A TECH POWER TO RECKON WITH
China’s ascent to scientific dominance has been unparalleled.
Citing the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI), Nikkie Asia (15 Sep 23) claimed that China leads advanced technological research in 80 per cent of critical fields, including hypersonic and underwater drones. Out of the 23 technologies analysed by ASPI, China reportedly led in 19!
The Guardian of Great Britain (02 March 23) also spoke in the same vein when it claimedChina leads in 37 of 44 technologies tracked by ASPI.
The report of ASPI created ripples around the globe when it was released during the Raisina Dialogue in Delhi in 2023. Clearly, China and the U.S. were far ahead of the pack, with a small, second-tier group led by India and the UK, including South Korea, Germany, Australia, Italy, and Japan trailing them.
Even the Rand Corporation came out with a report last year that asserted that China had a 'stunning lead' in essential technologies.
Compiled from research papers submitted globally, China has given a keyhole view of the extent and depth of its research prowess, particularly in chemistry, physics, and materials science. Chinese researchers contribute to more papers in prestigious journals than their counterparts from the United States and the European Union, generating a greater volume of highly cited work. Tsinghua and Zhejiang universities each conduct as much pioneering research as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
The Chinese Communist Party and American security hawks concur that innovation is the key to achieving geopolitical, economic, and military superiority. President Xi Jinping aspires to science and technology to enable China to surpass the United States. In response, worried politicians in Washington are employing a combination of export controls and sanctions to prevent China from gaining a technological edge.
Rise of the Dragon
Chinese laboratories have some of the most advanced equipment, including supercomputers, ultra-high-energy detectors, and cryogenic electron microscopes. China also boasts a wealth of talent and is actively training scientists; more than twice as many of the world's top AI researchers received their first degree in China as in the United States.
More importantly, what is most notable is that China is integrating its national research and development programmes with the innovation systems of both domestic and international corporations. Faced with a narrow window of opportunity before transitioning into an ageing nation, China has swiftly mobilised its resources to achieve technological superpower status within the next few decades.
In this context, significant advances in higher education, human resources development, technology access through foreign direct investment (FDI), technology transfer, information and communication technology (ICT), space and defence technology, and corporate technology are being strategically leveraged.
The West, smug in their belief that the East can never match them, has been slow to recognise the rise of China as a tech giant. In 2003, America produced 20 times more high-impact scientific papers than China; by 2022, China had surpassed America and the European Union. When the Nature Index of contributions to articles in prestigious journals was launched in 2014, China's score was less than a third of America's. By 2023, China had reached the top. According to the Leiden Ranking of the volume of scientific research output, six of the world's top ten universities are now in China.
Writing for the Harvard Business Review (May-June 2021), Rana Mitter and Elsbeth Johnsonclaimed, “Believing that China's economic growth would have to be built on the same foundations as those in the West, many failed to envisage the Chinese State's continuing role as investor, regulator, and intellectual property owner […] China has also defied predictions that its authoritarianism would inhibit its capacity to innovate. It is a global leader in AI, biotech, and space exploration. Some of its technological successes have been driven by market forces: People wanted to buy goods or communicate more easily, and the likes of Alibaba and Tencent have helped them do just that. But much of the technological progress has come from a highly innovative and well-funded military.”
The hypothesis that scientific greatness necessitates freedom of thought will be tested through China's extensive science plans. China seeks recognition as a global power with a titanic economy, geopolitical influence, military strength, cultural soft power, a storied past, and a promising future. Science plays a crucial role in this ambition, viewed as a noble pursuit and an essential foundation for technological advancement.
China has not stinted from investing in research; R&D spending increased tenfold between 2000 and 2016. Since 1978, China has encouraged top students to study abroad and return with knowledge unavailable domestically. The Thousand Talents program, initiated in 2008, aims to attract top researchers back to China, significantly boosting the country's scientific capabilities. Domestic talent is also nurtured through programs like the Changjiang Scholars initiative, which identifies and supports promising researchers in provincial institutions.
In addition to practical applications, China is pursuing ambitious projects in space and particle physics. The China National Space Administration plans to build a larger space station and conduct crewed missions to the Moon. The National Space Science Centre is launching numerous scientific satellites. Furthermore, China aims to construct the world's largest particle accelerator, reflecting its serious commitment to advancing in this prestigious field.Earlier this month, China's Chang'e-6 robotic spacecraft landed in a gigantic crater on the far side of the Moon, collected rock samples, planted a Chinese flag, and set off back towards Earth. It was the first mission to bring back samples from this hard-to-reach side of the Moon.
China also leads in quantum mechanics applications to computation and cryptography and has made significant strides in artificial intelligence and biology. The BGI, formerly the Beijing Genomics Institute, is a major player in genetic research and precision medicine, with extensive investments in genome sequencing and translational medicine.
Setting the Right Priority
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has prioritised agricultural research, viewing it as crucial for ensuring the country's food security. Over the past decade, the quality and quantity of crop research produced in China have established the nation as a leader in the field.
China now leads the world in other benchmarks that are less susceptible to manipulation. It tops the Nature Index, created by the publisher of the same name, which counts contributions to articles appearing in prestigious journals. To be selected for publication, papers must be approved by a panel of peer reviewers who assess the study's quality, novelty, and potential impact. When the index was first launched in 2014, China ranked second, with its contribution to eligible papers being less than a third of America's. By 2023, China had achieved the top position.
According to the Leiden Ranking of Scientific Research Output Volume, six Chinese universities or institutions are now in the world's top ten, and seven, according to the Nature Index. While they may not yet be household names in the West, institutions like Shanghai Jiao Tong, Zhejiang, and Peking (Beida) Universities are gaining recognition alongside Cambridge, Harvard, and ETH Zurich. "Tsinghua is now the number one science and technology university in the world," says Simon Marginson, a professor of higher education at Oxford University. "That's amazing. They've done that in a generation."
According to the Nature Index and citation measures, China leads the world in the physical sciences, chemistry, and Earth and environmental sciences. However, America and Europe still maintain substantial leads in general biology and medical sciences. "Engineering is the ultimate Chinese discipline in the modern period," says Professor Marginson. "I think that's partly about military technology and partly because that's what you need to develop a nation."
Applied research is a notable strength for China. The country dominates publications on perovskite solar panels, which have the potential to be far more efficient than conventional silicon cells at converting sunlight into electricity. Chinese chemists have developed a new method to extract hydrogen from seawater using a specialised membrane to separate pure water, which can then be split by electrolysis. In May 2023, it was announced that Chinese scientists, collaborating with a state-owned energy company, had developed a pilot floating hydrogen farm off the country's southeastern coast.
China also now produces more patents than any other country, although many are for incremental design improvements rather than truly original inventions. New developments tend to spread and be adopted more slowly in China than in the West. However, its strong industrial base, combined with cheap energy, allows for rapidly scaling up large-scale production of physical innovations like materials. "That's where China really has an advantage over Western countries," says Jonathan Bean, CEO of Materials Nexus, a British firm that uses AI to discover new materials.
Double-Edged Sword
While China surpassed the U.S. in the number of scientific papers published in 2016, concerns about the quality and integrity of some of these works persist. Since most non-Chinese readers must peruse translated works, much could be lost in translations. There are also cases of Chinese researchers failing to adhere to the ethical standards expected by Western scientists.
China's science system is inextricably linked with its State and armed forces—many Chinese universities have labs explicitly working on defence, and several have been accused of engaging in espionage or cyber-attacks.
China has also been accused of intellectual property theft, and increasingly stringent regulations have made it more difficult for international collaborators to take data out of the country. Notoriously, in 2019, the country cut off access to American-funded work on coronaviruses at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.
In America and Europe, political pressure is limiting collaborations with China. In March, America's Science and Technology Agreement with China, which allows scientists from both countries to collaborate, was quietly renewed for only six months. Although Beijing appears keen to renew the 45-year-old agreement, many Republicans fear collaboration with China will help the country achieve its national security goals.
Except for environmental and climate projects in Europe, Chinese universities have been effectively barred from accessing funding through the Horizon programme, a huge European research initiative.
In response, China is turning inwards. The country has explicit aims to become self-reliant in many areas of science and technology and shift away from international publications to measure research output.
The Way Forward
The overwhelming opinion of scientists in China and the West is that collaboration must continue or increase. And there is room to do more.
Though China’s science output has grown dramatically, the share that is conducted with international collaborators has remained stable at around 20 per cent. Western scientists tend to collaborate more internationally.
Western researchers could also pay more attention to the newest science from China. Data from a study published last year in Nature Human Behaviour showed that Chinese scientists cite Western papers far more than vice versa for work of equivalent quality. Western scientists rarely visit, work or study in China, depriving them of opportunities to learn from Chinese colleagues in the way Chinese scientists have done so well in the West.
Several notable successes have come from working together, too. During the COVID-19 pandemic, a joint venture between Oxford University's Engineering Department and the Oxford Suzhou Centre for Advanced Research developed a rapid COVID test used across British airports. In 2015, researchers at the University of Cardiff and South China Agricultural University identified a gene that made bacteria resistant to the antibiotic colistin. Following this, China, the biggest consumer of the drug, banned its use in animal feed, and levels of colistin resistance in both animals and humans declined.
Assessment
"The old science world order, dominated by America, Europe, and Japan, is coming to an end," declared The Economist magazine. While it may be premature to reach such a conclusion, as the reality is more complex than the magazine's assertion, this report reminds the Western world that China's progress in scientific research cannot be ignored.
China’s steady rise in investments in R&D and innovation
should serve as a reminder
that
the race for tech supremacy is a marathon, not a sprint.
C
onsistent
investment over the years, backed by the State's directions, has resulted in dramatic
developments and pioneering success for China in key science and technology
sectors. This is a lesson for India.
Rivalries in science have mirrored geopolitical tensions over time. Many U.S. business organisations and individuals have raised concerns and doubts since the United States attempted to force a "decoupling" of the American and Chinese technology ecosystems. This reflects Washington's anxiety and lack of confidence in the face of China's rise
.
China should be prepared for a prolonged
tech
conflict.
