critical Minerals are mentioned
- The panelists are bamboozled and befuddled by Trump’s actions
- A panelist thanks the organizers and fellow panelists
- Nobody from the private sector is on the panel
- There are A/V issues
- Russia-Ukraine War mentioned
- Trump-Xi Summit (est. May 2026) mentioned
- Chips and Semiconductors mentioned
- “We need to collaborate on climate crisis” is said with no elaboration on how to accomplish this
- A panelist worked specifically for the Biden administration
- “US-China AI race”
- No countries except the US and China are discussed
- Africa ignored
- EU ignored
- Rest of Asia ignored
- Local Taiwanese politics ignored
- Religion not mentioned
- Environment not mentioned
- “Debt-trap diplomacy” or Belt and Road Initiative mentioned
- Fentanyl ignored because no one here lives in Ohio
- “We really don’t know anything”
- TikTok mentioned
- “End of the old world order”/“Liberal Rules-based International Order”
- No places in the PRC except Beijing and Shanghai mentioned by name
- Name drop of a big Chinese governmental event or thing, eg: The Two Sessions, Plenary Sessions, Five Year Plan, etc…
- Argument about whether Taiwan is a country
- “is China an ally, a competitor, or an adversary?” OR its more hawkish cousin: “is China a competitor, a rival, or an enemy?”
Let me know how the bingo goes. I hope it’s fun!