Usually adults both work together and play by the same rules, no? Is China working together in cases outside of this?
In prisoners dilemma tit for tat is a winning strategy for a reason.
In prisoners dilemma tit for tat is a winning strategy for a reason.
In fact, the strategy by definition never leads to a win and is weakly dominated by just never cooperating.
The correct thing to do in this case, as an adult, is to have firm boundaries and push back strongly but fairly whenever they are crossed.
However, while it's an interesting thought experiment, anthropomorphasizing nation states in this way will only get you so far. China is not a child, nor is the USA, and they're not adults either. While it does sometimes seem apt, the concept of maturity, in human development terms, cannot be applied here.
We conveniently describe people's actions as being of a nation, but we should be careful in not taking this too literally. It's a convenient linguistic device that doesn't reflect the reality that underlying all national action is the action of people.