What’s Changing in the U.S.-China Relationship?
Key takeaways from UC San Diego’s 2026 China Forum offer insight into AI competition, economic ties and the forces reshaping relations between the two countries
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Whether the U.S.-China relationship is entering a new phase was the question at the center of the 2026 China Forum at the University of Calfiornia San Diego.
A new set of key takeaways from the forum explores several forces shaping the U.S.-China relationship, including artificial intelligence competition, economic interdependence and the challenge of managing strategic competition alongside sustained engagement.
The takeaways draw on three days of exchange among more than 80 leaders from academia, business, government, media, the military and think tanks Aug. 4–7. Held under the Chatham House Rule, allowing for candid conversation without individual attribution, the forum produced a synthesis of points of convergence and debate, rather than consensus, formal recommendations or an institutional position.
Among the key takeaways:
- The AI competition between China and the U.S. is becoming a race over diffusion and resilience. Frontier-model performance is only one arena. Adoption, global distribution and each society’s ability to absorb disruption matters as much.
- Economic interdependence is simultaneously a vulnerability and a source of competitiveness.
- Strategic competition is dynamic and involves both friction and sustained engagement.
- The United States’ central challenge is not a lack of strategic assets, but its inability to convert them into sustained advantage.
Read the full "2026 China Forum Key Takeaways."
Launched in 2019, the UC San Diego Forum on U.S.-China Relations is an ongoing bipartisan platform focused exclusively on the U.S.-China relationship. The 2026 forum centered on the theme “Towards a New Paradigm? The Uncertain Future of U.S.-China Relations,” beginning with China’s internal political, economic and technological dynamics before turning to implications for U.S. policy and the broader international system.
Susan Shirk, founding director of the 21st Century China Center, talks with forum participants.
Lei Guang, at left, So Family Executive Director of the 21st Century China Center, and Director Margaret "Molly" Roberts.
China Forum 2026 session: One of many in three days of exchange on the U.S.-China relationship.
As part of the forum, Harvard Kennedy School professor Graham Allison delivered the forum's public lecture – the 2026 Susan Shirk Lecture on U.S.-China Relations, moderated by Margaret Roberts, director of the 21st Century China Center.
On the Record: Can the U.S. and China build a stable great-power relationship?
UCTV video filmed by QI Events and Media Production.
Harvard's Graham Allison delivered the China Forum's public lecture.
A rapt crowd took in Allison's talk.
Learn more about the 21st Century China Center at UC San Diego.
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