This follows high-level China-US trade talks restarting after a November 1 Trump-Xi telephone conversation, November 6’s US midterm elections that delivered a Democrat-majority House of Representatives from January 2019 and US-China trade-related frictions at the APEC Summit (November 15-17) preventing a joint communique’s immediate release. These frictions have sparked fears of a US-China ‘trade war’, or worse, and what scenarios and drivers might see this avoided.
China may eye further trade renegotiations with the next US president, from 2021 or 2025.
Democrats would want any trade deal to include human rights and environmental protections; Beijing would certainly resist the former.
China might offer intellectual property concessions on paper, since there are multiple ways to circumvent such restrictions.
Trump could sell a ‘partial’ deal politically, but he may calculate that ‘China-the-adversary’ rhetoric will win more 2020 votes.
