What Happens When China Becomes Number One?

Good night all. My name is David Ellwood and I want to welcome you to the John Kennedy Junior Forum at the Harvard Kennedy School. This is a special occasion for several reasons. The first is that this is the Albert H. Gordon lecture that was. established in 1987 through a gift from Mr. Gordon, who received his undergraduate degree from Harvard in 1923 and his master's degree in 1925. The conference focuses on the fields of finance and public policy, with special attention paid to internationalization and the terms of the conference specify that speakers must generally be chosen from outside the Harvard community, well, I think Singapore is a little far away, although in terms of someone, it's someone who has been part of our community in many different ways , I will definitely say that our speaker is an extraordinary person.

Man, this is Kishar Mahambani, his career in public service spans government academia and exemplifies the commitment to promoting the greater good, the spirit of innovation that we strive for here. He graduated with first class honors in philosophy from the University of Singapore which he later attended. the university of delaware in canada, where he received a master's degree in philosophy and an honorary doctorate. He also spent a year here as a fellow at Harvard University's Center for International Affairs and has now entered college. His first part of his career was in the foreign service in Singapore. where he served between 1971 and 2004.

He has had postings in Cambodia and actually served during the war in Cambodia there in 1973-74 Malaysia Washington DC in New York served as two, with two terms as Singapore's ambassador to the UN and as president. of the un security council he was permanent secretary in the ministry of foreign affairs for five years and then he became dean of a school of public policy everyone's dream job I'm sure he was president of the un security council but of fact became dean of lee singapore Kuan Yew School of Public Policy It's quite interesting about the exact moment

when

I became dean here.

Now I think I know a thing or two about

what

it means to be a dean at a school named after an iconic public figure of whom the nation is proud. Um and I certainly have been enormously honored to be here at the Kennedy School. Kishore took charge of the school in the name of a living legend and speaks of high expectations. Lee Khan. You are a remarkable leader and have been vigorous and committed. You were vigorously engaged. Throughout his life, he believed deeply in the power of education and the notion of strong, merit-based, highly accountable government, with no corruption that could be tolerated at any cost, and Key Shore took on the role of leading a school with a living legend and, honestly, kennedy schools enjoyed a very close relationship with the lee kuan yew school for many years, including through the lee kuan yew scholarship program in which mid-career management students lky public school spend a semester here as benefited residents. immensely from that association and learned many lessons from watching Singapore emerge as an extraordinary nation, at an extraordinary time, and I too had the enormous pleasure of meeting um kishore.

I remember the first time I met him and it was in Davos and again we had both just become deans, I think we were both a little worried about

what

he was, I'll be honest, I was scared, um and uh, here's this guy, so We compare, you know what we've done before. and you know, I'm going to meet this guy who, well, I was, you know, president of the security council, ambassador in various things and so on, I said, well, I studied poverty, but, in fact, a great friendship was born and over the years. We've spent a lot of time together and so on, um, obviously, Lee Kuan Yew, the remarkable leader of Singapore, passed away very recently at the age of 92 and we certainly share the pain of all the people in Singapore and what an extraordinary man he is.

I would also say that one of the things that I consoled myself with

when

we first met in Davos was that it was okay, but you know, I'm going to support the dean of the Kennedy School and so on, and um, just watch what he does next. of becoming a dean, well, what he just did was write book after book, after book, that was on the bestseller list that was talked about, discussed, including the great convergence of Asia and the West and the logic of a world, a series of books. including Canadians think and has constantly pushed and challenged us to think about what the world will be like when the center of gravity shifts from the United States and the West to the East and um, in fact, and now there's all kinds of talk about what follows for Singapore and his is a forthcoming book here Can Singapore Survive About It?

It is not surprising that this man who has done so many notable things both in running an institution and in his writing has been listed by the British current affairs magazine Prospect as one of the best. 50 Thinkers of the World in 2014 and has won so many different awards that I can't list them all, but I think the simplest way to frame this is to say that keyshore is by far the best way to answer the question provocatively posed in your book, Can Asians think like that? Without further ado, kishore, thank you David, the problem with having such a generous introduction like that is that everything goes downhill after that, the best I can do is sit back and keep quiet, anyway, it's a great pleasure and a pleasure to be here. and I'm very glad that you highlighted the very special relationship that our two schools have and, in fact, frankly, the lee kuan yew school of public policy, which started in 2004, has been successful because it inherited a public policy program established by Harvard.

Kennedy School in Singapore in 91, I think we have inherited a lot of the wisdom and advice of the Harvard Kennedy School. I want to thank you very much for that. I also want to thank you for mentioning Mr. Lee Kuan Yew as you. Do you know who died? I think I'm not giving away a big secret if I say that he was a big fan of Harvard and that he really valued the relationship that the Liko and its school of public policy had established with the Harvard Kennedy School and he strongly encouraged me to continue that and I think that I would be very happy to see the Lee Kuan Yew School being recognized here again at the Harvard Kennedy School.

Now let me try to start my comments in 25 minutes. To answer the question, I actually have a pretty long text, but I won't do it. I think I'll post it on your Harvard Kennedy School website and on my website as well. What I'll give you is kind of a summary of the conference, but let me start with the beginning by saying you know in America, I know you start with a joke, unfortunately we Asians don't have jokes, I think my title, my next book would be an asian joke, but I'm going to To steal, frankly, literally, a joke that one of my predecessors told in this series from uh albert to gordon, his name was richard fisher and that's how he started his lecture when he gave this lecture on the garden in 2009, he said quote yesterday morning when I got on the plane to fly here.

I turned to Nancy and said: Her wife, Nancy. And I said, "In your wildest dreams, did you ever imagine me following in the footsteps of Mikhail Gorbachev, George H.W Bush, David Rockefeller and Ban Ki-moon to hit Gordon?" lecture at kennedy school and nancy responded quoting I hate to disappoint you richard but after 35 years of marriage you rarely appear in my wildest dreams I think my wife was there she would say the exact same thing so anyway for starters , you know The spirit of uh uh again Gordon's lecture, who said that we should talk about developments in the financial sphere.

The way I'm going to phrase my comments is that first I'm going to tell you three stories from the financial sector and then at the end I'm going to explain why these three stories are important and in terms of explaining and trying to answer the question, I'm going to try to answer the question first. to the question, of course, what China's goals and aspirations are. try to emerge and rise secondly, how did the relationship between the United States and China play a role in influencing the rise of China and finally try to answer the point and what is, I guess, the critical point that I'm going to raise at the same time?

Finally, China's behavior as

number

one will be heavily influenced by the behavior of the United States, that's

number

one and that's why these three stories are important and this will start with them. The first story is about an event that occurred at the height of the global financial crisis. crisis in 2008 2009 and until the financial crisis emerged, the Chinese were very happy to have developed an interdependent relationship with the United States of America, so that while China depended on the United States to sell its exports and buy its products, to They in turn trusted China to buy Treasury bills from us and to make sure that you know that the United States could continue to sell these Treasury bills abroad, so they both felt that, as Tom Friedman said in one of his columns, they were united at the hip in a mutually interdependent relationship, and in fact, I can tell you this as a fact, at the height of the crisis, when things were looking really bad, the Bush administration sent an envoy to Beijing in 2008 and said: Please continue buying US Treasuries because that's what We need to preserve global financial stability and the Chinese were happy to do it and I suspect the Chinese even felt a little smug seeing the Americans depending on us, but then, lo and behold , about a month later, in a move that completely shocked the Chinese the US fed. announced the first round of QE measures in November 2008 and as you know with QE measures essentially the United States could print money to buy US Treasury bills and lo and behold the Chinese said what happened to this interdependence.

The Chinese, the Americans, can just turn against the printing press and eliminate this dependence on China, and in fact, an Excel Merck commentator said that the United States is no longer focused on the quality of its Treasury bonds in the past. Washington seeks to promote a strong dollar through sound fiscal management today, yet policymakers are simply printing. Greenbacks and Merck said that by relying on the federal reserve printing press, the United States has effectively told other nations that it's our dollar, but it's their problem, so that's a story about the financial relationship between us and China .

He mentioned a second story from the financial world that I think not many people realize now. I think, of course, you must have heard that the United States has been prosecuting several foreign banks, including HSBC, RBS, UBS Credit Swiss and Standard Chartered. Now, for example, Standard Chartered Bank was fined $340 million for making payments to Iran and most Americans reacted with equanimity to this fine paid by Standard Chartered Bank and thought that the bank was simply being fined for dealing with the evil Iranian regime, however, few Americans really noticed that the standard chartered bank that was domiciled in the United Kingdom had not violated any British laws and had not violated any UN security council sanctions, but because the payments made to the standard authorized system they passed through the New York clearing system, the US dollars entered the territory of US laws, so the standard authorized bank was fined and this is what is called by the way extra-territorial application of national laws .

Remember this story again when it comes to the conclusion and the third story is about the fast s-w-i-f-t system. I think many of you will know what it is, it is a system to clear payments between countries. I think it's focused on Brussels and when things got very difficult between the United States and Russia recently, as you know, the United States said it might consider denying Russia access to the Swift system and in a column by Farid Zakaria, one of our friends mutual, the graduate. from harvard described the russian reaction to being denied access to the swift system and interestingly you know most of us when we look at russia we think that putin is the bad guy medvedev is a good guy, good guy, but There's what A good guy met with Vader, who said the Russian response to any denial of access to Swift will know no bounds.

Again, clearly, this was a global system for clearing payments and the United States was trying to use it for bilateral relations on terms. to punish Russia now these are the three stories that I'm telling you at the beginning and I'm going to conclude with these stories uh at the end now first of all let me answer the three questions that I mentioned earlier first, what are the consequences of China? goals and aspirations as it emerges as number one and here the most obvious point that I need to make and emphasize from the beginning is that although China,As you know, it is still governed by the Chinese Communist Party, I can assure you one thing, the Chinese leaders, unlike Stalin, Lenin or Khrushchev, have no desire to demonstrate the superiority of the Communist system, in fact, as you know, Khrushchev said the famous phrase on November 18, 1956, whether you like it or not, history is on our side, we will bury you now, the Chinese will not.

They have the kind of aspirations that the Russians had to somehow demonstrate the superiority of communist ideology, so if it's not communism they're trying to promote, what are they trying to promote? and the simple answer is that we simply In fact, I would like to revive Chinese civilization, if there is something that motivates Chinese leaders it is their memory of the many humiliations that China has suffered for more than a century, as you know since 1842, the war of opium, until about 1949, or you can even go further and the only thing that drives the chinese is a simple creed that says: no more humiliation for

china

, that is the great motivation and, in fact, xi jinping when he spoke before UNESCO in March 2014, this is what he said, are the goals of the Chinese people, he said.The Chinese people strive to fulfill the Chinese dream of the great renewal of the Chinese nation.

The Chinese dream is about the prosperity of the country, the rejuvenation of the nation and the happiness of the people. It reflects both the ideal of today's Chinese people and ours. time in a tradition of seeking constant progress the Chinese dream will be realized through balanced development and mutual reinforcement of material and cultural progress without the continuation and development of civilization or the promotion and prosperity of culture the Chinese dream will not will come true in quotes and I believe that in those few sentences he brilliantly captured what is at the heart of the aspirations of the Chinese people to move from an era of having been humiliated for a long time to an era in which they are once again proud of Chinese civilization and what we can achieve and, in fact, if the CCP, the Chinese Communist Party, could change its name to CCP, the Chinese Civilization Party, then I think that will be a more accurate description of the objectives and aspirations of the CCP, but, of course, while these may be the motivations of many in the West they still believe that China's approach is flawed because it is not changing its political system and you know, you can read any economist in the Wall Street Journal of New York Times, there is this constant belief that the best thing that can happen to China is to have a collapse of the Chinese Communist Party and have a democratic system.

The only slightly provocative point I am going to make here is to be careful what you wish for because if the Chinese political system

becomes

more democratic it could very well become much more nationalistic and much more aggressive as a power and the great paradox here is that the Chinese Communist Party is actually delivering a global public good by restricting Chinese nationalism and if you didn't have a party strong Chinese communist in charge, you could actually have a more nationalist party. China is more assertive, so I think it's actually in the world's interest to allow the Chinese Communist Party to evolve and change in its own way and that way I think we will have a China that is focused on economic growth and strengthening its civilization. .

To the second question, I said that I would discuss what the relations between the United States and China are because clearly the relationship between the number one power in the world, which today is the United States, and the number one emerging power in the world, China, is a key dynamic and here it is really remarkable how stable the relationship is. The relationship between the United States and China is, in theory, knowing when the world's number one emerging power is about to surpass the world's number one power and, as you know, in terms of ppp, China surpassed the United States in 2014, you should look at it with natural logic and I think Steve Wall.

We could agree to increase the levels of tension between the United States and China, but instead, surprisingly, we are seeing a very stable and, in fact, calm relationship and of course the question is why, and here I think we have to give, we have to pay a lot of tribute to the United States. United States for having handled the relationship with China very well and, in fact, the United States has been remarkably benign over the years toward China since the days of the 1990s. I mean, I have a lot to start with, of course, with the Cold War, Kissinger's trip and the efforts of the United States. bring China into the cold war alliance against the Soviet Union and then open the US market, as I mentioned earlier, to Chinese products, and even after the Tiananmen episode of 1989, when US-China relations could have plummeted.

Relations with China continued in balance. In fact, I vividly remember listening to Bill Clinton's election speeches in 1992 when he famously said on the campaign trail, "I will not hug the butchers of Beijing if I become president of the United States," and when he became president, we could have To my surprise, I saw a sharp decline in relations between us and China and actually saw this with my own eyes in November 1993 at the first AIPAC leaders' meeting held on Seattle's Blake Island. That was the first time Bill Clinton and jiangsu min met face to face and I could see that chiang sa min was incredibly uncomfortable, tense and nervous, trying to figure out what the president of the united states would do to him in this small close meeting in the that I was present and change them with surprise and To my surprise, Bill Clinton spoiled the Beijing butcher and it was a very wise decision on his part and at the end of the day, if you had observed the body language of Chiang Sa Min and Bill Clinton, surprisingly They were almost good friends in the end. of the day reflecting Bill Clinton's great charm at the time, but this pattern has continued.

The United States has helped China by bringing it into the WTO. The United States has helped China by being sensitive to Taiwan. In fact, he has been very hard on the leaders of. Taiwan when they tried to push for Taiwanese independence, these are several ways that the United States has demonstrated its wisdom and generosity toward the Chinese, and of course, speaking at Harvard University, I should mention that it's actually quite remarkable that the number one of the world. Power is training the elite of the world's number one emerging power by allowing it to send 275,000 students to come study at American universities.

I think historians of the future will wonder why the United States was so generous in supporting the rise of its number one emerging power. but all of this has led to this geopolitical miracle that we have today where we have a stable relationship between us and China and, by the way, I should also mention that the Chinese themselves have been very careful and sensitive, and some from time to time, of made. I did everything I could to keep the relationship in balance. I was in Belgrade literally two weeks ago and it is the first time I go to a modern city and see the results of NATO bombings on skyscrapers and of course Belgrade is important because As you know, the Chinese embassy in Belgrade was bombed in 1999.

Almost every American I talk to believes it was obviously an accident, but one hundred percent of the Chinese I've talked to are convinced it was deliberate, but despite their belief. that is deliberate, they swallowed the humiliation and said that our relations with the US are too important, this time we will swallow the buildup and proceed so that both sides, as you can see, have made an effort to keep the relationship in balance, so all this brings me. to my third part how American behavior and actions will have a significant influence on China's role as a number one power and here I must confess to you in all honesty that although I am normally quite provocative in the things I say, I feel some trepidation when saying some of the things I'm going to say in this section because, as you know, Bob Zelik many years ago called for China to emerge as a responsible stakeholder in the global system, but when he made that call, I think he assumed that, of course, the United States is a responsible actor in the global system and the difficult part here is trying to tell the American audience that this is not how the United States is often perceived abroad and that is why I told the three stories. of the financial sector at the beginning of my conference because the rest of the world quite often sees the United States acting unilaterally in its own interests and often at the expense of global interests and David mentioned that I have been the UN ambassador to the ONU. uh I was there twice, I've served there for almost 10 years and it's quite tragic to look at the United Nations as I saw it first hand and to see that the institutions that were essentially created by the United States after World War II with the guide. of fdr and eleanor roosevelt and all that were basically American-inspired institutions that have then been undermined by American policies and I think in many ways the United States has been very reckless in undermining these global institutions because every action that the United States takes in China could replicate the weakening of these global institutions and that is why in my last book, the great convergence, I decided to start the book by quoting a very wise speech that Bill Clinton gave.

I'm about to mention Yale in 2003 and this is what Bill Clinton said that if you believe that maintaining absolute power, control and movement, absolute freedom of movement and sovereignty is important to the future of your country, There's nothing inconsistent about the United States being the greatest and most powerful country in the world now that we have the juice and we're going to use it, but then he added a butt, Bill Clinton, he said, but if you think we should try to create a world with rules , associations and behavioral habits in which we would like to live when we are no longer here.

You would no longer be the world's military, political and economic superpower, so you wouldn't do that, so Bill Clinton was very wise to say, "As long as the United States thinks it's going to be number one, yes, we can continue to undermine multilateral institutions, but if we can". If we envision a world in which we are number two, then surely the United States is interested in strengthening multilateral rules and processes, but the strange thing is that Bill Clinton only gave the speech once and never repeated it again because, according to what I have been told, said, it is political suicide.

The United States talks about the United States being number two, so most politicians tend to deviate from that possibility, but I think the time has come for the United States to think very seriously about a world in which it could become number two and where China could become number one. Surely the interests of the United States change dramatically and that is why if the United States wants to see the emergence of a China that complies with global multilateral rules and processes, the best way to do so is not by giving speeches or saying eloquent words about how the global system in the best way. you achieve it through your deeds and here, of course, I will conclude by briefly mentioning the latest episode that has occurred in relations between the United States and China and that, of course, as you know, is the Chinese decision to establish an Asian bank of investment in infrastructure. which the united states unwisely decided to oppose and as you know and this is in many ways a sign of the times in the past, a veto by washington d.c would have meant that all allies would have firmly supported the united states and the United States the veto would have remained, but even to my surprise, the first country to break that veto was the United States' number one ally, which is the United Kingdom, and that is a sign of the times in which countries are preparing for a world in which the United States will no longer be number one, so if you want that world to be peaceful and orderly, the time has come for the United States to ask a very simple question: Would the United States be comfortable living in a world where China behaves just like the United States? did it when it was a sole superpower thank you thank you kishore um so now we have time for questions as you all know there are microphones in four locations one here one there one there and the hallmarks of a good parent question.

At the Kennedy School it has three characteristics, one is identified, the second is short and has only one period and the third ends with a question mark, so why don't we start there? Good evening sir, my name is Nico, I am a one-year student here at Kennedy School. I am also a co-founder of the future society at the kennedy, a new student club and my question refers to the role of

china

, the future of china in the middle east, we have seen the middle. This has been the big area of ​​tension for the last few decades and I was surprised to see if I remember correctly that the first trip of the newly elected Egyptian president, Mohamed Morsi at that time, was to go to China, not the United States.

Which I personally saw as a greatsignal and I was wondering if you could share with us your perspective on how the Middle East region might change in this new era of Chinese rise. Thank you. If you said yes, go ahead, I want to say that you know the Actually, this is a very difficult question to answer because I want to say that the tragedy of the Middle East is that it is the great exception in a world, as I try to demonstrate in a great convergence which is actually thriving and doing very well and because That region is a big exception and, to be very honest with you, it has a very dysfunctional dynamic.

It is a very difficult region to have any type of long-term postural plants. I am very sure that the Chinese want to see stability in the Middle East. but the chinese will never try to play the role of the united states, which is to go in there and intervene directly and try to influence political developments, whether within countries, like with the invasion of Iraq, or in relations between countries, etc Go ahead so and so when the Chinese emerge the one thing they won't try to do is try to replicate American policies in the Middle East so the next question is here keep in mind there are microphones here and here and since I'm just hanging around If you're in line, go to one of the other microphones Hello, my name is Patrick um Thank you very much for this very thoughtful and inspiring talk as a German I try to be the diplomat between the United States and China so my question is how can millennials? contribute to, as Kissinger would say, a peaceful coexistence between the United States and China, uh, I think millennials have a huge contribution to make and the first thing they should do is read my book, the great convergence, uh, I'll tell you, I'll tell you.

I will tell. What I'm making here is a serious thing: I'm selling my book, but I'm also making a very serious point: the one key point that many people haven't understood is that there are many ways in which the world has fundamentally changed, but One Way Where it has fundamentally changed is that I use a simple metaphor of a ship to explain this change in the past when Seven billion people live on 193 separate ships, it was as if they lived on 130 separate ships with captains and crews looking after each ship and rules. to make sure the ships didn't collide.

That's the old world order. Now what has happened is that the world has shrunk and become small and densely interdependent, so the seven billion people in the world no longer live in 193 separate boats. The seven billion people literally live in 193 separate cabins on the same ship, but you only have captains and crews taking care of each one. cabin and no captain or crew takes care of the global ship as a whole and that is why there is a global financial crisis, that is why there is global warming, that is why there is global terrorism, that is why there are also global pandemics, so I think the problem with my generation is that we've gotten so used to the idea that the only way to solve the world's problems is to get independent sovereign countries to talk to each other and solve the problems, but the world has changed so much that Our ideas about how to handle it The world of tomorrow is still limited by 90, in fact, it is limited by the Westphalian concept of the 17th century, so we, the millennials, have to persuade the leaders of all countries that things that make us interdependent in the world are far greater than the things that divide us. and you have to find a way to throw away all the textbooks you use at Harvard Kennedy School and write new textbooks, so it's very clear, we should put your number one textbook here, please, I'm a member of mid-career. student here at the kennedy school and I'm a big fan of yours, I'm so glad to see you, my question is, I mean, I've been following your readings and Thomas Friedman and Farid Zakaria, they all talk about the post-American world.

When you look at the top 20 universities in the world, not a single university is from China or at least the top 10 universities, there are none from China. You see that universities are not like stadiums and you are preparing for the Olympic games. It takes you 10 years to prepare the stadiums. For example, look at institutions like Harvard or Yale, you know it has taken 300 years to establish institutions like Harvard, how does China plan to fill that void of universities? Because, like you, you talk so religiously about the power of higher education institutions, so how's it going for China? address that issue if you are going to be the number one power in the world when not a single university in China ranks only among the top 10 universities in the world yes, well, it is since then that I see many, I have some questions yes no It doesn't matter, I'll go first to give very brief and quick answers.

I am pleased to report that about two or three weeks ago the Institute of International Education in New York published a new book called Asia as the Next Higher Education. superpower and the introductory essay was co-written by me and the fellow author uh synchronization by the chancellor please read that essay because it actually gives you a lot of data to talk about trend lines yes it is true that the best largest universities in the world The world is still in America, so it will take some time, but the trend line is very powerful in terms of developing new universities, higher education institutions, etc., but the second point, which is a very critical point that I must highlight here. is that the United States has been remarkably generous to the world by training the world's elites in American universities and I always say that one of the reasons why East Asia has defied all conventional wisdom and why East Asia remains peaceful is that East Asian elites, including the Japanese, Koreans, Chinese, Taiwanese, Indonesians, Thais, Singaporeans and Malaysians, have all studied at American universities and you know what

happens

, they use the same concepts, They understand each other and get along well.

This is a notable contribution that American universities have made strides toward peace in East Asia that no one has fully recognized, so in fact it is good for the world for the United States to retain the best universities, as long as it continues training the best minds from the rest of the world in these universities. Up here, thank you very much. My name is Peter Wu. I am a third year student at Harvard University. My question is: when or if China

becomes

number one? What is the future of Hong Kong? In the future of Taiwan. Well, I think you'll both do very well.

I mean, and for the simple reason that you know there is what I call a rising tide of prosperity. In the region they will now have short-term political challenges. I mean, Hong Kong unfortunately never developed the art of managing and resolving political disputes and so on, so it is going through a painful learning phase and in the same way, I think in Taiwan there may be political problems in the short term , but overall both will remain more or less autonomous economic entities that benefit from the growth of the region and I want to emphasize that since I come from Singapore and Singapore and Hong Kong are seen as competitors all the time, it is actually in the national interest of Singapore see Hong Kong prosper and succeed because we need competition from another city state and therefore we can do just as well here hi my name is chi um last name jai I work for the internal think tank unit of a large American company um thank you for presenting a view that may not be for the sophisticated audience here at the Kennedy School, but I think maybe In the US in general, that's a little different.

I also follow the non-Western press, specifically the Chinese one, and I think the point of view you presented is quite normal from the point of view of non-Western press coverage, but if we look at the average Western press and public discourse here and therefore the politics here, that point of view is perhaps strange. As you point out with the Belgrade embassy bombing, we can actually have the United States and China looking at things from two totally different angles, so my question is how can we close that public perception gap and then move towards relations? more harmonious bilateral relations.

Yeah, I mean, I have to say it's a very difficult question because as I get older, things surprise me less and less. You know it's pretty normal. but one thing that really surprised me is that on the one hand, the United States clearly has the freest media in the world, the best financial newspapers, the best financial television stations in the world, but I can tell you this, you know how As someone who travels to these 30 40 countries a year, when I come to the United States and go to my hotel room at the Charles Hotel and turn on the television, I feel like I've been cut off from the rest of the world and literally from the insularity of the United States.

The speech is really scary and oh my god this is also true by the way I told this to my friends there anyway in the New York Times this is true the New York Times this is true the Washington Post, this is true, the wall. street journal there is an incestuous and self-referential discourse among these journalists and so on, and they reinforce each other's perspectives and end up misunderstanding the world because you know the key point I emphasize is that the era of Western domination of world history was a 200 aberration years that is coming to an end and as a result one has to learn to understand non-Western perspectives in the world and it is actually quite frightening that in many ways you find American intellectuals behind intellectuals even in Serbia where I just was or in Greece or in Istanbul because they are much more aware of what is happening in the world than most American intellectuals.

I don't know how to solve that problem right here. Thank you. My name is race. I am a middle-aged student. running candidate for MP here and also from malaysia, so both malaysia and singapore and east asian countries have benefited enormously from china's economic rise, we trade with china, we benefit from that, but there is also the specter of security, China's nine dash claim in the South China Sea, you know, there are some skirmishes along the way and also China's increasing militarization is increasing the defense budget, so my question is: I think the world The whole thing is looking to see if China is true to its rhetoric of peaceful rise, but particularly relevant to East Asia because we are very close and we are directly affected by this, so what is your opinion on the rise of China not only as an economic power but also potentially as a military power?

Yes, again, very quickly number one overall, there is no doubt that China has been growing peacefully, but for some strange reason and I would say in the years 2010 to 2012 or 13, China began to make serious mistakes in its foreign policy. The big mistake he made, for example, was when the Japanese arrested the captain of a Chinese ship. fishing boat the Chinese put enormous pressure on Japan to release the captain and they succeeded and then they foolishly apologized to Japan and I told my Chinese friends that they already humiliated the Japanese by forcing them to release the captain Chinese fishing boat why what to humiliate them more?

By asking for an apology, then, as you know, they made mistakes in the South China Sea and, for example, at the ASEAN foreign ministers' meeting in July 2012. In Phnom Penh, Cambodia, the countries of the ASEAN wanted to use the usual reference to the South China Sea. China pressured the president of Cambodia to block it and then for the first time in 47 years, the ASEAN countries failed to produce the long boring joint statement due to Chinese pressure, so they made serious mistakes, but what What surprises me is how quickly they learn from mistakes and I can tell you that the biggest support is that one of the most surprising things I did in 2014 was that two different Chinese think tanks invited me to Beijing and in a fully recorded conversation they only asked me one question. question, please tell me what mistakes China has made in its foreign policy and I was there.

That surprised me because you know I've never been invited to Washington DC to talk about mistakes in American foreign policy, but I'm invited to Beijing, I mean. That's a sign of the times, that's how different the world is today, so I think and I think the Chinese want to emphasize one point: the Chinese themselves have not clearly defined what kind of power they want to be and are divided by contradictory. impulses and that's how we react to them, how we act as a role model for them, that will make a big difference and here in the military area, I can tell you a key point, I still say that it is now in the national interest of the United States to stop it .

An aggressive navy patrolling 12 miles off the coast of China because if you do that in 20 years there will be an aggressive Chinese navy patrolling 12 miles off the coast of California. Let's not push for that. Let's work for a new world where we no longer have to usethe army. and i think at the end of the day there will be no war between the us and china why not gradually reduce military competition i think it can be done right here thank you thank you david and thank you for the great presentation my my name is xing chai zhang i am from china it is a great honor to have this opportunity to speak to ask questions i am the founder of my lab tea company and my question is you are talking about mr xi jinping and they are talking about uh our purpose is to revive our culture so what do you think is the core culture of China and how China can contribute to the world and what can we learn from other civilizations through this process?

Thank you very much, well I suspect there are many more experts in this room on Chinese culture and civilization, but I can tell you that there are obviously many roots of wisdom in traditional Chinese culture and, in fact, I hope you know that if you look back in China's longest history. In the last two thousand years, it's really surprising to see how few military adventures the Chinese have had overseas, and in general, as you know, within the Chinese Confucian spirit, the guy who is a soldier is at the bottom of the list. value chain. maybe developing an ethos where the military is not so important is one possible thing that can come out of Chinese culture and civilization, but you will see things in many areas, for example in the medical area, for example, I think medicine china will become It's becoming more and more important and just as you know, Western medicine looks at the human body and tries to slice it and looks at your kidney and looks at your liver and looks at your heart, the Chinese look at the whole system of the body and say Come on to discover the whole system and I think that in that sense, as Chinese medicine rejuvenates, it will also make a development, so there are many other places like this and Chinese poetry, Chinese painting, all of that will return in the future a lot. in a stronger way so that you really see one of the happiest things that I hope for, for example, in the next 20 years, is that there will be not one but many important Asian cultural renaissances in the world and one of them will be from China, will you?

TRUE? over here thank you very much hi my name is subin kim I'm a student at harvard law school um thank you for coming to talk to us today was a great conference um some say that aiib is um in a sense china a stepping stone towards um possibly undermining the position of the US dollar as a reserve currency and preparing itself as the new reserve currency for the world or at least as a competitive alternative. I am curious to know your response to such arguments. Oh I guess I don't think the AIIB is a step towards replacing the US dollar as the global reserve currency it's actually that the Chinese basically use the aib on the one hand to find a use for the money they have and on the other hand also there is a demand in asia for more infrastructure even the adb has estimated that asia needs seven trillion dollars in infrastructure and that is what it is using its money for, but at the same time I agree with you that the chinese have started to think about how long they will be able to depend on the US dollar as the global reserve currency because traditionally the global currency the reserve currency is always the reserve currency of the number one economic power in the world.

Now China is not yet in nominal terms the number one economic power, but in five years, ten years, depending on your guesses and what China's growth rates will be. the world's number one economic power, let's say ten years from now, and then in that world, if you have a world where China is the world's number one economic power and the US dollar remains the global reserve currency, that will be a contradiction. important global, so it is In fact, it is better for us to find a solution to that global contradiction before it becomes a big problem because it will definitely be a big problem in 10 years right here.

Yes, my name is Charles Data. I am a student here at the Kennedy School. Arguably, in the era of the American superpower one could argue that democracy is the primary value that the United States has been pushing around the world. How about we imagine the day when China will be a superpower? What do you think will be the main agenda that will be promoted? all over the world, okay, let me start with the good news: no country in the world will be asked to establish a communist party. I guarantee you that I truly believe that in the long run China itself will eventually become a democracy.

Destiny is not in doubt. what you take is only the root and the moment, and I can tell you that the Chinese learned a lot from the collapse of the Soviet communist party because the Soviet Union went overnight from a communist system to a democracy the implosion of the Russian economy became smaller than Belgium infant mortality rates went up life expectancy went down and the Chinese saw that and said we don't want to see that in China so they won't make an immediate transition to democracy, but in the long term I think that they will move in that direction, but unlike the United States of America, the Chinese do not believe in proselytizing their beliefs, they do not believe that they have to be copied or emulated to be successful and they also believe that it is much better for people to admire and respect them. by their actions instead of paying attention to their words, so in a sense we will have a very different world when the number one power in the world is no longer a missionary power in the world right here, technological institution downriver um my question is similar to the previous one that was just asked, I think your point is very well understood that you learn to behave when you are number one by looking at the person who is now number one.

We are good to our parents so that our children take care of us in our old age, but how many years after China becomes number one? Do you think there would be true freedom of the press or that artists would have freedom or that the lama of Delhi could come to Tibet? How will that really happen with the communist dynasty you praise and can only get? By the way, in Cambridge, well, you know, the question of freedom in China, I think it's a very critical question, you know, I first went to China in 1980 and I came to Beijing to start with, there were no skyscrapers, they were big . roads there were no cars only bicycles people who walked people at that time could not have the freedom to choose where to live where to work what to wear you know, no, no, there is no type of personal freedom today you go to China, the Chinese can choose where live where to work what to study what to wear where to go and you know when I first went to China 1980 no, there was not a single Chinese tourist leaving China last year 100 million Chinese went abroad freely and one hundred million Chinese returned to china freely now if there is no freedom in china if china was this oppressive despotic state a hundred million chinese would return to china so clearly there has been an explosion of personal freedoms in china on a scale that the chinese people have not properly experienced Now you mentioned difficult things like the dalai lama and I agree with you that China should deal with the dalai lama, but isn't it shocking that the united states of america, which is the free society in the world, somehow, in many ways, in They actually prevented some Islamic scholars from coming to teach in American universities just 10 years ago, that is shocking, and all I can tell you is that no country is perfect, all countries have to learn to improve.

I want to take advantage of my position here to ask you a question. The question that no one else seemed to ask, but as you yourself asked rhetorically, is that after Lee Kuan Yew, can Singapore survive? You know, my favorite answer is to buy the book, no, actually I did, that's generally not an acceptable answer here, I know, I know, I know. No, I actually launched a book three weeks ago in Singapore called Can Singapore Survive? But actually the answer I give is very simple. The probability, of course, is that Singapore will survive. I mean, Singapore won't just survive.

Singapore will do very well. because you know that mr lee kuan yew and the founding leaders of singapore created some of the strongest institutions in the world in some areas, we, the mental quality of the singapore civil service, i think is number one in the world, the mental quality of the singapore judiciary is also probably number one in the world the quality of the singapore army is probably in the top 10 in the world the singapore education system is already ranked in the top three or four in the world we have the best airport in the world the best functioning port in the world, so we have created an entire ecosystem of excellence in Singapore and with that ecosystem of excellence, Singapore is prepared to take advantage of an important historic opportunity that is presented to it because just as London served the European century and New York served the American century, the one city in all of Asia that is comfortable with all the major civilizations of Asia with the Chinese civilization with the Indian civilization with the Islamic civilization and also with the Western civilization is Singapore, so that Singapore will become the New York of the Asian century, so it is a great time to come. ahead for Singapore, but okay, right there.

My name is ihabel gamel. I am a mid-career student from a conflict zone in the Middle East. My question to you is: Do you have any doubts about China's economic goals in the future for the number to increase? one is based on a wonderful story of growth of eight percent year on year yes, demographically, there are challenges, there are many challenges in the economy, do you see the story really continuing to become the nominal number one in the world? Yes, I'm very glad you raised that question because I've been here for 48 hours and I have to say that almost everyone I met at Harvard the first question they asked me when we talked about China is: can China sustain its economic growth? and of course there may be a massive slowdown in China they could grow at three four percent or whatever so that's possible but if I were a betting man I'm willing to bet with all of you that I think that China will be able to sustain seven percent growth now.

There is a very good reason why the Chinese have decided to slow down their economic growth because they are now shifting from one economic growth model to another economic growth model that used to rely heavily on export-led growth. They don't do it anymore because they are no longer the big markets in the West that they can rely on, they are trying to switch to domestic consumption that grows and takes time to do and if you are turning a fast train around a corner it is better to slow down and do that and secondly, if you look at the amount of investment that China has made in infrastructure, the world-class infrastructure that China has built in its ports, airports, roads, railways, etc., that kind of world-class infrastructure The world economy is paying dividends, and the Chinese Communist Party is, in many ways, one of the most meritocratic organizations in the world, and the mental quality of China's top political leaders has never been as good as it is today if you have a government with staff. by remarkably good minds taking advantage of world class infrastructure, I would say the possibility of maintaining good growth is there and within Asia, by the way, China is big, but even the Chinese have 1.3 billion people, but in total.

In Asia there are 3.5 by 4 billion people, that market is also becoming more integrated, so they will also benefit from the integration of that region, so there are many other sources of growth besides the export of that growth that they had in the past. If I were a betting man, I'd say they can sustain the seven percent growth. I'm afraid we have time for only two more questions. Hello, my name is Jack Mulhern. I am a former tour guide at the John. from the kennedy presidential library. I just had a quick question. It's a great honor to have you here first of all, but I went to law school about six months ago and Tommy, the US ambassador to Singapore, posited a theory that 11 times. one country has always been on top and has always been replaced in human history by the number two country.

I'm just wondering if this is inevitable because of what I've noticed China is doing: they're buying up factories in Indiana. They are producing rare earth elements that we need for our cell phones and our F-14 and F-16 fighter jets and so on, and I'm not saying they're not benign, I'm just saying this is what's happening and so I wonder if It is inevitable that the country that will always be number two will replace the country that is now economically number one. Well, I'm not Tommy Ko, by the way, uh, he's a Singapore ambassador, formerly Singapore invested in the US, in fact, he's a brilliant guy.

I succeeded him as ambassador to the UN. I mean, of course, it's never inevitable that number two will surpass number one, as you know, itJapan was supposed to overcome. And I see that Professor Ezra Vogel is gone, but he wrote the famous book. To say that Japan is number one, uh, and the Japanese never became number one, that

happens

from time to time and it is conceivable that China will not become number one, it is conceivable, but you know the probability is very clear, you know if you have a country with a population of 1.3 billion people chinese and a country of 300 million people united states if the average chinese can perform at the level of the average american in 25 years china will have a bigger economy and if it has any doubt about the ability of the Chinese mind to do so Well, look at the test scores of Chinese students at any major American university.

Look at the list of PhDs who come to pick them up and you see the success of Chinese intellectuals. So what's happening here, by the way, is that you know, I always say that We know that Western education was developed for the Western mind, but one thing that we haven't noticed is that in the last 10 years, when you take Western education and you combine it with an Asian mind, including the Chinese mind, it has an explosive effect, so Asians are thriving. with Western education and inevitably this is going to drive China's rise greatly and I am very confident that the average Chinese can perform at more than 25% of the level of the average American and that is why I believe that China will have a more big. right here I'm afraid last question hello my name is mabo andy salam a business school student to thank you for being here tonight my question is how would you most likely characterize the United States and China specifically refusing to participate? the 15 to 25 year range where while China will probably be number one, the United States will probably also be a close number, yes it is, of course it is possible that the United States will be a close number two to China, but already you know, many.

Of the projections that I have seen, I will give you, for example, Goldman Sachs has frigidly projected that by 2050 the number one economy in the world will be China and I have been talking a lot about China, the number two economy in the world. would be India and every United States would be number three, so it's really surprising that so few Americans talk about that world. It is no longer possible to talk about being number two. It's even harder to talk about being number three. But, frankly, that's what it is too. This is going to happen, you know, I wrote an essay recently where I said that if you look at the most successful ethnic community in the United States, everyone I would have thought of in the past would have been the Japanese or the Chinese or the Koreans. or the Jews, but the most successful ethnic community in the United States by far is the Indian ethnic community and if you look at a statistic, if the average Indian in India can achieve half the per capita income of the average Indian in the United States, India's GDP would not. it will be 2 trillion but 25 trillion and if you go to India like I do, the feeling of optimism about the future is phenomenal, so I have been talking a lot about China China China, but actually there is another more important Asian story: there is also India and other states doing very well in that world of tomorrow is simply by pure mathematical logic that the amount of space that 300 million Americans have carved out for themselves politically and economically when they represent less than five percent of the world's population has been phenomenal, it has been exceptional, but it cannot continue because the rest of the world has stopped performing poorly and if they start performing normally and the United States will continue to be a strong, dynamic and successful country, but its relative share of global GNP will only can reduce demobility.

Thank you so much. I must say: We are going to have a reception here in a moment, so those of you would like to stay and chat a little longer. Key Shore has a flight, I think last week here around 8:15, but at least it will be here for a while for those of you who didn't get a chance to ask, thanks again.