America's Great-Power Opportunity: How Strategic Competition Can Revitalize U.S. Foreign Policy

It has become axiomatic in Washington to contend that U.S. foreign policy must adapt to an era of renewed "great-power competition." The United States went on a quarter-century strategic detour after the Cold War, the argument goes, basking in triumphalism in the 1990s and getting bogged down in the Middle East in the 2000s. Now it finds itself on the defensive, with China and Russia increasingly challenging its influence across the globe and undercutting the order it has led since the end of World War II. How should it respond to these two formidable authoritarian powers?In this timely intervention, Ali Wyne offers the first detailed critique of "great-power competition," warning that a foreign policy anchored in that now-ubiquitous construct could place the United States in a perpetually defensive, reactive mode. He exhorts Washington to find a middle ground between complacence and consternation, selectively contesting Beijing and Moscow but not allowing their decisions to determine its own course. Analyzing a resurgent China, a disruptive Russia, and a deepening Sino-Russian entente in depth, Wyne explains how the United States can seize the "great-power opportunity" at hand: to manage all three phenomena confidently while renewing itself at home and abroad.