home > by publication type > academic modules > Academic Module: U.S.-China Relations: An Affirmative Agenda, A Responsible Course
Email
September 2007
| Author: | Frank Sampson Jannuzi, Hitachi International Affairs Fellow |
|---|
This module features teaching notes by CFR Hitachi international affairs fellow Frank Sampson Jannuzi, the director of the Council-sponsored Independent Task Force on U.S.-China Relations, along with other resources to supplement the text. The report takes stock of the changes under way in China and what they mean for U.S.-China relations.
What is a CFR Academic Module?
Academic Modules—featuring teaching notes by the authors of CFR publications—are designed to assist educators in creating or supplementing a course syllabus. The modules are customized packages built around a primary CFR text, such as a book or report, and include teaching notes; additional readings; video, audio, and transcripts of CFR meetings; Foreign Affairs articles; and other online resources. Use of these modules is free of charge. They may be used in part or in their entirety.
April 2007
Task Force Report No. 59
This report takes stock of the changes under way in China and what they mean for China and for U.S.-China relations. This report is also available in Chinese.
Graphics and multimedia explainers on the foreign policy, national security, and international financial issues of the day.
Succinct introductions to current political and economic issues.
Updated: March 7, 2008
China is dealing with growing signs of social unrest and a budding civil society, but the central government’s power grip leaves little room for democracy.
February 22, 2007
China's anti-satellite test in January drew international condemnation but also piqued interest in some quarters about instituting a space weapons ban.
June 6, 2008
Rising global energy demands have caused China to turn to Africa as a major supplier of oil. But Western states still make the vast majority of African investments and remain highly influential.
December 5, 2006
China is transforming its People’s Liberation Army into a leaner, modernized force, raising U.S. concerns over Beijing’s long-term military goals.
June 2, 2006
The Defense Department's most recent assessment of China's military power presents it as a potential military rival of the United States. But some experts say China has no intention of challenging U.S. military dominance in Asia or anywhere else, and accuse the Pentagon of hyping the China threat to justify its own military spending.
May 18, 2006
China is expanding its use of cultural, educational, and diplomatic tools to increase its appeal across the world. The move comes as U.S. cultural influence slips and some say the United States may be losing its "soft power," or ability to gain influence through non-coercive means.
April 19, 2006
Trade relations between the United States and China have provided enormous benefits to both countries. But a growing U.S. trade deficit, China's regulation of its currency, and concerns over intellectual property violations continue to stress the relationship.
April 14, 2006
Chinese leaders face the dilemma of continuing their country's staggering economic growth while spreading its benefits to the hundreds of millions of rural poor. Beijing hopes its "peaceful rise" policy will reassure neighboring countries that China is not a threat and help it accomplish these goals.
February 4, 2009
China's military modernization agenda has led most other countries in the region to respond with defense plans of their own to balance China's growing military capabilities.
April 2004
Selected by The Globalist as one of the top ten books of 2004, The River Runs Black is the most comprehensive and balanced volume to date on China’s growing environmental crisis and its implications for the country’s development.
September/October 2007
Summary
China's environmental woes are mounting, and the country is fast becoming one of the leading polluters in the world. The situation continues to deteriorate because even when Beijing sets ambitious targets to protect the environment, local officials generally ignore them, preferring to concentrate on further advancing economic growth. Really improving the environment in China will require revolutionary bottom-up political and economic reforms.
January/February 2007
Summary
Accurately assessing the rise of China is a critical task. Yet U.S. policymakers often overestimate China's military might. And if they continue to view China's power in substantially coercive terms when it is actually growing most rapidly in the economic and intellectual domains, they will be playing the wrong game, on the wrong Ţeld, with the wrong team.
September/October 2005
Summary
Despite widespread fears about China's growing economic clout and political stature, Beijing remains committed to a "peaceful rise": bringing its people out of poverty by embracing economic globalization and improving relations with the rest of the world. As it emerges as a great power, China knows that its continued development depends on world peace -- a peace that its development will in turn reinforce.
September/October 2005
Summary
No country can affect China's fortunes more directly than the United States. Many potential flashpoints -- such as Taiwan, Japan, and North Korea -- remain, and true friendship between Washington and Beijing is unlikely. But their interests have grown so intertwined that cooperation is the best way to serve both countries.
September/October 2005
Summary
The United States has done much to enable China's recent growth, but it has also sent mixed signals that have unnerved Beijing. More consistent engagement is in order, because the course of the twenty-first century will be determined by the relationship between the world's greatest power and the world's greatest emerging power.
May 17, 2007
Wu Yi, vice premier of China, argues for the importance U.S.-China economic links and says that both countries must rise to the challenges associated with globalization.
June 14, 2007
U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson says he will push for more Chinese flexibility in allowing its currency to appreciate, saying it “doesn’t reflect reality.”
April 10, 2007
Carla A. Hills, co-chair of the CFR Task Force on U.S.-China relations, discusses the group’s recommendation for greater diplomatic engagement.
Updated: June 8, 2007
CFR's Manjeet N. Kripalani and Adam Segal debate whether India will overtake China.
Updated March 26, 2007
East Asia military specialists Richard Halloran and John J. Tkacik, Jr. debate about whether China poses a military threat to the United States.
Updated: February 20, 2007
Deborah Brautigam of American University, author of Chinese Aid and African Development: Exporting Green Revolution, and Senegalese journalist Adama Gaye, author of China-Africa: The Dragon and the Ostrich, debate whether Chinese investment is good for Africa.
Updated: October 13, 2006
The Chinese economic boom could pose a real challenge to U.S. power and influence. Morgan Stanley's Stephen Roach and Desmond Lachman of the American Enterprise Institute debate whether China's growth is happening at the United States' expense.
April 2006
China: The Balance Sheet: What the World Needs to Know Now About the Emerging Superpower
Authors: C. Fred Bergsten, Bates Gill, Nicholas R. Lardy, and Derek Mitchell
February 15, 2000
About Face: A History of America's Curious Relationship with China, from Nixon to Clinton
Author: James Mann
June 11, 2007
The 280-page report, State Secrets: China's Legal Labyrinth, examines how China's complex and opaque state secrets system sweeps a vast universe of information into the state secrets net, including: incidence of people who contract any kind of occupational illness; statistics on trafficking in women and children; information on unusual deaths in prisons, re-education through labor and juvenile detention facilities; guidelines for making contact with religious organizations overseas; statistics held by the All China Federation of Trade Unions on strikes; and data on water and solid waste pollution.
Updated May 23, 2007
Beijing took steps to strengthen its currency ahead of economic talks in Washington, a move that may not halt a slide toward protectionism in Congress.
May 1, 2007
This paper from The Stanley Foundation argues that the challenges posed to the United States by China's rise cuts across all dimensions of power. It says that although the United states faces other major powers that are authoritarian and don’t respect human rights, what makes the rise of China so important to the United States is that China, alone among other nations, has the potential to be competitive across several dimensions of power.
February 14, 2007
The Congressional Research Service examines U.S. realtions with China in this report.
February 2007
This paper from the German Marshall Fund of the United States charts the evolution of China from 'An isolated, introverted backwater' less than 30 years ago, to becoming one of the most robust and open economies in the world. The paper examines the reemergence of China and its rising sway in the global economy.
December 15, 2006
Speech
October 30, 2006
Report
U.S.-China Relations: An Affirmative Agenda, A Responsible Course
| Speakers: | Carla A. Hills, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Hills & Company; Vice Chairman, Council on Foreign Relations |
|---|---|
| Dennis C. Blair, Former Commander-in-Chief of the Pacific Command | |
| Presider: | Kathryn Pilgrim, Anchor and Correspondent, CNN |
A Council on Foreign Relations Independent Task Force Report
12:15 – 1:00 p.m. Lunch
1:00 – 2:00 p.m. Meeting
Transcript: U.S.-China Relations: An Affirmative Agenda, A Responsible Course [Rush Transcript; Federal News Service]
Audio: U.S.-China Relations: An Affirmative Agenda, A Responsible Course (Audio)
Video: U.S.-China Relations: An Affirmative Agenda, A Responsible Course (Video)
This meeting is on the record.
Report of An Independent Task Force -- U.S.-China Relations: An Affirmative Agenda, A Responsible Course
| Speaker: | Carla A. Hills, Hills & Company; Former U.S. Trade Representative; Task Force Chair |
|---|---|
| Presider: | Judy C. Woodruff, Senior Correspondent, The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer |
**Please note special time**
Transcript: "U.S.-China Relations: An Affirmative Agenda, a Responsible Course" [Rush Transcript; Federal News Service]
This meeting is on the record.
China Task Force Press Briefing
| Speaker: | Dennis C. Blair, Task Force Chair, Former Commander in Chief of U.S. Pacific Command, and immediate past President, Institute for Defense Analyses |
|---|---|
| Moderator: | Carla A. Hills, Former U.S. Trade Representative, and Chairwoman and CEO, Hills & Company |
This meeting is on the record.
Nixon in China
| Speakers: | Bernard Kalb, Founding Anchor, Reliable Sources, CNN; Former Correspondent, CBS, NBC, and The New York Times |
|---|---|
| Margaret MacMillan, Provost and Professor of History, Trinity College; Author, Nixon and Mao: The Week That Changed the World | |
| J. Stapleton Roy, Vice Chairman, Kissinger Associates, Inc.; Former U.S. Ambassador to the People's Republic of China | |
| Presider: | Terrill E. Lautz, Vice President, Henry Luce Foundation |
On the 35th anniversary of President Richard Nixon’s historic trip to China in February 1972, our panelists will discuss the significance of Nixon's meeting with Chairman Mao Tse-Tung and how it changed U.S. China relations.
12:15 – 1:00 p.m. Lunch
1:00 – 2:00 p.m. Meeting
Transcript: Nixon in China
Audio: Nixon in China (Audio)
Video: Nixon in China (Video)
This meeting is on the record.
A Defining Moment for U.S.-China Trade Policy
| Speaker: | Max Baucus, Member, U.S. Senate (D-MT) |
|---|---|
| Presider: | J. Stapleton Roy, Managing Director, Kissinger Associates, Inc. |
12:15 – 1:00 p.m. Lunch
1:00 – 1:45 p.m. Meeting
Please note special time.
Transcript: A Defining Moment for U.S.-China Trade Policy [Rush Transcript; Federal News Service, Inc.]
This meeting is on the record.
To order Task Force reports, Council Special Reports, and Critical Policy Choices, please call, fax, or order online from our distributor, the Brookings Institution Press: phone +1.800.537.5487, fax +1.410.516.6998.
For information on other reports that are not for sale, or for general publications information, please call +1.212.434.9516 or email publications@cfr.org.
Start-Up Nation addresses the trillion-dollar question: How is it that Israel—a country of 7.1 million, only sixty years old, surrounded by enemies— produces more start-up companies than large, peaceful, and stable nations like Japan, China, India, Korea, Canada, and the UK? With the insights of geopolitical experts and investors, the authors examine this nation’s adversity-driven culture to answer this question and offer prescriptions for a global economy on the rebound.
In Forces of Fortune, Vali Nasr presents a paradigm-changing revelation that will transform the understanding of the Muslim world at large. He reveals that there is a vital but unseen rising force in the Islamic world—a new business-minded middle class—that is building a vibrant new Muslim world economy and that holds the key to winning the cold war against Iran and extremists.
In Cuba: What Everyone Needs to Know, Julia E. Sweig presents a remarkably accessible portrait of Cuba's unique place on the world stage over the past fifty years, including its internal politics, its often fraught relationship with the United States, and its shifting relationship with the global community.
Complete list of CFR Books
The report of this bipartisan Task Force of distinguished leaders and experts represents a strong consensus on the importance of repairing America's immigration policy. It makes the case that maintaining America's political and economic leadership depends on attracting talented and hard-working immigrants, and on securing the country's borders in a smart, effective, and humane way.
This report finds that nuclear weapons will remain a fundamental element of U.S. national security in the near term, and makes recommendations on how to ensure the safety, security, and reliability of the U.S. deterrent nuclear force, prevent nuclear terrorism, and strengthen the nuclear nonproliferation regime.
About Independent Task Forces at CFR
Complete list of Task Force reports
Identifying international threats and acting on them may be the most difficult job for U.S. policymakers. This report
provides an actionable road map for managing international threats before they erupt into crises and makes a strong case that preventive action is not a luxury but a necessity.
For more than a decade, the United States has mostly watched from the sidelines as Asian countries organize themselves into an alphabet soup of new multilateral groups. In this report, the authors review the relationship between pan-Asian and trans-Pacific institutions and suggest policy guidelines for a new U.S. approach to this new Asian landscape.
Complete list of Council Special Reports
To request permission to reprint or reuse CFR material, please fill out this permissions request form (PDF), referring to the instructions on page 1.
Copyright 2009 by the Council on Foreign Relations. All Rights Reserved.