A Republican president unveiled a new era of China-US relations.

Another Republican president put an end to that new era and unfolded a dramatically different one.

Since the beginning of the Cold War, Republicans have been known for their antipathy toward communism, and Richard Nixon’s staunch anti-communism helped to jumpstart his political career. But Nixon was more than a mundane politician; he was also a geopolitical strategist who had an acute understanding of international relations in his time. Throwing off his ideological straightjacket for a moment, Nixon reached out to China in order to balance against the USSR, which he perceived to be the biggest threat to US national security. His landmark visit to China in February 1972 set the two erstwhile enemies on a course of rapprochement, paving the way for more than four decades of rapidly increasing bilateral exchanges and cooperation.

To be fair, Donald Trump was not solely responsible for where the bilateral relationship stands now. Barack Obama initiated the high-profile rebalance to Asia near the end of his first term, ostensibly aimed at countering China’s fast-growing influence in the Asia-Pacific. Toward the end of his second term, there were already many signs—such as David Lampton’s “A Tipping Point in US-China Relations is Upon Us” and Michael Pilsbury’s “The Hundred Year Marathon”, both published in 2015—that relations between Beijing and Washington had embarked on a downturn trajectory.

But it was Trump who sent the already fraught relationship on a precipitous fall, by launching a full-scale trade war with China, limiting Chinese companies’ access to American technology, blaming Beijing for the global pandemic, closing the Chinese Consulate in Houston, imposing visa restrictions on Chinese journalists and students, and intensifying provocations on Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Xinjiang. And so far Joe Biden has largely carried on his predecessor’s China policy.

China was a valuable potential ally for Nixon, but a strategic competitor for Trump, who played the “China Card” in reverse. The two Republican presidents’ perceptions of and policies toward China were very different, not only because the two countries had changed so much, but also because the Republican Party had changed so much.

When Nixon arrived in Shanghai, China was poor, backward, and internationally isolated. On the eve of Trump’s election, by contrast, the Middle Kingdom had become the world’s second largest economy, the largest trading nation, the biggest creditor of Uncle Sam, and a consequential actor on a wide range of regional and global issues. In absolute terms America was—and still is—the world’s only super power, but its relative power had declined considerably against a rapidly rising China. This significant shift is widely viewed as the most important reason for the Trump administration’s sharp reversal of US-China policy.

Unlike Nixon, Trump is an atypical Republican. He reportedly had switched party affiliations at least five times since the 1980s. He ran for the Republican presidential nomination by running against the Republican establishment. He flouted the GOP’s free trade tradition by campaigning on a protectionist platform. He is truly a Republican in Name Only (RINO), a disparaging term Trump tossed at his critics. One study of the 2016 presidential election shows that Trump attracted strong support of the white working class, which accounted for about one third of both the American electorate and total Trump voters. Defined as those who do not have a college degree and whose annual household income falls below the median, the white working class used to be the cornerstone of the Democratic electoral coalition. Since the 1970s, however, they had been increasingly voting for Republicans in presidential elections, boasting an unprecedented 62 percent in 2016. This electoral realignment of the white working class had made it possible for a candidate as un-Republican as Trump to win the 2016 Republican primary handsomely and to eventually become the 45th president.

Though Trump is gone, his electoral base is not. Contrary to conventional wisdom, one study shows the white working class enthusiastically rallied around Trump not so much because of economic concerns as because of perceived racial and global status threats. In particular, a rapidly rising but racially different China is widely considered a threat to both America’s global dominance and whites’ racial dominance. Nixon probably would not have anticipated such an outcome of his China policy.

What is the future of China-US relations, then? Given their racial differences and assuming America’s continued relative decline, China will remain a major source of threat perceptions among a sizable proportion of Americans. Fundamental differences in political institutions and values will only make the perceived China threat even more salient. Nevertheless, the two great powers are not destined for war. Structural factors alone, both domestic and international, are not sufficient causes for war or peace. Rather, it is decision-makers’ perception and evaluation of structural factors that almost always play the decisive role.

We commemorate the 50th anniversary of Nixon’s ground-breaking visit at this critical juncture of China-US relations, in the hope that another president, Republican or Democratic, will demonstrate the same courage, vision, and statecraft that Nixon did. The bilateral relationship is too important—to both countries and to the rest of the world—to be hijacked by parochial ideologies, partisan interests, or racial resentment.

The author is professor and dean of the School of International Relations and Diplomacy at Beijing Foreign Studies University. The opinions expressed in this article reflect those of the author, not necessarily those of the People's Daily.