Writing in the Washington Post on August 23, 2018, China's Tsinghua University Professor Yan Xuetong observed that U.S.-China trade tensions this year have bolstered protectionist forces in both countries that support a tit-for-tat trade war, posing a serious threat to China’s development. Recalling that since the 'opening up' in 1978, China’s rise has been inextricably linked to globalization, he said for China to realize its goal of general prosperity it must maintain and strengthen that link. Emphasising that the successful rise of a major power requires constant adjustment and continuous reforms and that exposing policymakers to other nations’ development achievements enables them to devise policies that address defects in their own countries, he argued that China needs to attract as much world-class talent as possible to strengthen innovation. He said "the closed environment of the Cultural Revolution, for example, prevented an objective understanding of how the outside world was developing, resulting in a mistaken belief that class struggle was the way to modernization". Because of this China missed out on strategic opportunities to help the nation rise for ten years. As examples, he said the opening up of higher education forced Chinese universities to compete with foreign universities to attract and retain top faculty and encouraged the Chinese government to formulate an education reform plan in 1998 for building world-class universities. Similarly, the U.S. decision to sanction computer chip supplies to the China's ZTE bolstered China’s resolve to strengthen its scientific research. He said "there is now newfound motivation for the government to encourage technological innovation and for enterprises to strengthen independent research and development capability". He added that clashing domestic and foreign policies will prevent a rising nation from expanding its national interests worldwide. Asserting that "as a rising nation’s international interests grow in speed and scale, the vulnerabilities of interdependence decrease and the security of its overseas interests increase. Similarly, the more open a state is, the more opportunities it has to enter foreign markets and seek alternatives. If there is reciprocal opening up, the rising state would have larger relative benefits than other countries due to its larger overseas interests. But with reciprocal closing up, the rising state would have more to lose". He concluded that "whether it’s overcoming the trade spat with the United States or other obstacles, China’s rise can only be guaranteed by continuing to open up". He quoted Xi jinping as saying that “the more developed China becomes, the more open it will be” and said "how much the Chinese government turns this into practice will decide the fate of China’s national rejuvenation".
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