Tuesday, May 20, 2025 | 4:45 PM EDT
At a time of heightened tension and strategic recalibration, the U.S.-China relationship is undergoing significant change as the Trump Administration announces high tariffs on Chinese goods and trade and investment restrictions while also signaling that President Trump may be open to negotiations. Sino-American competition is intensifying across economic, political, and technological realms, and opportunities for collaboration to tackle global issues such as AI governance, climate change, and public health remain elusive. From debates over trade and industrial policy to diverging visions of the global order, the world’s two largest powers are navigating a period of profound uncertainty.
Join Alison Friedman, Andrew Polk, and Jessica Chen Weiss at 4:45 p.m. on May 20 for the National Committee’s annual Members’ Program as they and NCUSCR President Stephen Orlins discuss the state of the U.S.-China relationship from cultural, economic and trade, and political perspectives.
Register to attend in-person:
The in-person event will take place at The Ford Foundation Center for Social Justice in NYC.
Register to attend virtually:
Speakers
Alison M. Friedman
Alison M. Friedman has been the James and Susan Moeser Executive and Artistic Director for Carolina Performing Arts (CPA) at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill since 2021; she lived and worked in China for the previous 20 years.
Prior to CPA, Ms. Friedman was artistic director of performing arts for the Hong Kong West Kowloon Cultural District, one of the world’s largest arts and cultural developments. Previously she founded and ran Ping Pong Productions, a U.S.- and Beijing-registered cultural exchange organization that worked in more than 50 countries on five continents. Her productions have toured Lincoln Center, the Sydney Opera House, the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, China’s National Centre for the Performing Arts, Shanghai International Arts Festival, and other leading venues and festivals.
She was a 2002-03 Fulbright scholar to China and a John F. Kennedy Center arts management fellow. She is an NCUSCR Public Intellectuals Program fellow.
Andrew Polk
Andrew Polk is a co-founder and the head of economic research at Trivium China, a strategic advisory firm. Before founding Trivium, he was the China director at Medley Global Advisors, where he advised asset managers and hedge funds on developments in China’s economy and financial markets
Previously, Mr. Polk was the resident China economist at The Conference Board’s China Center in Beijing, where he conducted economic analysis on the Chinese economy for corporate clients
He is the co-author of The Long, Soft Fall in Chinese Growth and maintains a deep network of professional contacts in the official, academic, and business communities in China built over a decade of living in China and working on China issues.
Mr. Polk holds an MA in economics and international relations from Johns Hopkins SAIS and a BA in American studies, communication, and religious studies from Texas A & M University. He is an NCUSCR Public Intellectuals Program fellow.
Jessica Chen Weiss
Jessica Chen Weiss is the David M. Lampton Professor of China Studies at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies and nonresident senior fellow at the Asia Society Policy Institute Center for China Analysis. From 2021 to 2022, she served as senior advisor to the Policy Planning Staff at the U.S. State Department on a Council on Foreign Relations fellowship for tenured international relations scholars. She previously held positions at Cornell and Yale.
Dr. Weiss is the author of Powerful Patriots: Nationalist Protest in China’s Foreign Relations. Her research appears in International Organization, China Quarterly, International Studies Quarterly, Journal of Conflict Resolution, Security Studies, Journal of Contemporary China, and Review of International Political Economy. and her commentary in many media outlets. She was profiled by the New Yorker and named one of Prospect Magazine’s Top Thinkers for 2024.
Dr. Weiss is a Public Intellectuals Program fellow and a member of the NCUSCR board of directors.