[SCMP] Chinese academics take first steps back to world stage after Covid-19

July 13 , 2022

■ Does US visit by Beijing-based think tank delegation signal a return of China’s knowledge class to international policy discussions?

■ Two years of disrupted travel combined with geopolitical tensions between the US and China have kept face-to-face meetings to a minimum.

Members of the delegation from Beijing-based think tank the Centre for China and Globalisation meet the World Bank Prospects Group’s chief economist Ayhan Kose (second from left) at the bank’s headquarters in Washington.

Face-to-face talks between Chinese academics and think tanks and their US counterparts are slowly resuming, as disrupted travel between China and the rest of the world enters its third year.

A delegation of experts from the Centre for China and Globalisation (CCG), a Beijing-based non-government think tank, spent 10 days in the United States from late June to early July, visiting New York and Washington.

The group met members of 11 US think tanks, including the Centre for Strategic and International Studies, the Peterson Institute for International Economics, the National Committee on United States-China Relations and the Council on Foreign Relations.

The delegation also visited the Brookings Institution, meeting its honorary president John Thornton. The two sides discussed China-US trade, the development of bilateral relations and new international political and economic patterns, according to the CCG’s official website.

The think tank representatives also visited the Chinese embassy and the US State Department.

“The CCG expert panel answered US concerns, clarified many misconceptions, and elaborated on the positions and propositions of Chinese think tanks during this trip,” the think tank’s statement said.

The CCG said many US institutes believed the visit was a positive signal for the resumption of exchanges between China and the US since the start of the pandemic.

The delegation is now in Europe, meeting government officials and academics.

Academic visits between the two largest economies, already stifled by geopolitical tensions, were stripped back to a minimum by the restrictions on flights, visas and exit permits stemming from China’s zero-Covid policies.

The CCG trip is among only a few attempts by Chinese academics to resume in-person meetings with their foreign counterparts, amid the tight travel restrictions imposed by Beijing.

In February, Wang Jisi, a prominent international relations professor at Peking University, spent a month in Washington resuming people-to-people exchanges with the US policy community.

Among other China hands in the US, Wang met former secretary of state Henry Kissinger and exchanged views on the international political situation and China-US relations.

Short-term visits to China by private US citizens have also been extremely rare since the start of the global outbreak. Last year’s visit to Beijing by Thornton was among the very few exceptions.

While China is sticking with its strict Covid-19 controls at its borders, it has made limited improvements to ease international travel.

Earlier this week, the civil aviation authority said it was working to increase the number of inbound and outbound flights. The quarantine period for overseas arrivals has also been shortened from 14 days to seven.

Chinese diplomats have also said they are working to resume “people-to-people matters”.

During Foreign Minister Wang Yi’s meeting with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Bali last week, the two sides agreed to create better conditions to resume exchanges and consultation on people-to-people and cultural matters, according to the Chinese readout.

 

From SCMP, 2022-7-13

 

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