Who can you count on when the chips are down? Transatlantic cooperation when confronting China

In the past five years or so, the EU’s trade policy (broadly understood) has pivoted from a commitment to efficiency and competitiveness to concerns about resilience and security. One driver of that shift has been the gradual hardening of European perceptions of China, from seeing China only as an opportunity to perceiving it as a competitor and, increasingly, a rival. Europeans’ perceptions of China as a threat have changed more slowly than and still lag those of the US. Differing threat perceptions pose challenges to transatlantic cooperation with respect to managing geoeconomic cooperation, competition, and conflict with China. This paper will analyse those tensions with respect to two policies that have analytically useful similarities and differences: dual-use export controls on cutting-edge semiconductors and restrictions on the provision of critical 5G telecommunications infrastructure. While both issues concern advanced technologies, export controls are an offensive measure intended to constrain Chinese capabilities and limits on participation in 5G networks are defensive, seeking to restrict China’s ability to extract information or disrupt activity. Both issues involved degrees of US coercion and the burden of cooperation has fallen on Europe. Semiconductors are an example of strong convergence with the one member state that matters, the Netherlands. Cooperation with respect to 5G is mixed. The European Commission’s 5G "toolbox" proposed steps to mitigate security risks and some member states have restricted Chinese companies, but others have not. There is thus variation in the degree of transatlantic cooperation between the issue areas and across member states.