The United States and China are diverging in their approach to Southeast Asian regional expertise, creating a significant asymmetry in how each power perceives the region. While Washington is dismantling long-standing university-based area studies programs due to funding cuts, Beijing is institutionalizing “country and regional studies” as a state-backed academic discipline. This shift impacts how both nations formulate policy, with the U.S. risking a loss of deep, on-the-ground knowledge and China potentially prioritizing state-aligned narratives over independent analysis.
Why is the U.S. dismantling its regional expertise?
The U.S. knowledge ecosystem for Southeast Asia is struggling under a fragile funding model that relies heavily on federal support. According to reports on academic policy, the sudden termination of federal Title VI funding in 2025 has forced major institutions to scale back or shutter essential programs. For instance, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill has closed all six of its area studies centers, including the Carolina Asia Center. Similarly, the University of Washington has been forced to scramble for emergency funding just to keep its Khmer language program—one of only seven in the entire country—from shutting down.
Did you know? The U.S. model for regional expertise historically relied on Title VI National Resource Centers, which were designed during the Cold War to support language instruction and research vital to national strategic needs.
How is China scaling its regional research?
China has adopted a top-down, state-directed approach to academic research, elevating “country and regional studies” (区域国别学) to a first-level graduate discipline in 2022. By 2025, the subject was officially added to China’s undergraduate major catalogue. According to official state narratives, the goal is to produce practical, interdisciplinary research that aligns with diplomatic and economic priorities. China now hosts over 300 research institutes dedicated to Southeast Asian studies, a scale that dwarfs current U.S. capacity. However, scholars note that this growth is heavily tilted toward short-term policy research, often at the expense of humanities subjects like history and literature.
What are the risks of state-directed research?
The primary risk for the Chinese model is the emergence of a “policy turn,” where academic inquiry is incentivized to support state objectives. When area studies are built to serve national strategy, researchers face pressure to prioritize politically legible findings over critical, open-ended inquiry. For example, research concerning the Belt and Road Initiative is often encouraged to focus on economic connectivity and development, while complex social or environmental questions raised by those same infrastructure projects may be marginalized. This creates a risk that Beijing’s knowledge of the region will be filtered through the lens of its own diplomatic ambitions.
How does the U.S. knowledge gap affect regional diplomacy?
As the U.S. loses its base of language-trained regional specialists, policymakers may increasingly rely on simplified strategic categories. Instead of nuanced local understanding, the U.S. may view Southeast Asian states primarily through the binary of being either partners or sites of Chinese influence. Without deep expertise in village politics, religious life, and local archival sources, the U.S. risks losing the ability to understand regional agency. This reliance on think tank policy briefs and English-speaking elites can obscure the complex, heterogeneous nature of the region.
Pro Tip: To maintain genuine regional expertise, experts suggest that universities and think tanks in Southeast Asia should lead by expanding joint research and immersive residencies, ensuring that outside observers are anchored in local intellectual communities.
Frequently Asked Questions
- Why does university-based research matter for regional policy? It sustains inquiry into local languages, history, and social dynamics that are not immediately relevant to current budget cycles but are essential for long-term strategic understanding.
- Is China’s research model inherently flawed? Not necessarily, but its focus on scale and state-alignment can incentivize short-term, policy-relevant work over the deep, independent social knowledge required to understand a region’s complexity.
- What is the main difference between the two systems? The U.S. model offers intellectual autonomy but suffers from budget volatility, while the Chinese model offers institutional scale and state coordination at the risk of ideological conformity.
How do you think the decline in regional language programs will impact international relations in the coming decade? Share your thoughts in the comments below or subscribe to our newsletter for more analysis on global geopolitical trends.
