Not Yet the End of Transnational Digital Capitalism: A Communication Perspective of the U.S.–China Decoupling Rhetoric

Abstract

The interlinks of ICT industries between the United States and the People’s Republic of China reveal the complexity of the U.S.–China decoupling rhetoric, seen here from a critical political economy approach. The highly interdependent and symbiotic value chain between these two countries throughout hardware production, software provision, and capital investments may pose challenges to the decoupling motif. Also proposed is the concept of financialization of ICTs as a foundational mode of reproduction in the contemporary global political economy, where the United States and China are the two most active and engaged actors. Whereas decoupling is neither inevitable nor foreordained, complexity and uncertainty persist in terms of how both nations respond to crises.