China and the United States have entered a multifaceted cold war: trade, high tech, space, defense, environment and values as they jostle for influence throughout the world. This rivalry between the world's top two economic powers will likely dominate the decades to come and its outcome is uncertain. After the American century, this new century may indeed be China's, or it may not. With Joe Biden's election as president of the United States, we are certainly in for a change of leadership style. But in terms of substance, US policy towards China is likely to remain tough. How will Beijing react? What strengths and weaknesses does China have in this long struggle for supremacy against the United States? This book analyzes the different aspects of this disconcerting rivalry that has had, and will continue to have, an impact on our daily lives. The coronavirus pandemic has further exposed the failings of a monolithic Chinese system that does not tolerate freedom of expression but it has also, paradoxically, placed China in a position of strength against the United States.

China and the United States have entered a multifaceted cold war: trade, high tech, space, defense, environment and values as they jostle for influence throughout the world. This rivalry between the world's top two economic powers will likely dominate the decades to come and its outcome is uncertain. After the American century, this new century may indeed be China's, or it may not. With Joe Biden's election as president of the United States, we are certainly in for a change of leadership style. But in terms of substance, US policy towards China is likely to remain tough. How will Beijing react? What strengths and weaknesses does China have in this long struggle for supremacy against the United States? This book analyzes the different aspects of this disconcerting rivalry that has had, and will continue to have, an impact on our daily lives. The coronavirus pandemic has further exposed the failings of a monolithic Chinese system that does not tolerate freedom of expression but it has also, paradoxically, placed China in a position of strength against the United States.

During the 1970s, the editors supported the founding of research in this area at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis and the Austrian chair at Stanford University in California. Their tasks are to promote Austrian and Central European studies among professors and students of their host nation. This anthology contains not only a description of the institution's activities in the academic year 2008/2009, but also the working papers of ten of their present PhD students. Their research covers a period from the nineteenth century to the present.

Arnold Suppan is a professor at the University of Vienna, Institute for Eastern European History.

Richard Lein is a university assistant at the University of Vienna, Institute for Eastern European History.