The sense of wonder appeals to not only blockbuster producers, but also every one of us. From time to time, we tend to pin our hopes on something, wishing that it will magically extract us from a challenging situation.
Previous rounds of the US-China Strategic Economic Dialogue (SED) have taken place amid high expectations. Although there has been steady progress made, and both sides have listened closely to each other’s positions, it wasn’t the miraculous breakthrough many people were hoping for, leading to complaints that the Strategic Economic Dialogue fails to produce either strategy or dialogue.
What will come of the new “Strategic and Economic Dialogue” (S&ED) – now with bonus ampersand – is still unknown, but it’s of even more significance than the previous events. According to the Obama administration, the S&ED will tackle long-term strategic and economic objectives between China and the US. Pretty abstract, isn’t it? The dialogue is even more complicated than before, given the complexity of the bureaucratic process involved, the efforts to match on issues of the key US and Chinese players, and the wide sweep of issues on the agenda.
China sent 28 minister-level officials from Beijing to Washington. On the US side, both the legendary Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and the “old China hand” Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, are going to co-chair the opening ceremony of S&ED attended by US President Barack Obama. One can imagine the thoughts going on in the heads of politicians, and the big and small dramas that the press will capture and no doubt enjoy.
The Washington press corp have already begin to predict that both sides will be as focused on managing the logistics of a bureaucratic circus as achieving concrete results.
So, why do we need the S&ED, in all its complexity? Five years ago, former US Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick said something that might help to explain. He said that “it is time to recognize China for what it is and may become, not what we imagine China to be.”
What exactly is China to the US and the US to China? Analyzing such an intertwined relations could be very difficult. But China’s influence and national interests are now far broader than they have been at any time in the history of People’s Republic of China and the prospect for mutually reinforcing diplomacy or diverging diplomatic strategies is also greater than it ever has been.
air diffuser,diffusers,fan coil unit,fan coils,air handling unit
