It was called the Middle Kingdom, a self-absorbed and xenophobic empire. Its massive indifference to the outside world remained in place for millenniums, through dynasties and revolutions. Until, suddenly, the communists in Beijing cast aside their Marxist zeal and set their country on the road to capitalism. Only 15 years later, China -- with a fifth of the globe's population -- is a candidate superpower, more involved in international life than ever before in its history. The impact of its emergence is so profound that scholars are predicting relations between China and the U.S. will shape the world in the 21st century.
For that reason, Bill Clinton and his advisers regarded his talks with Chinese President Jiang Zemin in Seattle last week as the most important of the summit with 15 Asian and Pacific leaders. Their hour-plus session was the highest-level contact between the U.S. and China since the massacre of pro- democracy demonstrators in Beijing in 1989. Though it was essentially a getting-to-know-you meeting and made no progress on bilateral issues, Clinton said afterward that he and Jiang "agreed on the need to work on improving our relationship."
Like Presidents before him, Clinton has learned that China is just too big to bully and too important to ignore. With relations getting worse almost from the time he took office, Clinton had to face the real possibility that if Congress refuses to renew China's most-favored-nation tariff status next June, it could lead to a serious, even dangerous, breach with the world's next superpower.
There are compelling reasons for the U.S. to pay attention to China. While the country ran an $18.3 billion trade surplus with the U.S. in 1992, in the process it bought $7.5 billion in U.S. exports, which meant jobs for thousands of Americans. To curb the proliferation of nuclear weapons and missiles, Washington has to entice Beijing into new and better-enforced arms control agreements. China's cooperation will also be essential if any international action -- diplomatic or military -- is taken to halt North Korea's push to develop nuclear weapons. The Clinton Administration hopes that what it calls "enhanced engagement" with Beijing will enable them to talk through such contentious issues without endangering the entire relationship.
China's leap forward is still hampered by its rigid politics -- and the prospect that the system could soon change dramatically. The man who was not there in Seattle but who figuratively sat in on all the meetings was Deng Xiaoping, China's senior leader and chief reformer. Deng, now 89 and very frail, is China's last emperor -- the tail end of the charismatic generation of military and political leaders who held power alone, and he is not likely to rule China much longer.
As Deng slips away -- "going to meet Marx," he jests -- the key question is whether his economic reforms will remain in place or be overturned by elderly hard-liners who survive him. Can the Communist Party, with waning legitimacy and faith, provide the stability to keep the vast country on track and under control? Can China, like neighboring Singapore or South Korea, strike a lasting balance between authoritarian politics and free-for-all capitalism?