The Right Way for China and the US to Get Along
From September 12-14, I attended the 2024 Beijing Xiangshan Forum, participating in a panel discussion entitled “The Right Way for China and the United States to Get Along.” These were my opening remarks.
First, I would like to thank the forum for inviting me to participate and speak here today. While I’m here as a member of United States civil society and not a representative of the U.S. government, I will do my best to describe the current state of the policy debates in the United States, and how I think these relate to the question of how the United States and China can get along.
While many Americans have questions about China’s ultimate goals in the world, I think most American leaders, and most of the American people, understand that the U.S. and China need to find ways to work together. There will be areas of disagreement, sometimes strong disagreement on issues of human rights, privacy, tech and trade, and others. But we can have a multifaceted relationship in which we cooperate, compete, and, when necessary, confront. The key is to keep talking.
Right now, U.S. foreign policy is in a period of transition between the old era and a yet undefined new one. Donald Trump’s surprise victory in the 2016 U.S. presidential election awakened many in our policy community to the reality that despite Washington’s presumption of an unquestioned foreign policy consensus, many Americans actually had very serious questions about the assumptions that had guided decades of U.S. foreign policy.
There is no “new Washington consensus”— not yet, at least. There is, instead, a contest for what will be the next paradigm for U.S. foreign policy. There are some who wish to subordinate all other concerns to the imperatives of “great-power competition.” There are others who want the U.S. to pull back to a more restrained role in global affairs. Of course, there remain those who cling to every scrap of the old neoliberal international order and the belief in the necessity of American primacy.
The Biden administration has taken several important steps toward defining a new approach, probably best articulated in an April 2023 speech by National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan. A global trade policy based on reducing global inequality and economic precarity through equitable trade, labor, and investment rules, could have enormous positive consequences for American workers and communities around the world.
This is part of the logic that undergirds the strong push for U.S. government investment in American manufacturing and infrastructure, in strengthening people’s faith in government by addressing the long-neglected needs of workers and their communities. And this is why I’m addressing a security conference by talking about jobs and the economy – because rebuilding a strong and durable American political consensus is essential for the United States to remain a reliable and effective security partner.
I think most of the U.S. public understands how diplomacy and cooperation with China can provide benefits for Americans, as evidenced recently when China imposed new controls on fentanyl, which has had a devastating impact on many of our communities and families. There are other steps China can take in the diplomatic realm to be a better partner to the U.S. China showed a willingness to play a brokering role in Iran-Saudi detente, even if that was already baked, and in brokering Palestinian unity, even if that wasn’t baked at all. Playing a constructive role elsewhere would be welcome, particularly as in Russia’s war on Ukraine, where China is unfortunately helping Russia replenish its war machine.
I think it’s important to note that a positive relationship of cooperation cannot be based on illusions. The U.S. and China can build a more collaborative security order, but unlike the previous global order, it can’t be built on redirecting insecurity toward others–be they ethnic or religious minorities, human rights defenders or political activists, internally or externally. Peace between great powers is only possible if it rests on a foundation of peace within our respective societies. While leaders everywhere exploit the failings of their adversaries for their own political ends, it is a mistake to dismiss these concerns. The American people do genuinely care about human rights, and support a foreign policy that reflects that.
So what should we do?
1) Advance global priorities that break away from an outdated and counterproductive “Great Power Competition” mindset
The embrace of a “Great Power Competition” worldview with an unquestioned need to “win the future” defines US interests as a zero-sum fight that drains resources and goodwill. Both our countries need to recognize and secure their interests in the reality of a multi-polar world, rather than attempting to forestall it via a costly and ultimately self-defeating effort to disadvantage others.
A new approach to defining success in global influence should focus on 1) global public goods like universal public health infrastructure and green energy for all; 2) significantly increasing development investment in those countries and regions that have been starved of capital for decades; and 3) guaranteeing human, political and labor rights globally. Building international cooperation around such a transformation of the global economy would reestablish US–China relations on a new foundation, revive the legitimacy of international norms by expanding the opportunity it offers to people of all countries, and address the truly existential threats we all face today.
2) Invest in the domestic critical technology workforce, while cooperating on shared challenges like climate change.
The Biden administration has already taken steps to increase domestic production capacity for technologies critical to the security and economy of the United States, especially advanced technologies and those essential to address dire challenges like climate change. The only true growth trajectory, however, is one anchored in U.S.-China collaboration. The technologies needed to survive, mitigate, and overcome challenges like climate change and global health threats will not be built in one nation, and will require significant investment and cooperation from governments across the world.
Both China and the U.S. face tremendous challenges from warming temperatures, particularly in the area of desertification and water security. Exploiting these vulnerabilities elsewhere in the world in the hope that they lead to crisis and instability and strategic opportunity is both immoral and dangerous. Instead, the United States should approach cooperation on addressing urgent climate change imperatives – such as working with China to leverage non debt-creating climate finance investments and provide critical technical assistance to developing countries – as an opportunity to build trust and identify areas of mutual benefit on other issues.
Developing a stable and constructive relationship between the United States and China will not be easy. But the future peace of the planet requires us to make that choice.
