China’s Approach to Promoting Artificial Intelligence as a General Purpose Technology

Scholars connect China’s technology policy to government interventions that target particular industrial sectors. But not all sectors are created equal. Relying on evidence from China’s Artificial Intelligence (AI) policies, this paper develops a framework for assessing China’s approach toward promoting a technological domain that permeates across many industrial sectors: general-purpose technologies. It shows that China’s AI strategy diverges from expectations derived from typical characterizations of China’s industrial policy, which stress an emphasis on self-sufficiency, support for a limited number of national champions, and the essential role of military investment and demand for progress in dual-use domains.

This working paper is part of an IGCC series on China’s science, technology, innovation and industrial policies. This work was made possible through support from the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research.