the United States for dissenting from official CCP views and for otherwise speaking freely.123 Universities’ financial dependence on tuition dollars from China complicates matters: in recent years, American universities have intentionally admitted more Chinese nationals because they, unlike many American students, pay ballooning tuition costs in full.124 At the graduate and undergraduate level, China sends more students to the United States than any other country.125 And Beijing uses Confucius Institutes not only to promulgate CCP-approved views about China and the world but also to press U.S. universities to censor discussion, curtail inquiry, and generally conform to CCP dogma and political objectives.126
Transforming International Organizations from Within
Beijing continues to throw its weight around at the United Nations and in other international organizations to align these institutions with China’s transformative ambitions. China generally delivers higher levels of development assistance to countries voting with it in the UN General Assembly.127 As a veto-wielding member of the UN Security Council, the PRC — in cooperation with Russia — has frustrated significant measures proposed by the United States and European nations to address challenges in Syria, Ukraine, North Korea, Venezuela, Iran, and elsewhere. To advance its revisionist agenda and counter U.S. efforts to promote transparency and accountability, the PRC vigorously pursues leadership positions, using its voting advantages as a member of the Group of 77 at the United Nations and in the NonAligned Movement.128 A growing number of PRC citizens now serve as heads of international organizations — including the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO), and Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) — and in other top-level leadership and management positions at such organizations.129 China tries to insert into multilateral documents communist language derived from so-called Xi Jinping Thought and references to the Belt and Road Initiative and other signature efforts to give China’s communist propaganda a UN imprimatur.130 Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, China provided a dramatic illustration of abuse of the international system, compelling the World Health Organization to comply with Beijing’s self-serving preferences — including the exclusion of Taiwan.
