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clay dube.
clay dubeThis seems like a natural subject for discussion in this election year. Please share your resources and opinions!
clay dubeHere are links to some videos available at YouTube (sorry for those visiting from schools where net nanny blocks YouTube).
Obama on China and climate change (Des Moines, Iowa, Oct. 2007)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hdrT3qhjmJ0
Richardson and Dodd in Iowa on China
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vRfLevIC9UY
Clinton on MSNBC on China (AFL-CIO debate)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vuJeqQ70JbY
Edwards, Clinton, and Obama on China, Iowa Public TV debate
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mhqz-3TXJu0
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CNBC story on US-China Trade
clay dubeUSC student Anthony Marra just published an essay on the remaining three candidates' views toward China. You can read it at US-China Today:
http://www.uschina.usc.edu/ShowFeature.aspx?articleID=1483
AnonymousThere are many reasons why the different presidential candidates view China either as a threat or as a tough competitor. First, the Chinese government, like the Soviet government of the Cold War era, is communist. American democracy has always been at odds with communists style governments because it is contrary to democracy. Besides economic reasons, China's government is officially atheist while the U.S. was founded on Judeo-Christian principles and 80% of the American population claim to be Christian. As a result, the presidential candidates are not going to overlook human rights violations, China's rising economic power, and the fact that they are still Communist. (Even though Barack and Hillary secretly love their socialist policies and Bill Clinton is still spending the money he received after selling them stealth technology secrets.)
AnonymousInteresting that a part of this topic came up at the seminar on the Taiwanese Elections on 3/26/08 at USC. The question was posed to the panel - 'How will the elections in Taiwan affect the US?’. Unanimously the panel thought that with Ma’s election, the issue of Taiwan’s being part of the US elections debates was rather slim at best.
AnonymousFor a timely article with a long-term perspective on China as a world economic power, see http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/worldnews.html?in_article_id=559133&in_page_id=1811
clay dubeSen. Clinton was the first of the presidential candidates to call for Pres. Bush to not attend the games. On Thursday, 4/10 Sen. McCain also called for Pres. Bush to skip the opening ceremony. So far, German Chancellor Merkel and British PM Brown have announced they would not attend. Neither, though, had planned to attend in the first place. French Pres. Sarkozy indicated he's considering not attending.
Please check out the voices and daily updates section of our web magazine US-China Today for more on this:
http://uschina.usc.edu
What do you think the president should do?
AnonymousOne part of me says that President Bush should boycott the opening ceremony, however, in the long run I do not think it would be the smart thing to do. I think it would be most prudent if President Bush attended the opening ceremony. The Olympics afterall are games and not chance to illustrate foreign policy.
AnonymousIt seems ridiculous for the president to boycott the ceremony. What would the point be? To hightlight the civil rights abuses in China? Lets say Bush does boycott the ceremony; sure that we be news worthy, but it would only beg the question, "what next?" Will we stop having our goods manufactured in China? Would we stop trading with them? The answer is no, and ultimately that how our nation would make an impactful statement, one that would really effect China's economy. A presidential boycott would be a PR stunt and would seem very hypocritical to me.
AnonymousPresident-Elect Obama seems to be relying upon the shadow cabinet of former President Clinton. This may alienate the current loyalists of Obama. I think he should draw upon some new but experienced blood for implementing his foreign policy. I do not believe Hillary Clinton is the best choice for Secretary of State. What is her experience with China, and the rest of the world? What is wrong with being a Senator from New York? I would even be happy with being a Senator from California!
clay dubeEarlier this week, the NY Times and other publications focused on the rapidly increasing numbers of students headed to China. Here's the Times story:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/17/education/17exchange.html?_r=1
The greatest number of US college students go to Spain (24,005) and France (17,233), no doubt a reflection of how much more widely Spanish and French is taught in high school and college. In 2006-7, though, 11,064 students went to China. (These are study programs, not just tours.) The rise from 2005-6 for China was 25%, for France 11% and for Spain 10%. I'm sure the 2007-8 numbers will show similar growth.
What does this mean? Obviously it means there's increasing interest in China's economy and culture and in Asia generally (note that India was up to 24%, with more than 2,000 students, Japan up 14% with 5,012 students). South Africa and Latin America are also increasing in popularity. Clearly our students are less wedded to a junior year in Europe than previous generations (though study abroad has always been limited to a sliver of all students -- I didn't go abroad until after graduation, as a student working full time, that wasn't a viable option). What does it mean for the future? We should hope that this more diverse experience base makes us more sensitive to opportunities, beliefs, and assumptions of others and hopefully helps us acquire the language skills necessary to really understand a place and its people.
What do you think? Do your students know that American students can and do study elsewhere? Are they curious about experiences such as that?
AnonymousIt will be interesting to see how Obama and his Harvard educated advisors deal with China when he takes over as President Obama. Part of the issue of our policy towards China should probably include the reality of China’s policy towards America. Due to the economic meltdown precipitated by the Bush years, a worldwide meltdown at that, it will surely take a great deal of tweaking to return to the status quo or regain a semblance of economic normalcy. Things have changed drastically as China has invested billions in America, billions it earned by selling us much more of their stuff than we sold them of our stuff. This gigantic trade imbalance, some would argue, puts China into a much more vital role in future American economic development. The Obama years guarantee there will be significant changes made in our US-China policy. It should be instructive to see how soon the new administration begins making changes to our existing policies.
clay dubeChina's top officials have focused attention on American profligacy and poor regulation as the source of the crisis. American officials have said the problem is that China keeps its currency artificially low in value so as to make its exports cheap. The recent US-China Strategic Economic Dialogue meetings in Beijing provided officials with the chance to bring this all out yet again. The reality is that China did help drive the housing bubble by buying American debt and thereby helping keep interest rates low. But they did so for their own economic benefit not to harm the US. Investing in American debt has been a secure investment. And the Chinese are loathe to weaken the dollar since that will harm the dollar based investments they have made.
No - the fault lies in our inability to keep our spending within sight of our income. And with the aging of our population and the increased demands to made of the Medicare and Social Security systems, we are going to have even less budget maneuverability. We better educate our children well as we need each of them to be fabulously productive so as to carry the burden we have already assigned to them.
Will American policy toward China change? I don't expect significant short term change. We need Chinese cooperation on the economic front, in curtailing nuclear weapons proliferation, and in beginning to address the ultimate challenge of global warming. We need the Chinese to more fully open their markets and media and to stimulate domestic consumption rather than relying so heavily on exports. This is ultimately good for China's own economic stability as well. China's leaders recognize this, but have thus far aimed their stimulus package in traditional ways, favoring infrastructure first and foremost.
The USCI website will soon have an article about China and the crisis. It already has news summaries in the US-China Today daily update pages: http://www.uschina.usc.edu/dailyupdateS.aspx. To see what US and Chinese officials said the this week's SED and at previous meetings, visit the resources pages: http://www.china.usc.edu/Resources21.aspx
clay dubeHi Folks, As you likely know - Sec. Clinton's first foreign trip will be to East Asia. You can read a bit more about her statements here.
On Friday, Feb. 13, just before leaving for her trip, Sec. Clinton will reward Richard Holbrooke, her special envoy to South Asia who has just stepped down as Asia Society chair, by speaking at the Asia Society about US policy toward Asia. The event will be webcast -- perhaps you'll want to watch it with your students.
The event will be webcast live at http://www.asiasociety.org. In the event of server overload, the backup call-in number is: 1-877-270-2157 (pass code 01711457).