Introduction

The adoption of China's 14th Five-Year Plan in March 2021 further solidified the dominant role of innovation, emerging technology, and advanced manufacturing in Beijing's development strategy, as well as highlighted the government's intention to accelerate the building of a digital economy, society, and government. The plan details China's desire to use data and digital technology to upgrade traditional industries, develop smart cities, and create a "future of shared destiny" in cyberspace.¹ These elements represent pieces of Beijing's broader digital and innovation strategy that seeks to leapfrog China to become a global technology leader and position the country as a dominant player in shaping and controlling the world's digital future. Chinese leaders see accomplishing this as a key means to continuing China's rise and achieving the "great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation."

The strategies used to carry out China's digital ambitions and grow its digital influence are multifaceted and carry significant global repercussions. This Asia Policy roundtable seeks to identify these objectives and shed light on their consequences. The following essays analyze the policies China is using to achieve these goals; examine the consequences for the United States, like-minded powers, and others caught in the middle; and offer policy recommendations for both national governments and international rule-setting bodies to mitigate the challenges associated with China's digital rise.

In the roundtable's opening essay Emily de La Bruyère outlines China's digital grand strategy, emphasizing both the vastness of its scope and its centrality in China's long-term strategic objectives. Through the analysis of speeches by Chinese president Xi Jinping, official policy documents, and Chinese-language journal articles, La Bruyère emphasizes the significance of China's digital rise, concluding that the government "sees the IT revolution as an opportunity to claim leadership over the world order." To capitalize on this opportunity, Beijing is pursuing a "network great power" (wangluo qiangguo) strategy that extends beyond the virtual domain to achieve real-world impact.

The network great-power strategy integrates with China's industrial and manufacturing plans through the informatization of industrialization to link production, distribution, circulation, and consumption in a new development pattern that makes greater use of the digital domain and ongoing IT revolution. It also seeks to balance between protecting China's domestic network and taking advantage of access to global networks. After decades of benefiting from asymmetrical integration with the global system—by maintaining relatively closed markets at home while capitalizing on the openness of markets abroad—China is now pursuing a similar strategy in the digital world. Becoming a network great power resides at the core of this strategy, providing "a roadmap for China's rule-setting ambitions in the digital domain" and seeking to catapult China to the forefront of the IT-empowered world.

In the following essay, Elsa Kania zeros in for a closer look at some of the actions the Chinese government is taking to achieve the strategy laid out by La Bruyère. Kania details the increases in expenditures on R&D, basic research, and megaprojects targeting strategic technologies such as artificial intelligence and quantum computing that have demonstrated the magnitude of state-led efforts to advance China's innovation ambitions. In particular, she notes the role of national science and technology in helping China develop vaccines and other tools to recover quickly from the Covid-19 pandemic. China's emphasis on R&D in science and technology has been matched by the incorporation of rhetoric such as "self-reliance" and "autonomous innovation" at the highest levels and in official policy statements, further centering the new development model on domestic innovation and capturing the gains from emerging technology. China's ability to play a leading role in shaping the future of the environment for innovation is critical to achieving its desired national rejuvenation. But Kania also addresses the tensions that China faces between retaining control and autonomy and becoming a global, trusted leader in science and technology fields.

In response to the country's growing digital, technological, and innovative capacities, Kania cautions against using overly broad bans on scientific engagement. She instead...