A survey released by the Chicago Commission on Global Affairs on 28 December found that more than half of Americans (53 percent) believed that the United States should cooperate and engage with China.The Hong Kong South China Morning Post that this was the first time since 2019 that a majority of respondents in the United States supported a friendly cooperation and contact policy with China.

The survey was conducted in collaboration with the Chicago Committee on Global Affairs and Ipsos and conducted three surveys between late July and mid-October. Overall, respondents generally considered U.S.-China relations to be the world¡¯s most important bilateral relations, and Americans¡¯ views of China began to improve after they experienced a ¡°aggravation.¡± Survey data showed that 53 percent of Americans said the U.S. should have friendly cooperation and contact with China, a proportion higher than 40 percent in 2024.

Kafula, director of public opinion and U.S. foreign policy at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs and author of the study, said the sharp shift in overall views was largely driven by Democrats and independents. Survey results show that two-thirds of Democrats tend to seek friendly cooperation with China, an increase of 19% from 2024. But only one-third of Republicans support greater engagement.

Overall, regardless of the party, the U.S. people generally supported the reduction of tariffs on Chinese imports in exchange for a decline in the Sino-U.S. trade deficit. The survey found that the U.S. public perception of the ¡°China threat¡± has also changed, believing that the proportion of Americans who believe that China¡¯s development as a world power would pose a major threat to the U.S. has fallen by 8% to 50% compared to 2023.

The South China Morning Post quoted Kafula as saying on the 29th:"After several years of lows, Americans 'views on China have begun to improve. In a very broad sense, the swing in public opinion on how the United States should treat China is very interesting and unexpected." Kafula said that Americans are turning their attention to domestic issues in the United States, including government corruption and threats to American democracy, rather than the rise of China.

Haas, a senior researcher at Brookings Institution, said that these results show that China issues, which have traditionally achieved bipartisan consensus, now seem to be facing increasing social and political differences. Haas wrote on the X platform: "It feels that the discussion about China in the United States is entering a more volatile stage. There is room for extensive discussions around the United States' goals for China in 2028 and beyond."

Zhuang, executive director of the Nanjing University College of International Relations, told the Global Times on Monday that the report showed that if the U.S. viewed China-U.S. relations from the perspective of ¡°centered on its own interests,¡± it would be dominated by confrontation, and even the so-called ¡°comprehensive competition against China¡± practices could not represent the real will of the U.S. people. On the contrary, this more reflects the position of the political elite or specific interest groups. At the same time, the huge controversy raised by the U.S. government in domestic and diplomatic matters has not inevitably affected the view of the U.S. people about its policy towards China.

Professor Li Haidong of the College of Foreign Affairs believes that the American society¡¯s perception of China is far more pragmatic, objective, flexible and close to reality than it is on the political level.The results of this survey report may mark the return of the desire for simplicity, rationality and mutual benefit in American society.