National Identity and Strategic Competition: The Logic of Identity Politics in the U.S.-China Tech War

DOI

10.2991/978-2-38476-609-3_59How to use a DOI?

Keywords

National identity; Strategic competition; U.S.-China relations

Abstract

This article explores how national identity narratives shape the framing and escalation of U.S.-China technological rivalry. Current studies have primarily interpreted this rivalry through material and strategic lenses, and emphasize power transition, national security, industrial policy, and economic coercion. These approaches indeed offer great insights; however, they do not fully explain how technology is incorporated into broader narratives of national purpose, historical mission, and legitimate international role. In order to address this gap, this article will conduct a case study, with the qualitative comparative method, and with discourse analysis, which will focus on official U.S. and Chinese documents produced between 2018 and 2025. The analysis shows that the United States treats technological leadership as a core requirement to global leadership and national security, while China frames technological self-reliance as the foundation to national rejuvenation and autonomy. This article argues that these competing identity narratives intensify the rivalry, as they are transforming technological competition into a bigger struggle over status and legitimacy. This article, therefore, contributes to the literature by showing that U.S.-China technological rivalry could be understood not only through material and strategic explanations, but also through identity-based narratives, which give it deeper symbolic and political force.

Copyright

© 2026 The Author(s)

Open Access

Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

Download article (PDF)

TY  - CONF
AU  - Jinglin Zhang
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/09/04
TI  - National Identity and Strategic Competition: The Logic of Identity Politics in the U.S.-China Tech War
BT  - Proceedings of the 2026 3rd International Conference on Public Relations and Media Communication (PRMC 2026)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 555
EP  - 563
SN  - 2352-5398
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-2-38476-609-3_59
DO  - 10.2991/978-2-38476-609-3_59
ID  - Zhang2026
ER  -