Yuan Peng on the Anchorage Summit

Yuan Peng, “The High-Level Strategic Dialogue is Imminent—Where are Sino-American Relations Heading?”[1]

​Introduction and Translation by David Ownby
 
Introduction
 
Yuan Peng (b. 1967) is Research Professor and President of the China Institutes of Contemporary Relations 中国现代国际关系研究院 in Beijing, and a well-respected scholar of international affairs, the United States, and Sino-American relations.  He has published extensively in Chinese (some 25 essays are available on his Aisixiang page) and in English.[2]  Yuan is fluent in English, and has done stints as a Visiting Scholar both at the Brookings Institute and at the Atlantic Council.  His is an important voice explaining the United States and Sino-American relations to the Chinese elite.  As Bill Bishop noted on Sinocism, Yuan was the lecturer at the December Politburo Study Session on National Security, so we know that he talks to the main players in China’s foreign policy world, even if we do not know if they listen.  As I have mentioned before, if you are wanting daily news about what is happening in China, Sinocism is the place to go.

The text translated here was published on the eve of the Anchorage Summit that began on March 19, 2021, the fiery optics of which received a great deal of media attention.   Yuan’s tone is by contrast quite moderate, without a whiff of “Wolf Warrior diplomacy,” or even the occasional barbs (basically directed at Trump) we can read in Yuan’s piece from last year on the “once in a century change” that China and the world are experiencing.  He quite clearly is attempting to be positive, to entertain the notion that the arrival of Biden and his team may open a window of opportunity for a certain course correction in Sino-American relations. 

At the same time, Yuan insists, in a way that strikes me as quite consistent with what many other Chinese establishment intellectuals have been saying for some time, that China and the United States are both great powers, which means that neither one should disrespect or talk down to the other.  China will not knuckle under, which means that the two powers must invent a “new type of great power relationship,” another oft-repeated theme.  In other words, China and the United States are destined to compete, with neither side likely to “win” in the foreseeable future, and it is imperative that they find a way to do so that fosters a mutual, and, to the extent possible, healthy coexistence.    

Yuan is quite clear on what this means from China’s perspective:  Taiwan is part of China, and any U.S. action that upsets the status quo—the Trump administration flirted with this on several occasions—will be met with a firm response.  Hong Kong and Xinjiang belong to what Yuan refers to as a zone of "non-interference in each other's internal affairs," and in addressing these issues, the U.S. should have a “sense of proportion in its words and actions.” Yuan does not discuss what the zone of "non-interference in each other's internal affairs" might include on the U.S. side, but the fireworks at Anchorage suggest that such issues as racism, police brutality, and the state of American democracy might be among them.

In sum, Yuan says that China and the U.S. have no choice but to live with one another, whether they like it or not, for their own national interests as well as the interest of the current world order.  As for the “framework” within which this might play out, Yuan notes that:  “So far, Henry Kissinger's ‘co-evolution’ theory is the most positive and constructive, and Kurt Campbell's ‘competitive coexistence’ is also a possible idea to be explored. However, these proposals still do not go beyond the formula that President Xi Jinping proposed during his meeting with President Obama in 2013:  ‘no conflict, no confrontation, mutual respect, and win-win cooperation.’”  In other words, you have your frameworks and we have ours, and ours looks slightly better, although they are not really very far apart.

The problem of course is that, even if the American side were convinced by Yuan’s argument, how to move forward without someone’s appearing to make “concessions” in not at all obvious.  Here, Yuan attempts to have it both ways, arguing on the one hand that the ball is in Biden’s hands (“China’s only choice is to wait and see”—Trump is a convenient scape-goal here), but at the same time devoting the last section of his essay to the question of “How Can China Proactively Shape the Sino-American Relationship.” 
 
Both sides realize that playing to the peanut gallery is a necessary evil in this populist age; even in Anchorage, after the two delegations took multiple potshots at one another, once the doors were closed they got to work on issues where the two sides might make common cause, such as Iran or North Korea.  At the same time, this week’s Xinjiang “cotton controversy” prompted more calls for boycotts in the West as well as articles in the Chinese press claiming the so-called “Xinjiang issue” is not about human rights but about money (see one example here, in Chinese), illustrating just how hard it is for the “framework” Yuan proposes to come into focus. 
 
Favorite Quotes
 
“The U.S. intends to ease the current tensions in bilateral relations. The Biden team's priorities are focused on domestic affairs, such as the urgent need to deal with the epidemic, economic development, and rebuilding unity, and the fact that they have stopped publicly referring to the ‘China virus’ and to China as an ‘enemy,’ and that they are promoting a summit meeting of heads of state, all suggest that the U.S.-China relationship has a window of opportunity to get back on track.
 
But we should note at the same time that the window is not very wide, nor will it stay open for very long. In the U.S., both political parties, the government, and the general public share all a common judgment that China is America’s number one competitor and main strategic challenge. This perception forms the bedrock foundation and bottom line of the U.S. strategy toward China. Biden and Trump differ mainly in their strategies and approaches, with Biden relying more on allies and rules, placing more emphasis on democracy and human rights, stressing the strengthening of the foundation, and being more adept at coordinating actions, while being equally tough as Trump on issues related to Taiwan, Hong Kong and Xinjiang, and in some aspects even tougher. Recently, Biden promised to vaccinate all adults in the U.S. by May 1, passed a $1.9 trillion economic stimulus package, completed the first round of joint talks with European and Japanese allies, and achieved a four-way dialogue between the U.S., Japan, India, and Australia. The fact that the high-level U.S.-China Alaska dialogue is taking place in this context shows that Biden is dealing with China in a ‘by the books’ kind of way.”
 
“Continuing to promote international security is by no means a mere slogan. The entire world has entered an era where we flourish or fail together, as the coronavirus pandemic illustrates:  as long as one country has not completely eradicated the virus, other countries cannot relax. The security of one country can only be considered in tandem with our common international security, which is in line with China's idea of a community of human destiny. Without a deep understanding of China's peaceful development path, China’s overall national security concept and other diplomatic theories and security ideas with Chinese characteristics, the United States will not be able to understand China and escape from the security dilemma facing China and the United States. This requires that the U.S. strategic community abandon the Cold War mentality and adopt an attitude of tolerance and open-mindedness.  China’s only choice is to wait and see.”
 
“There has already been considerable discussion in China and the United States about how to structure the framework of future bilateral relations. Some have used the term ‘strategic competition’ while others have used the term ‘competition and cooperation,’ but by and large they all revolve around the word ‘competition.’ But both ‘competition’ and ‘cooperation’ are descriptions of the state of relations between the two countries, not a framework for relations; “strategic competition” is not sufficient to sum up the complexity of U.S.-China relations. So far, Henry Kissinger's ‘co-evolution’ theory is the most positive and constructive, and Kurt Campbell's ‘competitive coexistence’ is also a possible idea to be explored. However, these proposals still do not go beyond the formula that President Xi Jinping proposed during his meeting with President Obama in 2013:  ‘no conflict, no confrontation, mutual respect, and win-win cooperation.’"
 
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Translation
 
Responding to the invitation of the United States, Yang Jiechi, member of the Political Bureau of the CCP Central Committee and Director of the Office of the Central Committee for Foreign Affairs, and Wang Yi, State Councilor and Foreign Minister, will hold a high-level strategic dialogue with Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs Jake Sullivan in Anchorage from March 18 to 19. With the high-level strategic dialogue near at hand, how should we understand the Biden team's view of China? How should the two sides make the best use of the current window of opportunity? Where will the bilateral relationship go from here?
 
How to Understand the Biden Team's Worldview and View of China?
 
Biden’s assumption of office provides an opportunity for China and the United States to engage in dialogue and cooperation. But this opportunity must be understood in terms of the extreme pressure the previous U.S. administration exerted on China, which caused serious damage to U.S.-China relations. Many policy elites and think tanks in the United States have recognized that American society did not benefit from the previous administration's crude measures of dealing with China.
 
At present, the Biden team's world view appears to be relatively rational. For example, Jake Sullivan is not too pessimistic in his view of the current international order, believing that the world still needs order, and that the order will not easily collapse, and he has seen no evidence that China wants to destroy the current order and replace it with another one, which is a valid understanding. Sullivan argues that although it may be difficult for the United States to dominate the world in the future, the world still needs American leadership. “Dominate” generally means to decide everything unilaterally, while “lead” means rather to guide and coordinate, which illustrates that the U.S. is tending toward a more rational understanding of their own power position than during the previous administration. Sullivan also believes that the future international order may not be a fixed order defined by treaties as in the post-World War II era, but is more likely to be a combination of "top-down" and "bottom-up," with more flexibility and diversity. Examples of this flexibility and diversity include the Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), the Paris Agreement on climate change, the Asian Investment Bank, among others. As long as these systems serve to help the world order function, they are have value.
 
This understanding of the world's general situation exhibited by high-level American officials meshes to a certain degree with China's worldview, which creates certain conditions for dialogue and communication between China and the United States.
 
From an overall perspective, the Biden team's view of China is not entirely consistent with that of the previous U.S. administration. In terms of how to deal with the challenge of China, the Biden team is currently considering different strategies, which in a nutshell is what Blinken meant when he said that " Our relationship with China will be competitive when it should be, collaborative when it can be, and adversarial when it must be," which represents the basic consensus of the Biden team on China.
 
While acknowledging the competitive nature of the U.S.-China relationship, the Biden team recognizes at the same time that competition does not necessarily mean conflict and that there is room for cooperation between the United States and China. After serving on the Obama team and observing the Trump administration's China policy for the past four years, Kurt Campbell joined the Biden team as senior director of Indo-Pacific affairs, and suggested that the U.S. and China should learn to practice "competitive co-existence" and develop a notion of “competition without catastrophe,” providing some opportunities for U.S.-China dialogue at the macro- and strategic levels.
 
On the basis of such a vision, the U.S. intends to ease the current tensions in bilateral relations. The Biden team's priorities are focused on domestic affairs, such as the urgent need to deal with the epidemic, economic development, and rebuilding unity, and the fact that they have stopped publicly referring to the "China virus" and to China as an "enemy," and that they are promoting a summit meeting of heads of state, all suggest that the U.S.-China relationship has a window of opportunity to get back on track.
 
But we should note at the same time that the window is not very wide, nor will it stay open for very long. In the U.S., both political parties, the government, and the general public all share a common judgment that China is America’s number one competitor and main strategic challenge. This perception forms the bedrock foundation and bottom line of the U.S. strategy toward China. Biden and Trump differ mainly in their strategies and approaches, with Biden relying more on allies and rules, placing more emphasis on democracy and human rights, stressing the strengthening of the foundation, and being more adept at coordinating actions, while being equally tough as Trump on issues related to Taiwan, Hong Kong and Xinjiang, and in some aspects even tougher. Recently, Biden promised to vaccinate all adults in the U.S. by May 1, passed a $1.9 trillion economic stimulus package, completed the first round of joint talks with European and Japanese allies, and achieved a four-way dialogue between the U.S., Japan, India, and Australia. The fact that the high-level U.S.-China Alaska dialogue is taking place in this context shows that Biden is dealing with China in a "by the books" kind of way. In this sense, the Biden government’s professional team is not easy to deal with.[3]
 
How Can China and the U.S. Escape from their Security Dilemma?
 
Whether from the perspectives of politics, economics, security, or ideology, the U.S.-China relationship is a very complex bilateral relationship. According to Western international relations theory, rising powers challenge existing powers, and existing powers attempt to contain rising powers, with both sides mutually fearing the other, which is the security dilemma of great powers.
 
With China’s rise, the general story of the rise and fall of great powers has transformed into the particular, historic case of China and the United States, and both sides have begun to fall into a certain security dilemma. Compared with the rise and fall of other great powers in history, the rivalry between China and the United States adds elements such as the conflict between capitalism and socialism and the clash of Eastern and Western civilizations, making the relationship between China and the United States more profound and fraught than any other rise and fall of great powers in history, with more far-reaching implications.
 
It is extremely important that China and the United States deal with each other's security issues in order to uphold and advance the common security of the international community. General Secretary Xi Jinping specifically talked about continuing to advance international security during the 26th Politburo collective study on December 11, 2020, which is the distinctive feature of the national security path with Chinese characteristics that distinguishes it from the security path of major Western countries, and the distinctive feature of China's rise, that distinguishes it from the rise of historical powers and from the rise of some Western countries. China has always thought about its own security and international security together, without putting its own country first and without neglecting the security of other countries.
 
Continuing to promote international security is by no means a mere slogan. The entire world has entered an era where we flourish or fail together, as the coronavirus pandemic illustrates:  as long as one country has not completely eradicated the virus, other countries cannot relax. The security of one country can only be considered in tandem with our common international security, which is in line with China's idea of a community of human destiny. Without a deep understanding of China's peaceful development path, China’s overall national security concept and other diplomatic theories and security ideas with Chinese characteristics, the United States will not be able to understand China and escape from the security dilemma facing China and the United States. This requires that the U.S. strategic community abandon the Cold War mentality and adopt an attitude of tolerance and open-mindedness.  China’s only choice is to wait and see.
 
Humanity is living in an era of globalization, networking, and multipolarity. It is desirable and entirely possible for China and the United States escape from their security dilemma, avoid the "historical cycle" of the power transfer of the great powers, and take a new road of mutual development and peaceful coexistence.
 
What is the Ideal Framework for Sino-American relations?
 
For many years, in the process of strategic communication with China, the United States has tended to be reluctant to discuss the broad framework of bilateral relations, always preferring to solve specific problems directly. However, the experience of the past few years has illustrated that if both sides become too focused on specific problems and do not talk about the framework and or the structure of the relationship, things readily become problematic. With the Biden team in power, the U.S. and China should work hard to find a breakthrough, permitting the construction of a long-term peaceful and stable bilateral relationship.
 
There has already been considerable discussion in China and the United States about how to structure the framework of future bilateral relations. Some have used the term "strategic competition" while others have used the term "competition and cooperation," but by and large they all revolve around the word “competition.” But both “competition” and “cooperation” are descriptions of the state of relations between the two countries, not a framework for relations; “strategic competition” is not sufficient to sum up the complexity of U.S.-China relations. So far, Henry Kissinger's "co-evolution" theory is the most positive and constructive, and Kurt Campbell's "competitive coexistence" is also a possible idea to be explored. However, these proposals still do not go beyond the formula that President Xi Jinping proposed during his meeting with President Obama in 2013:  "no conflict, no confrontation, mutual respect, and win-win cooperation."
 
It is necessary, possible, and feasible for China and the United States to explore the establishment of a framework for relations in the new period, and that the framework of a new type of major power relationship have new connotations and meanings from the beginning. So far, there is no framework that is more rational, more forward-looking and more in line with reality than the above framework proposed by President Xi Jinping.
 
Previously, the U.S. side was unhappy with the term "mutual respect," and understood it too narrowly. In fact, mutual respect does not apply to every concrete issue, but rather emphasizes the attitude and spirit of mutual respect necessary to deal with bilateral relations. After eight years of competition and cooperation, the U.S. side should have a better understanding of "mutual respect," and Biden has begun to take the initiative to talk about this. President Xi’s formulation of "non-conflict and non-confrontation" has something in common with the "competitive coexistence" proposed by the U.S. side. This shows that after a period of ups and downs, the framework of a new type of major power relationship has taken on new life at this stage.
 
The overall intention behind creating a "new type of great power relationship" is positive, and has the potential to shape things, moving forward. What China and the United States need to do now is to provide this framework with genuine content, such as linking up the discourses of China and the United States and finding more points of convergence of interests, instead of focusing too much on the so-called "Thucydides trap," or "offensive realism," or the "100-year marathon" and other clichés or so-called theories that do not stand up to scrutiny.
 
For example, China and the United States should strengthen crisis management, deepen and refine the function of various policy mechanisms, and communicate directly on the strategic issues of greatest concern to each other, so as to reduce misjudgments, increase trust, and reduce doubts, and properly handle the "third-party factor" in Sino-US relations, etc.
 
In order to promote the establishment of a framework, a high-level strategic dialogue between the U.S. and China is needed. The Anchorage Dialogue, focusing on strategic security, is expected to cover macro- and deep-level strategic issues, which will help the two sides confirm each other's intentions at the strategic level and provide an opportunity to build a framework for bilateral relations.
 
What Strategic Thinking Should China and the United States Engage in?
 
In order to get bilateral relations back on track, it is necessary for China and the United States to reposition and rethink their future relationship at the strategic level. The most urgent task is to deal with the "three lines.”
 
First we need to establish a base line 底线. There are boundaries we do not cross in relations between people and it should be all the more the case between countries. The previous U.S. administration went beyond sensible base lines and caused a great deal of "toxic" damage to Sino-U.S. relations, which was not in the interests of either country, and both sides should work together to attempt to repair this situation.  For example, the U.S. imposed barriers on humanitarian exchanges, including mean-spirited constraints and other rude measures aimed at companies and even individuals, which should be stopped and corrected immediately.
 
Second, we must make our red lines clear. This is especially true for the Taiwan issue. In recent years the Taiwan issue has tended to evolve away from being the most central and sensitive issue in U.S.-China relations, becoming a general, non-sensitive issue. Over the past four years, however, the U.S. side has violated the strategic tacit agreement or consensus reached between China and the U.S. over the past decades in various ways , including legislative efforts, arms sales, and high-level visits,  and it would be extremely dangerous to go further down this path. The U.S. and China need to reaffirm the high-level strategic importance of the Taiwan question, and the U.S. must put the one-China principle into practice in both words and deeds, otherwise U.S.-China relations cannot move forward.
 
Third, we should define boundary lines 划出界线. The two sides should, in the spirit of mutual respect, redraw the line of "non-interference in each other's internal affairs," for example, in issues related to Hong Kong and Xinjiang, the U.S. should have a sense of proportion in its words and actions, and its policy should respect certain limits, and not arbitrarily "cross the line.”
 
In addition to the above three "lines," China and the United States should also seek "three points."
 
First is the starting point. Sino-American relations must be defended domestically in both countries.  Biden has proposed what he calls "middle-class diplomacy" and President Xi Jinping talks about diplomacy "based on the people's security," indicating that both sides must take serving their own people and handling domestic matters as the starting point for advancing the relationship. The United States needs to understand China's "dual circulation model 双循环"[4] and "14th Five-Year Plan," and China needs to grasp the new changes in U.S. domestic politics and society.
 
Second is the focus point. The focus point should be beyond the bilateral relationship, that is, at the international level. As two great powers, China and the United States need to find the space to pursue mutual interests in the world at large, such as joint efforts to fight epidemics, cope with climate change, and build an international order together. The history of U.S.-China relations proves that when the two countries really put global affairs in the forefront, they can often find more opportunities for cooperation and help reduce bilateral differences to a more manageable level. Conversely, if we leave global issues aside and focus only on bilateral differences and contradictions, the problems will be magnified.
 
Third is the conflict point. It is important to make sure that those issues that are most likely to cause conflict remain manageable, otherwise we will wind up being unable to talk to one another at all.
 
How Can China Proactively Shape the Sino-American Relationship?
 
The space for the future development of U.S.-China relations in the final analysis does not depend on a static "structural analysis," but is in the hands of the policymakers and the people in both countries, and depends on the evolution of U.S. strategy toward China and the active shaping of China's strategy toward the United States.
 
For a long time, people seem to have accepted the view that China has a limited and passive role in determining the direction of Sino-American relations, on the grounds that the United States is a superpower and China is in a passive position as an emerging power. This conclusion overlooks the dialectical relationship between static and dynamic power, and between power and strategy. China’s revival is the most profound motive force and the main variable in the once-in-a century change the world is currently experiencing, and the international impact of China's every move is sometimes bigger than China itself imagines.
 
It is important to see that China in fact has a certain ability to shape Sino-American relations. China's ability to promote deeper reforms and higher levels of openness and to integrate its own development with the future destiny of mankind is itself shaping these relations; on major global issues, China maintains its determination not to privilege in its own priorities, so that countries can see that China is a force for stability and peace in the world, which is also shaping Sino-American. relations. In addition, the necessary countermeasures that China employs are also shaping this relationship.
 
Proactively shaping Sino-American relations also means that China should work with the U.S. to explore cooperation in important areas and the construction of mechanisms to manage differences.
 
For example, concerning economic and trade relations, even if there is a situation of "partial decoupling" in core science and technology areas, both sides should continue to make economic and trade relations the foundation of Sino-American relations in the context of their respective domestic economic transformations, and the upgrading of economic and trade relations. The U.S., especially, should, on the basis of the first phase of the trade agreement, seize the opportunity of China's "dual circulation plan" and promote a higher level of openness, to reconstruct a new type of Sino-American economic and trade relationship at a higher level, rather than taking the backward path of anti-globalization.
 
In addition, concerning military security, we must get rid of “detonators” that lead to military conflict. The experience of China and ASEAN in jointly promoting the negotiation of a code of conduct in the South China Sea can be a resource, and on the basis of the existing cooperation mechanism between the two militaries, a code of conduct between China and the United States can be reached on issues such as the South China Sea to regulate interactions between the two countries in the Western Pacific region.
 
Or again, in terms of humanitarian exchange, we need in-depth, realistic explorations of non-governmental interactions, so that exchanges between parliaments, parties, states and provinces, and Chinese and American people can grow, the current trickle eventually becoming a flowing river.
 
Both China and the United States are permanent members of the Security Council and are the world's two leading economies, shouldering special and important responsibilities. In the next 30 years, even if China's total economic output exceeds that of the United States, both sides will remain in a state of strategic stalemate for a long time, meaning that China cannot completely escape from U.S. domination 打压, while there is little that the U.S. can do about China, which is destined to achieve the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation against the background of this strategic stalemate. For China, the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation is not predicated on replacing the United States, but on the pursuit of a better life for the Chinese people. China and the United States will find a way to coexist in a strategic standoff that will benefit not only the two countries but also the world.

Notes 

[1] 袁鹏, “高层战略对话在即 中美关系向何处去?”  published online on March 17, 2021.
 
[2] Translator’s note:  For a representative example, see Peng, Yuan, “Sino-American relations: new changes and new challenges,” Australian Journal of International Affairs, 2007-03-01, Vol.61.1:  98-113.  Yuan’s university website lists other publications.  

[3] I assume that Yuan means that Biden’s approach will leave less room for China to manipulate American policy, although this sentiment seems out of place in an otherwise very measured essay.  The Chinese appears straight-forward to me, but perhaps I missed some nuance:  “从这个意义上说，拜登政府专业团队不好应对.”

[4] Translator’s note:  The “dual circulation” plan or model is meant to address China’s overdependence on the global economy, especially in terms of high tech supply chains, by developing its own infrastructure and supply chains, while not decoupling from the world.