Techno-Geopolitics and Semi-conductor Chokepoints: beyond the US-China WTO Dispute

Abstract

Much ink has been spilled on the US-China tech and trade war, particularly the role of US export controls in containing China and preserving America’s tech dominance. Less attention, however, has been paid to other critical nodes in the global semiconductor supply chain – Taiwan, South Korea, Japan, and the Netherlands – which we coin as ‘chokepoint economies’. Taiwan alone produces over 90% of the world’s most advanced chips, vital to the digital age and the future of AI in the Indo-Pacific and beyond. Using Taiwan as a case study, this paper shows how chokepoint economies navigate competing pressures amid intensifying great power rivalry. We enrich the scholarly and policy debates by making three interrelated claims. First, while the US has relied heavily on extraterritorial export controls to limit China’s access to advanced chips, chokepoint economies like Taiwan may adopt more permissive policies. This potential divergence reflects their distinct roles and agendas in the supply chain and strategic balancing between economic and geopolitical interests. Such regulatory gaps, in turn, raise important questions about where legal responsibility lies and how effective US unilateralism can be over time. For one, if China’s restricted access results primarily from US laws rather than chokepoint economies, any legal challenge would target the US – which has substantially disengaged from the WTO dispute system – while others remain committed to the rules-based order. China may thus retaliate through unilateral tools, such as imposing export bans on critical raw materials, adding further complexity to the global supply chain. For another, the durability of US unilateralism is uncertain. Gaps in enforcement and heavy reliance on extraterritorial reach may drive the US to further reshore production for greater control. This will deepen ‘Silicon Statecraft’, as seen in TSMC’s 2025 massive investment project in Arizona, where Washington bypassed Taiwan’s government to deal directly with its companies – further fueling concerns over unilateralism and the erosion of the postwar liberal rule-based system.