Tai Ming Cheung

The Chinese Defense Economy's Long March from Imitation to Innovation

Abstract Chinas defense economy has been vigorously developing a comprehensive set of innovation capabilities that will eventually allow it to join the worlds top tier of military technological powers. Chinas target is to catch up by 2020. Although this maybe possible in a few select areas, the defense economy as a whole will likely require another decade or more to successfully master the ability to produce major innovations of a radical nature. This paper analyzes the key areas in the Chinese defense economys gradual but accelerating shift from imitation to indigenous innovation.

Dragon on the Horizon: China's Defense Industrial Renaissance

Abstract Chinas grand ambition is to become a world-class military industrial power by 2020, but can it succeed? A concerted restructuring of the defense industry is taking place to tackle deep-seated obstacles constraining its ability to absorb, create and diffuse technological innovation. This includes promoting competition and creativity by reducing the reach of the state and encouraging enterprises to play a leading role, developing a robust regulatory and standards regime to provide benchmarks and rules, and forging integration between the civilian and military portions of the economy through spin-ons.

China's Emergence as a Defense Technological Power: Introduction

China is beginning to flex its expanding military and strategic clout in the pursuit of its broadening national security interests. At the same time, the country’s economic and technology policies have also become more nationalistic, state-centered, and ambitious. The reasons behind this adjustment from a previously accommodating posture, why it has occurred across different policy areas, and whether it is a temporary phenomenon or the beginning of a more deep-seated strategic shift are not yet well understood. Important drivers appear to be at play. Powerful political and policy dynamics include surging nationalistic sentiment, leadership competition ahead of the 18th Chinese Communist Party Congress in 2012, and a more confident policy elite seeking to accelerate China’s relative rise in the international order in the wake of the 2008 global economic crisis. More structural explanations point to weak authority at the top that allows powerful bureaucracies such as the military and science and technology (S&T) apparatus to pursue their own interests, which may not always align with national priorities. It will take some time before the overall nature and direction of change in China’s grand strategy can be determined. In the defense technological realm, the development path is more visible. China’s defense economy has set its sights on catching up with the West by the beginning of the 2020s and is making steady progress in building up its innovation capabilities, although this is presently in the form of incremental and sustaining types of activities. More highend, disruptive forms of innovation that would lead to major breakthroughs are likely to be beyond China’s reach for another five to ten years, although there may be exceptions in high-priority areas, such as space or aviation, that enjoy access to ample funding, foreign knowledge and technologies, and leadership support. The Journal of Strategic Studies Vol. 34, No. 3, 295–297, June 2011

Innovation in China’s Defense Technology Base: Foreign Technology and Military Capabilities

ABSTRACT China’s defense science, technology, and industrial system has been undergoing a far-reaching transformation over the past two decades and the single biggest factor behind this turnaround is the role of external technology and knowledge transfers and the defense industry’s improving ability to absorb these inputs and convert into localized output. China is pursuing an intensive campaign to obtain defense and dual-use civil–military foreign technology transfers using a wide variety of means, which is explored in this article.

Trade Versus Security: How Countries Balance Technology Transfers with China

Apart from a short period in the 1980s, the Peoples Republic of China has been almost completely excluded from access to military and sensitive dual-use civilian-military technologies from the United States and its allies. But in an era of globalization and convergence in the civilian and military technological domains, this compartmentalization of the economic and security arenas has become increasingly difficult to maintain and justify. Major trading countries are caught in the dilemma of balancing restrictions on high technology and other sensitive trade and investment with China against the benefits of deeper ties with the worlds second-largest economy. In examining the trade-offs between economics and national security for the United States, the European Union, Israel, and Japan, it becomes clear that Chinas rise and growing economic and strategic influence introduce new complexities and challenges for controlling militarily relevant technology and knowledge transfers.