The upcoming meeting between Chinese President Hu Jintao and U.S. President Barack Obama in London reflects the fact that relations between the two countries are increasingly grounded in shared interests of stabilization of issues of global importance, a leading U.S. scholar has said.
"This upcoming meeting reflects the evolution of the foundation for U.S.-China relations," Professor David M. Lampton, director of China Studies of the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University, said in an interview with Xinhua over the weekend.
The professor, who authors the book "The Three Faces of Chinese Power: Might, Money, and Minds," said that the necessity for productive U.S.-China relations is now grounded in the common necessity of stabilization: stabilization of the global economy; stabilization of the regional and global counter proliferation systems; and stabilization of the global climate.
"In some sense, stabilization is the most common interest that China and the United States share," Lampton said.
The U.S.-China summit scheduled for April 1 in London, where leaders of the Group of 20 (G-20) will meet to tackle the ongoing financial crisis and global economic downturn, comes against the background of an earlier, productive phone call between the two presidents in January and a productive G-20 meeting late last year, he said.
The phone call between the two presidents laid a good foundation for their meeting in person and both countries generally are acting in parallel on the economic front, Lampton said.
Moreover, he added, the new U.S. administration is staffed with the personnel who have experience in bilateral relations and hence the relationship will receive the attention it requires on the American side.
"All this has set the stage for a productive bilateral meeting," he said.
"The issues we all are confronting and the domestic pressures in both countries mean that the issues our presidents will address are difficult, whether it be domestic economic and social policy, future global regulatory policy, climate change and so forth," the professor said.
"In short, both administrations have laid a good foundation for the meeting, it is important, but the issues are difficult and we have to have realistic expectations for what can be accomplished in one meeting between our presidents or within the framework of the G-20," he added.
Responding to the question on how the two leaders could deal with difficult issues at their first summit, Lampton stressed that it is important for the leaders to begin to address these issues, however difficult they are.
"While Washington and Beijing seemingly have the will to cooperate, and it is important that they do cooperate, achieving actually policy agreement that is effective will not be easy – it will require far-sighted leadership willing to educate our peoples in both countries," he said.
Lampton said both nations should resist impulses toward protectionism, carry out prudent monetary policies in response to the financial crisis and make difficult decisions to address the threats posed by global climate change.
He said "it is important that our two leaderships begin to address these problems and not let current difficulties stop the quest for common policies that are in the interest of our two peoples over the long run."
"I hope that the upcoming G-20 meeting moves us in these kinds of far-sighted directions. Of course, Europe and many others have to cooperate as well, but U.S.-China cooperation increasingly is a key," the professor said.
(Xinhua News Agency March 31, 2009)