Fatigue is rewriting the US-China soft power contest, starting in Asean

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For years, debates about US-China competition have defaulted to the obvious categories: ships, chips, tariffs and security pacts. Soft power was often treated as America’s home turf, the domain of Hollywood, top universities, global brands and a political ideal that still attracts even when it disappoints.That assumption is getting riskier.The world has entered a new emotional weather pattern: fatigue. It’s a structural condition shaped by overlapping shocks: pandemic after-effects, inflation...