The U.S. and China are both racing to advance artificial intelligence, but they may not be running the same race. Graham Webster, research scholar at Stanford University’s Center for International Security and Cooperation, joins Elisa Poteat to examine China’s rapidly evolving AI ecosystem, from open-weight reasoning models and semiconductor constraints to Beijing’s approach to regulation and risk. They explore what China means by keeping AI “under human control,” how Chinese and American policymakers perceive AI safety differently, and whether competition between the two countries is obscuring a much more complicated technological landscape.

Graham Webster is a research scholar in Stanford University’s Program on Geopolitics, Technology, an ...