Is the US overreacting to the China threat? Yes, but Beijing’s iron grip isn’t helping, says leading Harvard professor
- William Kirby warns Beijing’s increasing ideological grip could backfire by encouraging US hardliners and hampering educational development
- White House isn’t speaking to the ‘smartest people’ when forming policy towards China, he tells seminar in Chinese capital
The US is at risk of “overreacting” to the threat from China, a leading Harvard academic has warned, but added that Beijing’s increasingly hard ideological line may be encouraging the more hawkish elements in America.
William Kirby, professor of China Studies at Harvard University, warned that Donald Trump’s administration was not consulting “the smartest people” about China, which may increase the risk of policy missteps.
Kirby was speaking at a seminar in Beijing on Friday, where he also said that education would be the key to whether China could replace the US as the world’s leading power.
“When you think of the broader question here: ‘Can China lead and will China be the leading power of the 21 century?’ A central point will be education,” said Kirby, who is also chairman of the Harvard China Fund, the university’s academic venture fund for China.
“So when I worry about Chinese universities, I worry about things like this: the statue of Mao Zedong in Zhejiang University. A man who has done more to destroy education in China than any other human being.”
Kirby said statues of Mao, which were erected in many universities across China during the Cultural Revolution and are still present in some institutions, symbolised how Beijing was refusing to loosen its ideological grip over education.