Departing Zoellick Looks Back On Pending Business With China
SHANGHAI -- The sweltering heat of summer in Shanghai -- a steam bath of 15 million to 20 million people expanded by a growing tide of migrants -- provided an unusual stage to assess U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick's unfinished project to help make China a more-responsible global player.
Mr. Zoellick, who announced his resignation last week, concedes his initiative to get China to do more to protect the system that has so benefited it is "a work in progress." Yet it is worth tracking his mixed success here as the U.S. administration's point man for the 21st century's most-important bilateral relationship.
THINKING GLOBAL
How responsibly do you think China is performing as a "stakeholder" in the global system? Where do you think it is particularly weak of strong?
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Sign up to receive alerts when new installments of Thinking Global are published. Frederick Kempe also writes a daily analysis of the biggest news of the day. You may sign up to receive Mr. Kempe's full daily commentary by email, along with links to all of the stories and features that are mentioned in each day's Asian or European edition of the print Journal.This city shut down businesses and traffic for much of three days this month to host the Shanghai Cooperation Organization Summit, the first multilateral organization of Beijing's making, which includes Central Asian countries and Russia but not the U.S. It showed off China's please-everybody diplomacy that embraces countries odious to America while trying to reassure Washington it means no harm.
The group enraged some U.S. officials by embracing (with observer status) Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who is bent on making nuclear arms and destroying Israel. But at the same time, Chinese leaders satisfied Mr. Zoellick with their message to the Iranian that he should take the European-U.S. deal that would require him to abandon nuclear enrichment and thus abandon or delay his weapons ambitions.
It was all part of Beijing's emerging foreign policy driven by the state's principle-free priority of continued economic growth, and increasingly also by a rising desire for global respect and influence. Chinese officials believe they need between 7% and 8% of their 10% growth rate simply to ensure domestic stability through providing jobs for the wave of migrants coming to booming cities like this one and services to restive rural communities. The result is a policy as eager to tap U.S. consumers as the world's most unsavory of energy producers.
Trying to answer whether this makes Beijing more friend or foe, I placed a call from here to Mr. Zoellick as he packed his bags in Washington to leave the State Department July 7 to join Goldman Sachs (and ultimately support the John McCain campaign as well). Mr. Zoellick says his initiative to make China a more "responsible stakeholder" in the international system was never intended for instant results.
It was instead constructed to "reframe our relationship with China" from the successful one that had been focused since the 1970s on integrating China into the global economy to one that "shifted into a more intensive dialogue on the responsibilities in the international system." In that, it was also meant to refocus the American lens.
Launched with a speech in September and followed up with a number of multiday meetings, the notion was nothing less than that of the world's incumbent leader taking the fastest rising challenger under its wing for a tutorial in global leadership. The hope was that China would see national interest in sustaining and protecting the system of rules and institutions established by the West that had produced one of China's best historical moments.
"The ultimate test of the initiative will be in the years ahead" and how both sides follow up, says Mr. Zoellick. He would be first to say his was only part of what has become the broadest official exchange in U.S.-Chinese relations on matters from the environment and energy to defense and antiterrorism.
Mr. Zoellick regards Beijing's useful message to Tehran as one of many signs of progress that include new Chinese willingness to help United Nations efforts to solve the Darfur crisis, Beijing's recent hosting of the Iraqi government and its participation in Afghan rebuilding. (China's foreign minister broke off a vacation to join an Afghan donor conference in London.)
Yet China still balks at demands to allow its currency to appreciate more quickly; it moves too slowly in protecting international property and it befriends the worst of U.S. enemies while making them richer through trade and investment deals.
"China's rise is a serious challenge to America on a number of fronts," says David Zweig at Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. He says that as China expands its global footprint, it inevitably runs up against established U.S. relationships and countries happy to use Beijing to increase their leverage with Washington. It has found countries with rich resources and bad relations with Washington to be particularly willing partners for its morally unburdened, economically driven ambitions. The Chinese leadership suspects that Washington would ultimately like to see its single-party Communist system come undone.
The charm of the nuanced Zoellick approach has been accepting this complex challenge and realizing that the way to reach China is by influencing how it defines the national interests that drive its policies.
Mr. Zoellick's China initiative will be best remembered for providing an intellectual map to navigate this perilous world. "The task is to maximize the points of agreement and to manage the differences so they don't spin out of control," he says.
佐立克美中关系思路回顾
盛夏的上海酷暑难耐，却为回顾罗伯特?佐立克(Robert Zoellick)未竟的事业提供了一个非同寻常的舞台。这位即将卸任的美国副国务卿一直在促使中国成为国际舞台上一个更负责任的参与者。
上周宣布辞职的佐立克承认，他敦促作为受益人的中国尽更大努力来维护这套体制的努力“尚未大功告成”。不过，我们还是有必要在此回顾一下他作为布什内阁美中关系定调人期间毁誉参半的成就，要知道，中美关系堪称二十一世纪最重要的双边关系。
上海市本月暂停部分商业并执行交通管制将近三天，为在此召开的上海合作组织峰会(Shanghai Cooperation Organization Summit)让路。这是中国政府发起成立的第一个多边合作组织，包括了中亚国家和俄罗斯，但将美国排除在外。中国政府一方面欢迎美国不喜欢的国家，另一方面又在极力安抚美国、表明该组织对其无害，这种做法体现了中国政府谁也不得罪的外交策略。
上海合作组织允许伊朗总统艾哈迈迪-内贾德(Mahmoud Ahmadinejad)以观察员身份出席，这让一些美国官员十分恼火。内贾德支持发展核武器和消灭以色列。不过，在迎接内贾德的同时，中国领导人也向他传递了这样的信息：应该接受欧盟和美国提出的方案，放弃核浓缩计划，最终放弃或推迟核武计划。这一做法让佐立克很满意。
这是中国正在成型的外交政策之一，推动这一政策的是它的一切以经济增长为先、为此可以放弃原则的思想，以及日益强化的、希望赢得全世界尊敬和获得全球影响力的愿望。中国政府认为，经济年均增长率需要保持在7%-8%，才能为不断涌入上海等大城市的农村富余劳动力提供足够的工作机会，为不安定的农村地区提供所需要的服务，以确保全社会的稳定。结果就产生了中国这种以美国消费者和全球最让人生厌的产油国并重的政策。
这种做法让中国变得更友好了还是更敌对了？为了回答这个问题，我给佐立克打了个电话。他正在收拾行装，准备在7月7日离开国务院，前往高盛(Goldman Sachs)任职，最终还将加入约翰?麦凯恩(John McCain)的竞选阵营。佐立克回答说，他倡议的让中国变成国际社会更加“负责任的利益相关者”原本就不是一个期待其立即就能实现的目标。
七十年代以来，美国一直努力带领中国融入全球经济体系。佐立克称，他的这项倡议就是要在这个成功的基础上重新构建中美关系，将重点转向针对国际社会秩序及相应责任展开更广泛的双边对话。就这一点而言，这也意味著美国的政策重点需要调整。
佐立克是在去年9月份的一次演讲中提出“利益相关者”这个概念的，并在此后的几次会议上多次重申。这怎么看都像是当今全球的领导者以谆谆教导的姿态面对一个迅速增长的国家。美国希望的是，中国能看到维持和保护西方社会确立起来的制度和机构体系能给它带来的种种利益，而正是这样的体系造就了中国最好的时期之一。
佐立克说，“这项倡议的最终考验要到几年后才会到来”。他将是第一个承认自己只是中美关系（从环保、到能源利用、到国防和反恐）官方交往中的一小部分的人。
佐立克认为中国对伊朗发出的有用信息是进展迹象之一，这些进展包括：中国新表现出来的帮助联合国解决达尔富尔危机的意愿、最近对伊拉克新政府的接纳以及对阿富汗重建的参与。（中国外交部长中断休假，参加了在伦敦举行的捐助阿富汗大会。）
但是，中国仍在抵制让人民币更快升值的呼吁，保护知识产权行动不力，还与美国最危险的敌国签署贸易和投资协议。
香港科技大学(Hong Kong University of Science and Technology)的David Zweig说，“中国的崛起在很多领域都对美国构成了挑战。”他说，中国在全球的扩张不可避免地要影响到现有的中美关系，其他国家也很乐意利用中国来增加自己在美国面前的影响力。我们已经发现，很多资源丰富但与美国关系不好的国家，特别愿意同中国合作，以期在不受道德谴责的情况下实现经济利益。中国领导人则怀疑美国是真地希望中国最终结束一党制。
佐立克路线的优点在于：接受这种复杂的挑战，认识到接触中国的方法就是对中国自己确定的作为决策基础的国家利益的概念产生影响。
佐立克对中国的看法会被人们长期铭记，为我们在当前的复杂国际局势中看清前景提供重要指引。他说，任务就是要最大限度地达成协议，并控制分歧，让它们不会脱离控制。
Frederick Kempe
