As AI technologies become increasingly sophisticated, the United States and China are vying to win this technology competition. Both countries have different approaches and strengths in their development, deployment, and regulation of AI – the United States is recognized as leading in advanced AI development and China in industrial AI integration. Although perceptions of AI differ between people, companies, and the government in the United States and China, a shared anxiety exists among both populations over the effects this technology will have on their lives.
Yi-Ling Liu joined us on June 10, 2026 to share similarities and differences between the ways people in the United States and China view AI and who the narrative of a U.S.-China AI race neglects.
Further reading: Yi-Ling Liu’s recent book The Wall Dancers: Searching For Freedom and Connection on the Chinese Internet traces the evolution of the Chinese internet, following entrepreneurs, activists, and artists as they navigate surveillance and censorship within the Great Firewall. Liu draws on years of firsthand reporting and interviews in China to examine online subcultures, shifting state policies, and tech innovations over the last three decades
Yi-Ling Liu
Yi-Ling Liu is a writer & editor covering Chinese society and technology. Her work has been published in The New York Times Magazine, Harper’s Magazine, WIRED & The New Yorker. She was previously the China Editor at Rest of World. She was New America Fellow, a recipient of the Matthew Power Literary Reporting Award, & an Overseas Press Club Foundation Scholar. She is currently based in London, as a journalist-in-residence at the Tarbell Center for AI Journalism.