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National People's Congress, 2013 (photo by Dong Fang via Wikimedia Commons) On March 9, 2000, US President Bill Clinton gave a speech on US-China trade relations in which he advocated for the expansion of trade between the two countries and defended his administration's decision to push for China's entry into the World Trade Organization (WTO). President Clinton's argument in favour of closer trade relations with the People's Republic of China (PRC) was based on two assumptions. First, that increased trade with China would benefit the US economically, and that if the US failed to promote trade, then other countries would benefit from the opportunities that the Chinese market offered. Second, that closer economic ties between the US and the PRC would allow Washington to "pull China in the right direction."  " Last fall, as all of you know, the United States signed the agreement to bring China into the W.T.O. on terms that will ope

Starbucks Coffee in Yu Garden, Shanghai (by Haluk Comertel via Wikimedia Commons) On January 27 Howard Schultz , the former CEO of Starbucks, told CBS' "60 Minutes" that he is considering running for president of the United States as an independent .  Schultz has hired former Republican strategist Steve Schmidt and Democratic consultant Bill Burton. Schmidt was involved in the presidential campaign of George W. Bush in 2004, while Burton was a member of Barack Obama's 2008 campaign and later served as deputy White House press secretary. Schultz, who as of January 30 is worth US$3.4 billion according to Forbes , stepped down as executive chairman and board member of Starbucks in June 2018 and is now chairman emeritus. He owns more than 37.7 million shares of the company's stock. Many have criticized Schultz's presidential bid, worrying that it might help re-elect Donald Trump by taking votes away from the Democratic candidate. But

In the 1960s the United States and the People's Republic of China (PRC) had no diplomatic relations. Washington continued to recognise the Republic of China on Taiwan as the sole legitimate government of the whole of China. The unstable situation in East Asia contributed to the maintenance of this situation. The Korean War and the Vietnam War caused frictions between the US and the PRC, as the Beijing regime felt threatened by the West. At times war between the two powers seemed a real possibility. This favoured Chiang Kai-shek 's Guomindang regime on Taiwan. The Americans needed the island as a military base for the war in Vietnam and as a resting place for soldiers on leave ( Davison 2003 , Chapter 6).  However, in the late 1960s Washington and Beijing began to realise they could use each other to contain the Soviet Union. Under Leonid Brezhnev 's leadership Moscow pursued an aggressive foreign policy in Asia, Africa and South America that deeply unsettled b

The political and moral collapse of Communist regimes throughout the world in 1989 marked the beginning of a new era in global geopolitics. At that time, it seemed as if the capitalist-democratic Western system had triumphed and all countries in the world were destined sooner or later to accept the allegedly irrefutable verdict of history. Very few people would have bet on the survival of the CCP in China, or on the success of Deng Xiaoping's reform programme. The PRC appeared like a dying relic of a past age. The true meaning of the year 1989 remained inscrutable to those who didn't want to see. Western bias was too strong. In 1989 a new China was born; a China that combined East Asian-style developmentalist economic policies, autocratic statehood, and nationalist ideology.  The CCP regime survived the collapse of the Soviet bloc because the path it chose was different from that of its Communist 'brothers'. The PRC had already in the late 1970s embarked on a p

On March 13 Taiwanese President Ma Ying-jeou began an official trip to the central American country of Guatemala, one of the few states that maintain diplomatic relations with Taiwan .  On the website of the Central American Parliament (Parlamento Centroamericano) Ma Ying-jeou is called "President of the Republic of China (Taiwan)". According to Taiwanese reports, other sections of the website called him simply " President of China (Taiwan) ". At a press conference, Ma Ying-jeou clarified which country he represents. "As far as the relations between our two countries are concerned", he said, "China means Republic of China ". Democratic Progressive Party legislator Luo Zhizheng (羅致政) criticised Ma's response, wondering if the Foreign Ministry could accept "Republic of China" as the country's official name. Wang Peiling (王珮玲), spokesperson of the Foreign Ministry, reiterated that "Republic of

Shanghai, Nanjing Road (photo by Agnieszka Bojczuk via Wikimedia Commons ) Since its founding in 1921 the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has mastered the art of propaganda and recruitment of individuals both inside and outside the country who are willing to cooperate with it and further its interests - a practice known as "united front work". "United front work" refers to the CCP's strategy of cooptation of groups or individuals that are not members of the CCP but are willing to cooperate with it. Cooptation describes the process of bringing outsiders (usually the resource-poorer) inside (usually the resource-richer) ( Saward , 1992). An example of this strategy is the case of former Hong Kong's Chief Executive Tung Chee-hwa. Prior to the 1997 handover of Hong Kong from Britain to the People's Republic of China (PRC), Tung Chee-hwa had close ties with the government of Taiwan. However, after his shipping company ran into financial trouble and

Beijing National Stadium (by Peter23 via Wikimedia Commons ) On April 6 the US State Department denied that it was considering a boycott of the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing  over the Chinese government's human rights abuses, including in Hong Kong, Xinjiang and Tibet. "Our position on the 2022 Olympics has not changed. We have not discussed and are not discussing any joint boycott with allies and partners," a senior State Department official wrote in a statement to CNBC. After years of tough anti-Beijing rhetoric from the Trump administration, voices of appeasement are already reemerging. The Financial Times argued that boycotting the Olympics would be ineffectual and would be the wrong solution.  Former Ambassador Christopher Robert Hill stated in a recent interview that the United States needs to be proactive in finding ways to communicate and collaborate more closely with China rather than pursuing a policy of decoupling.  "I do believe that we need to find

In his book " In Two Chinas: Memoirs of a Diplomat ", Kavalam Madhava Panikkar (1895 – 1963), an Indian intellectual, journalist, historian and ambassador, born in the Kingdom of Travancore, then part of the British Indian Empire, recounted his impressions of the transition between the Guomindang -led Republic of China (ROC) and the newly founded People's Republic of China (PRC).  Shortly after India had obtained its independence from Britain, Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru appointed Panikkar as India's first ambassador to China (then ROC). During the following two years, Panikkar would experience the chaos and turmoil of the Chinese Civil War , which ended with the complete collapse of the Guomindang regime and its retreat to Taiwan. Panikkar remained in China until 1953.  *** What was my general impression of New China? I had spent over two years in Peking in close contact with the leaders of the Central People's Government. I had also lived

A pro-China Taiwanese army officer has resigned in protest against Taiwan 'separatism'.  Ch'iu Yü-hung (邱裕弘), an infantry platoon leader of the Taiwanese army, resigned due to what he described as 'separatism' (分離主義). In a Facebook post that followed his resignation, he stated his belief in Chinese unification and his opposition to Taiwan independence. Ch'iu wrote that he chose to pursue a career in the military because he believed that the Republic of China was "not only a thing of the past," but that it was "still important for the future of a united China." Embed from Getty Images The Republic of China  (ROC) was founded in 1912 in mainland China . At that time Taiwan was part of the Japanese Empire . During the Nationalist era  (1927-1949) the ROC was governed dictatorially by the  Guomindang (Chinese Nationalist Party) under the leadership of Chiang Kai-shek . At the end of World War II, the Allies pledged to return T