China and Transnational Crime: Fentanyl and Beyond

In early 2024, Beijing and Washington, DC, launched a counternarcotics working group with the intent to better coordinate efforts to counter the global manufacturing and trafficking of illicit synthetic drugs, including fentanyl. Chinese officials announced in late August additional regulations to tighten controls on chemicals used to make street fentanyl. These moves constitute a bid for China to make good on its commitment to combat transnational crime. Still, questions loom over the role that Chinese entities play in fueling the fentanyl trade and other illicit activities. This webinar brings together a set of experts to unpack the tension between China’s public efforts to fight transnational crime and convergence of Chinese criminal and political agendas, China’s role in the fentanyl trade, as well as U.S. policy options.

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Virginia Comolli is head of the Pacific Program at the Global Initiative against Transnational Organized Crime where she focuses on the mapping of foreign criminal actors active in Pacific island countries. Previously, she spent 14 years with the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) in London, most recently as head of the Conflict, Security and Development program.

Vanda Felbab-Brown is a senior fellow in the Strobe Talbott Center for Security, Strategy, and Technology in the Foreign Policy program at the Brookings Institution. She is the director of the Initiative on Nonstate Armed Actors. She is also the co-director of Brookings’ Africa Security Initiative and series on opioids. She is an expert on international and internal conflicts and nontraditional security threats, including insurgency, organized crime, urban violence, and illicit economies.

David S. Luckey is a senior international and defense researcher at RAND and professor of policy analysis at the Pardee RAND Graduate School. He came to RAND from the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs where he was the director of Homeland Security and served as the counterterrorism advisor to the chairman.

Dennis Wilder (moderator) is a senior fellow for the Initiative for U.S.-China Dialogue on Global Issues at Georgetown University, where he previously served as the managing director. Wilder holds a B.A. from Kalamazoo College and an M.S. in foreign service from Georgetown University.