"The rivalry between China and the U.S. is fundamentally different from the Cold War," says Yale professor Odd Arne Westad, renowned historian and global Cold War scholar. For one, during the U.S.-Soviet Cold War, the Soviet Union was outside international markets and was isolated by its own design. In contrast, China and the U.S. are competing within the same economic system and markets. Secondly, the ideological dimension differs profoundly: Cold War ideologies were rigid and unchanging, whereas today's Sino-U.S. confrontations involve ideological elements that focus more on framing policies and concepts to gain broad acceptance.