Join us for this timely installment of our popular Chat & Chowder series, featuring Stephen Roach, Senior Fellow at the Paul Tsai China Center at Yale Law School, renowned economic analyst, and Wall Street leader, to discuss an economic perspective on U.S.-China relations, notions of a trade war or tech war between the two countries, and more.

Chat & Chowder programs are an excellent opportunity to engage with expert speakers and to network with other globally-oriented participants in an informal environment. Each event features a presentation, audience Q&A, dedicated time for networking, and (of course!) a selection of chowders and beverages.

Stephen Roach is a Senior Fellow at the Paul Tsai China Center at Yale Law School. A rare combination of thought leadership on Wall Street and academia qualifies Stephen Roach as a leading practitioner of analytical macroeconomics. After thirty years at Morgan Stanley, mainly as the firm’s chief economist and eventually as the Hong Kong-based Chairman of Morgan Stanley Asia, he joined the Yale faculty in 2010 where he developed popular new courses — “The Next China” and “The Lessons of Japan.”

A forecaster by training in his early days as a Fed economist, Stephen Roach has long been mindful of the perils of historical extrapolation. As seen through that lens, his vision of the “Next China” offers a unique template for the exciting but daunting possibilities of China’s uncertain future. Roach’s focus on the US-China relationship is an outgrowth of the interplay between two major strands of his professional experience—as a leading US economist and an influential analyst of a rising China. His two most recent books—Accidental Conflict (2022) and Unbalanced (2014)—draw extensively on that focus.

Stephen Roach has a Ph.D. in economics from New York University and lives in New Canaan, CT.

The US-China conflict is an accident that wouldn’t have happened were it not for the false narratives that both America and China have embraced toward each other. For the United States, a massive trade deficit with China is the scapegoat, even though it is an outgrowth of America’s own shortfall of saving. For China, fears of containment by the United States are seen as an existential threat to its aspirations of prosperity, deflecting focus away from a consumer-led transformation of its economy.

America and China share one critical inclination: it is far easier to blame the other than to accept responsibility for their own shortcomings. This blame became the high-octane fuel of conflict. Over the short span of just four years, 2018 to 2021, America and China have entered a trade war, a tech war, and now the early skirmishes of a new Cold War.

In a hard-hitting analysis of America and China’s economies, politics, and policies, Roach posits that the false narratives on both sides, amplified by information distortion and social networks, are more a reflection of each nation’s exaggerated fears of the other than an honest self-assessment of problems of their own making.

Outlining the disastrous toll of conflict escalation between China and America, Accidental Conflict concludes with an innovative road map of conflict resolution that stands in sharp contrast to the failed approach that has taken the Sino-American clash to the breaking point. A new strategy is desperately needed—before it is too late.

WorldBoston’s Chat & Chowder series features key authors on international affairs in an engaging setting. In addition to discussion of a featured book (usually sold at a significant discount), the program offers the opportunity for discussion among members and guests – and of course a selection of chowders and beverages. This Chat & Chowder will be hosted in-person (from 6:00 to 7:30PM ET) and live-streamed to Zoom (from 6:15 to 7:15 PM ET only).