Rising concerns over Chinese influence and restrictions on U.S. scholars in China

40 For their part, American universities and US scholars have also engaged in China during this period, although in far fewer—but not insignificant—numbers. (For example, in 2015-2016, 11,688 American students and scholars were studying in China.)° For those in the field of Chinese studies, it is de rigueur to study and do research in Chinese universities. Professional collaboration among faculty—mainly in the sciences and medicine—has also flourished. Some US universities—notably Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (Hopkins-Nanjing Center), New York University (NYU-Shanghai), and Duke University (Duke-Kunshan)—have gone so far as to establish campuses in China, while others have opened centers (e.g., Stanford, Virginia, Chicago, Yale, Harvard, Columbia). Many more American universities have forged collaborative exchange programs with Chinese counterparts. While US-China exchanges in higher education have primarily been a success story, as in many other dimensions of the Sino-American relationship, clouds have appeared on the horizon.’ American students have become less keen than in the past to study in China due to concerns about pollution, lack of open internet access, and expanding political controls. American scholars trying to conduct research in China have run into an increasing number of restrictions and impediments since 2010, due to a broad campaign against “foreign hostile forces” and an increasingly draconian political atmosphere that has cast a shadow across Chinese society, especially over higher education. Whole subject areas and regions of the country are now off-limits to American and other foreign scholars for fieldwork; previously normal interactions with Chinese scholars are now often heavily circumscribed; many Chinese scholars have become reluctant to meet with American counterparts; a growing number of libraries are off-limits; central-level archives have been closed, and provincial; municipal archives are increasingly restricted; interviews with government officials (at all levels) are more difficult to arrange; public opinion surveys must be carried out with Chinese partners, if they can be conducted at all; simple eyewitness social research in rural and, even some urban areas, is considerably more limited than previously. In short, normal scholarly research practices permitted elsewhere in the world are regularly proscribed in China. These restrictions also include the inability to hold open and uncensored public scholarly discussions, conferences, and other kinds of events. Meanwhile, Chinese students and scholars enjoy unimpeded access to all of these activities in the United States, resulting in a severe asymmetry in Sino-American scholarly exchange. This contravenes the spirit of the bilateral US-China educational exchange accords. At the same time, storm clouds are also gathering on American campuses with respect to another aspect of this important relationship, namely, growing concerns about unfair Chinese “influence-seeking activities” in the United States. Universities HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_020499