Changing face of Sino-American relations

By Anne-Marie Slaughter and Samm Sacks

WASHINGTON, D.C. ― The Sino-American relationship is at its lowest point in decades. Following the recent bilateral meeting in Alaska ― the first high-level talks since President Joe Biden took office ― it is far from clear whether the new U.S. administration understands what it will take to revive it.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has said that, while America's relationship with China has some “adversarial” aspects, it also has “cooperative ones.” At the Alaska meeting, however, there was little sign of the latter, with Blinken and National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan publicly trading barbs with Chinese officials.

Biden said he was proud of Blinken for sitting through an anti-American tirade, but acknowledged that it was not a great start to his administration's relationship with China. The hope now, it seems, is that John Kerry, U.S. Special Presidential Envoy for Climate, will have more luck at the upcoming talks with his Chinese counterpart in an area where both sides have expressed a willingness to cooperate.

But what is really needed may be a much broader dialogue. At the last meeting of the U.S.-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue, held in Beijing in 2016, the large U.S. delegation, led jointly by the secretaries of state and the Treasury, included officials responsible for issues such as climate policy, ocean health, counterterrorism, non-proliferation, food security, and mineral supply-chain practices. Agreements were reached in every area.

If this kind of broad U.S.-China dialogue were to be held today, imagine what the U.S. side of the table would look like. Beside Blinken would sit Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.

Several other women would also be in attendance: Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo, Trade Representative Katherine Tai, Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers Cecilia Rouse, White House National Climate Adviser Gina McCarthy (the first to hold that position), and Samantha Power, the incoming administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Michael Regan, Secretary of Health and Human Services Xavier Becerra, and Attorney General Merrick Garland would join them.

Such a diverse array of U.S. officials ― over half of them women ― confronting a phalanx of Chinese men would make for a striking picture. But it is not only a matter of optics: Placing a more diverse group, including many exceptionally qualified women, at the forefront of U.S.-China engagement could help to shift the tone of discussions and break the deadlock.

In a similar vein, the United States could propose a bilateral dialogue exclusively on cybersecurity and data-privacy issues, alongside planned dialogues on issues like climate change. Here, again, women would dominate the American side of the table. They include Anne Neuberger, deputy national security adviser for cyber and emerging technology; Jen Easterly, awaiting Senate confirmation as the national cyber director; and Mieke Eoyang, deputy assistant secretary of defense for cyber policy. Shannon Coe, Jennifer Daskal, Melanie Hart, and Cynthia Carras would also be in attendance.

Making these women the public face of the American half of a U.S.-China cyber-policy dialogue would be good for women everywhere. Moreover, much like a single broad dialogue, the simultaneous pursuit of multiple targeted dialogues would highlight the complexity of the bilateral relationship and the importance of cooperation on a wide range of issues.

To be sure, simply replacing male officials with women will not bring about harmony in Sino-American relations. Just ask Canadian Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland, who has long been locked in tough and unproductive negotiations to free Michael Spavor and Michael Kovrig, who were arrested in China and charged with espionage, in apparent retaliation for Canada's 2018 arrest of Meng Wanzhou, Huawei's CFO, at the request of the U.S.

But women may be well suited to the type of relationship-building that effective foreign policy demands. As Biden well knows, foreign policy ― like politics more broadly ―― is created not only at the negotiating table, but also after hours, unwinding over an informal meal and finding common interests and identities.

When Hillary Clinton was secretary of state, she forged a relationship with Chinese state councilor Dai Bingguo, based partly on their shared commitment to their children and grandchildren. That relationship helped the U.S. and China to weather a major diplomatic crisis.

Today, building such relationships ― essential to foster trust between high officials ― should be a top priority of U.S. leaders, regardless of gender. Such an effort could build on the ties being created through unofficial dialogues.

For example, as the Alaska meeting was unfolding, women from the U.S., China, and Europe gathered via Zoom for a private discussion about internet censorship. This group ― including multiple generations of government officials, academics, business leaders, investors, and journalists ― meets regularly for candid, off-the-record conversations about some of today's most pressing topics, from artificial-intelligence start-ups to export controls and biotechnology. These relationships could prove very useful to governments.

As Kerry has noted, the U.S. will never accept China's violations of human rights and trade abuses in exchange for climate cooperation. This is the right approach. But cooperation on climate change ― as well as pandemics, cybercrime, and other shared threats ― remains critical. Only with a broad (or multi-pronged) dialogue, led by a different set of faces and fortified by deeper personal relationships, can the U.S. strike the right balance between ― to use Blinken's words ― the adversarial and cooperative aspects of its relationship with China.

Anne-Marie Slaughter, a former director of policy planning in the U.S. State Department (2009-11), is CEO of the think tank New America, professor emerita of politics and international affairs at Princeton University, and the author of “Unfinished Business: Women Men Work Family.” Samm Sacks is cyber policy fellow at New America and senior fellow at Yale Law School's Paul Tsai China Center. This article was distributed by Project Syndicate (www.project-syndicate.org).