CCG Delegation of Experts Visits Singapore
June 23 , 2022The world is struggling to recover from profound shocks that have brought into question the integrity of the international order, the current geopolitical landscape and the global economic system. The huge short-term costs resulting from the fight against Covid-19 as well as increased distrust among key global actors in the wake of the Ukraine Crisis has given communication and diplomacy a greater immediacy and importance than ever before.
Pushing forward its Track II Diplomacy vision, a CCG Expert Delegation initiated a global tour that has crisscrossed Asia, North America and Europe. During their visit to Singapore on 23-28 June, representatives from CCG held a series of symposiums that touched on topics including the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), multilateral trade regimes and global governance, which were attended by Chinese ambassadors, think tank leaders, administrative officials, and university scholars. CCG Delegation members included Henry Wang, CCG Founder and President; Mabel Miao, CCG Co-Founder and Secretary-General; Mike Liu, CCG Vice President and Senior Fellow; and Wang Wei, a CCG Researcher.
On June 23, CCG’s delegation visited the Chinese embassy in Singapore and Ambassador Sun Haiyan. Henry Wang presented CCG’s research achievements, think tank exchange activities and examples of policy recommendations the think tank has made. He also discussed the schedule and goals of the Singapore Track II Diplomacy tour.
On June 24, the delegation visited the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS) at Nanyang Technological University (NTU) and met with Hoo Tiang Boon, Associate Professor and Coordinator of their China Programme; Li Mingjiang, Associate Professor and Provost’s Chair in International Relations; as well as Gong Xue, Research Fellow of China Programme. Discussions touched on China-Singapore relations, China-US relations, trade liberalization in the Asia-Pacific region, and RCEP’s successful implementation.
Professor Liu Hong, Associate Vice President in International Engagement, invited the CCG Delegation to give a lecture titled ‘China and Globalization in the 21st Century’ to the students of the Nanyang Centre for Public Administration (NCPA) and the “Mayors’ Class”.
CCG delegation was also very pleased to meet with Professor Bert Hofman, the director of the East Asian Institute at NUS. Before joining NUS, he has been working with the World Bank for 27 years and was the World Bank Country Director for China 2014-2019 and the Chief Economist for the World Bank in the East Asia and Pacific region 2011-2014. The group discussed the major macro issues and the regional and global trends concerning Singapore’s development.
CCG experts also visited the Temasek Foundation, a local NGO, where they discussed global talent flows with Senior Director Gerald Yeo.
On June 25, the delegation visited Professor Danny Quah, Dean of the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore. His major research interest is supply and demand in the world order from an economic perspective, and the discussions included social mobility, economic growth, and international economic relations.
Later that day, they met with Kishore Mahbubani, a prominent Singaporean academic, diplomat and geopolitical consultant who served as former Singapore’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations and the President of the United Nations Security Council. Earlier this year, Mahbubani’s new book, The Asian 21st Century, was pubished jointly by CCG and Springer Nature. In the first few months since its English version released, nearly 2 million copies have been downloaded, which is par excellence in the English world.
On June 26-27, CCG President Henry Wang was invited to attend a CEO retreat held by A.T. Kearney’s Global Business Policy Council, and was the only Chinese guest on site. He delivered a keynote address concerning the new phase of China and its relationship with globalization, the challenges encountered by the Chinese economy as it recovered from the pandemic, and the opportunities China offers in a world facing massive transformations, followed by an engaging question and answer session.
CCG is a leading non-governmental Chinese think tank and is ranked among the world’s top 100 think tanks in the University of Pennsylvania’s Global Think Tank Index. CCG actively engages with international think tanks, providing a critical window for the international community to better understand China. This series of high-level dialogues and discussions in Singapore comes at a crucial point in Asia-Pacific strategic relations as the world emerges from the shadow of Covid-19.
