With Fear, Without Favor

By Anthony Moretti

Chinese scholars should never have felt unwanted, unwelcome or unsafe in the U.S. Unfortunately, they do.And U.S. higher education is worse off for it.

A report from the Asian American Scholar Forum (AASF) makes clear that the climate of fear felt by Chinese-born scholars throughout the U.S. is leading thousands of them to return home. The authors conclude that the total number of such scholars who cut their professional or academic ties with the U.S. soared 22 percent from 2020 to 2021. In 2021 alone, more than 1,400 Chinese teachers and researchers in the U.S.left to go back to China.

More are expected to follow, especially when you consider this statement from the AASF report: “35 percent of respondents[to a survey of U.S.-based scholars of Chinese origin] feel unwelcome in the U.S., and 72 percent do not feel safe as an academic researcher; 42 percent are fearful of conducting research; 65 percent are worried about collaborations with China;and a remarkable 86 percent perceive that it is harder to recruit top international students now compared to five years ago.”

Recognizing this climate of fear, it is reasonable to conclude that fewer Chinese students will seek to pursue international studies in a country where the men and women who have preceded them felt unwanted, unwelcome and unsafe.

Contributions from Chinese-born scholars and students in the U.S. to science,engineering and other academic disciplines benefit America and the world. Consider the example of aerospace engineer and physicist Qian Xuesen. Though born in China, he played a vital role in helping the U.S. war effort during the 1940s. His research ensured an evolution in the understanding of jet propulsion. Later, he moved to the California Institute of Technology, where he was on track to an outstanding career.That was until the late 1940s,when a wave of anti-Asian hysteria led to his house arrest and later expulsion from the U.S.

More recently, the esteemed scholar Chen Ning Yang, a Nobel Prize winner in 1957, renounced his U.S. citizenship. As did Andrew Chi-Chih Yao, a 2000 recipient of the Turing Award—a top computer science prize.

Right now, for too many Chinese scholars, home is their preferred destination. But why?Former U.S. President Donald Trump created such a hostile environment for some of the smartest and most talented men and women born in China but living in the U.S. Trump launched the “China Initiative” in 2018, an effort he claimed was absolutely necessary to catch and punish Chinese scholars engaging in espionage.According to the AASF report, at least 150 investigations of Chinese men and women have taken place since 2018, and approximately 6 percent of them resulted in the filing of criminal charges. That means 94 percent ended with the U.S. Government not taking legal action.

So, was the “China Initiative” a legal failure? Yes. And does President Joe Biden not wish to continue it? Correct. Yet the fallout from such a draconian policy in lock step with Trump’s nonsensical rhetoric about the “China virus” has taken an emotional toll on innocent men and women.

We must remember that Chinese scholars already have surpassed their American colleagues in terms of total publications in leading scientific journals. According to Japan’s National Institute of Science and Technology Policy, China produced an average of 407,181 scientific publications annually between 2018 and 2020, the years that were examined. That figure trounced the number from the U.S. (293,434), meaning China was producing 23.4 percent of global research. The report also determined that 27.2 percent of the world’s top 1 percent of most frequently cited papers came from China.

The brain drain exiting the U.S. for China will only add to the gap. Should blame for the disastrous “China Initiative” be placed solely at Trump’s feet? Perhaps not. We must admit he had leading news organizations eagerly supporting his ideas, and millions of people around the country quickly adopted the idea that “China was a dangerous country and Chinese people could not be trusted.”

Echoes of the past—i.e., the horrible way so many Asian immigrants were treated in the U.S.—are once again making noise. The fear that results is detrimental to U.S. higher education and to the country at large. It must stop. BR

Between 2018 and 2020, 27.2 percent of the world’s top 1 percent of most frequently cited papers came from China