Report
Regional Responses to U.S.-China Competition in the Indo-Pacific
Nov 12, 2020
Does the United States or China Have More Influence in the Indo-Pacific Region?
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U.S. policymakers and experts are focused on two central questions about long-term strategic competition between the United States and the People's Republic of China (PRC): How do we assess how well the United States is doing relative to China, and which country has more influence in the Indo-Pacific region?
RAND Project AIR FORCE researchers addressed these two questions by first defining what influence means in the context of great-power competition and creating a framework to measure U.S. versus PRC influence. The result brings into focus a well-defined picture of the United States and China's strengths and weaknesses in third countries in the Indo-Pacific—in short, a snapshot of whether the United States or China is "winning" the competition for influence and where.
To understand whether the United States or China is "winning" the competition for influence, RAND researchers traveled to nine countries in the Indo-Pacific in late 2018 and early 2019 and interviewed and consulted with more than 100 U.S. and partner government officials and academic experts. Researchers analyzed official documents, academic reports, and data on U.S. and Chinese activities to answer these four questions:
The United States and China both hope to persuade other countries to partner with them. Influence is the ability of one actor to shape the behavior of another actor. When it comes to U.S.-China competition, relative influence is key: What interests do third countries share with the United States or China, and what resources or capabilities can the two countries use to incentivize or coerce partners?
Competition for influence is dynamic and continuous. In contrast to U.S. military conflict with China, where China is the primary target and adversary that the United States seeks to defeat, U.S. peacetime competition with China is focused on shaping a partner's choices to favor the United States. There is unlikely to be a single, clear, and final victory in competition.
Peacetime Competition for Influence | Military Conflict | |
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Goal | Encourage partner support for the United States on major issues. | Defeat China politically and militarily. |
Target | Partner | China |
Means | Extent of shared partner interests with the United States (compared with China) and relative U.S. capability incentivize or coerce the partner (compared with China). | Balance of interests and balance of capabilities between the United States and China. |
Desired End State | No single, clear, and final victory. Instead, the United States continuously obtains partner support ("wins") on major decisions. | Clear U.S. political and military victory over China. |
Competing visions and objectives for the Indo-Pacific drive U.S.-China competition. The U.S. vision is based on maintaining regional freedom and openness and ensuring security and stability. China's vision involves expanding its power, fostering regional integration and dependence on China, limiting the role of outside powers, and bringing Southeast Asia under Beijing's leadership.
These divergent goals cause the United States and China to prioritize expanding their influence among different partners. The research team examined the importance the United States and China attached to Southeast Asian partners and ranked countries as high, medium, and low priority. Overlapping U.S. and PRC priority countries allowed the researchers to identify where we expect the most intense U.S.-China competition: in Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam.
China | ||||
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High Priority | Medium Priority | Low Priority | ||
United States | High Priority | No countries | Indonesia, the Philippines, Singapore, Vietnam | No countries |
Medium Priority | Malaysia, Thailand | No countries | No countries | |
Low Priority | Burma | Cambodia, Laos | Brunei |
The researchers developed a basic framework with 14 variables to measure and assess how regional countries view U.S. and PRC influence. The framework consists of eight variables that measure a partner's shared interests with the United States (or China) and six variables that measure the relative diplomatic, economic, and military capabilities and resources the United States (or China) could use to convince partners to side with them. The variables capture:
The RAND team applied the framework to the six Southeast Asian countries where competition is most intense and to three key U.S. allies and partners in the region: Australia, Japan, and India. The table below displays the coding of each variable for all nine countries. Each variable captures where the partner is on a range between stronger U.S. influence on one end (blue) and stronger Chinese influence on the other end (red).
The table and the corresponding RAND analysis show that the United States and China have different strengths and approaches to competition:
Singapore | Philippines | Indonesia | Malaysia | Thailand | Vietnam | Japan | Australia | India | ||
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Diplomatic and political | ||||||||||
Diplomatic and political ties | Slightly more U.S. influence | Slightly more U.S. influence | Slightly more U.S. influence | Similar U.S. and Chinese influence | Similar U.S. and Chinese influence | Significantly more Chinese influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | |
Support for U.S. vs. Chinese vision for the region | Slightly more U.S. influence | Slightly more U.S. influence | Slightly more U.S. influence | Similar U.S. and Chinese influence | Similar U.S. and Chinese influence | Slightly more U.S. influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | |
Views of U.S. commitment to the region | Slightly more U.S. influence | Slightly more U.S. influence | Similar U.S. and Chinese influence | Similar U.S. and Chinese influence | Similar U.S. and Chinese influence | Similar U.S. and Chinese influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | Slightly more U.S. influence | Similar U.S. and Chinese influence | |
Public opinion | Significantly more U.S. influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | Similar U.S. and Chinese influence | Slightly more Chinese influence | Slightly more Chinese influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | Slightly more U.S. influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | |
Economic | ||||||||||
Economic dependence | Slightly more Chinese influence | Slightly more Chinese influence | Slightly more Chinese influence | Slightly more Chinese influence | Slightly more Chinese influence | Slightly more Chinese influence | Slightly more U.S. influence | Slightly more Chinese influence | Similar U.S. and Chinese influence | |
Economic opportunity | Significantly more Chinese influence | Significantly more Chinese influence | Significantly more Chinese influence | Significantly more Chinese influence | Significantly more Chinese influence | Significantly more Chinese influence | Slightly more Chinese influence | Significantly more Chinese influence | Significantly more Chinese influence | |
Threat perception of U.S. vs. China (economic) | Slightly more Chinese influence | Significantly more Chinese influence | Significantly more Chinese influence | Significantly more Chinese influence | Significantly more Chinese influence | Significantly more Chinese influence | Significantly more Chinese influence | Significantly more Chinese influence | Significantly more Chinese influence | |
Willingness to work with U.S. vs. China based on economic threat perceptions | Similar U.S. and Chinese influence | Similar U.S. and Chinese influence | Similar U.S. and Chinese influence | Similar U.S. and Chinese influence | Similar U.S. and Chinese influence | Similar U.S. and Chinese influence | Slightly more U.S. influence | Slightly more U.S. influence | Similar U.S. and Chinese influence | |
Military and security | ||||||||||
Threat perception of U.S. vs. China (military) | Slightly more Chinese influence | Significantly more Chinese influence | Slightly more Chinese influence | Slightly more Chinese influence | Similar U.S. and Chinese influence | Significantly more Chinese influence | Significantly more Chinese influence | Significantly more Chinese influence | Significantly more Chinese influence | |
Willingness to work with U.S. vs. China based on military threat perceptions | Slightly more U.S. influence | Slightly more U.S. influence | Slightly more U.S. influence | Slightly more U.S. influence | Similar U.S. and Chinese influence | Slightly more U.S. influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | Slightly more U.S. influence | |
Support for major U.S.-led security efforts | Significantly more U.S. influence | Slightly more U.S. influence | Similar U.S. and Chinese influence | Slightly more U.S. influence | Slightly more U.S. influence | Similar U.S. and Chinese influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | Slightly more U.S. influence | |
Military cooperation | Significantly more U.S. influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | Slightly more U.S. influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | |
U.S. vs. Chinese military capability | Significantly more U.S. influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | |
Perception of U.S. willingness to aid country in conflict vs. China | Slightly more U.S. influence | Slightly more U.S. influence | Similar U.S. and Chinese influence | Similar U.S. and Chinese influence | Similar U.S. and Chinese influence | Similar U.S. and Chinese influence | Slightly more U.S. influence | Significantly more U.S. influence | Similar U.S. and Chinese influence |
Overall, neither the United States nor China is clearly "winning" the competition for influence in the Indo-Pacific region as whole, and they have varying levels of influence across countries. U.S. influence is greater in Australia, India, Japan, the Philippines, and Singapore than in Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, and Vietnam.
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