China-US mutual trust, respect urged to face globalization 'crossroads'

China and the United States must work together based on mutual trust and respect, recognizing the major challenges in their relationship and working toward solutions as globalization faces a crossroad following the US presidential election, according to the latest analyses.

"The pandemic continues to ravage economies and communities worldwide, globalization and its institutional pillars are really facing increased pressure and scrutiny," Wang Huiyao, president of the Center for China and Globalization, a think tank based in Beijing, said during an international forum on Wednesday.

"How will the US and China shape the trajectory of development for the next four, five years? How should China, the US and the world, including many others like the EU, Japan and ASEAN, respond to these changing dynamics?"

Wang was speaking as the moderator of the opening session of the 6th China and Globalization Forum, an annual international platform organized by the think tank. Ambassadors, international organizations and other leading representatives from the private and public sectors are attending the two-day forum's online and offline events. The conference includes topics ranging from China's economic rebound, trends and outlooks for global trade and investment, corporate development, and great power relations amid the geopolitical upheavals of 2020 and beyond.

At the session themed "Globalization at Crossroads: US Election and its impact on China and the World", leading US scholar Graham Allison said the relationship between the world's largest and second-largest economies "will be the defining relationship for globalization and the international order going forward".

New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, who has written extensively on globalization issues, said the world is "flatter than ever", but with safety buffers failing to sustain greater interconnecting nodes in the economic, financial and other sectors, resulting in global crises ranging from terrorism to the COVID-19 pandemic.

"In terms of climate, what are we doing? We're removing buffers. Removing mangroves that limit the impacts of storms, hurricanes and storms that come from the sea. We're removing rainforests, we're pumping C02 into the atmosphere and reducing the resilience of our climate system," Friedman said.

"Unless we find a way to provide global governance in a world where there is no global government, global governance to wisely manage the buffers and the flow between all these nodes that are being connected, we are simply inviting the next pandemic," he said.

Ronnie Chan, chairman of Hang Lung Properties, one of Hong Kong's oldest developers, and co-chairman of the Asia Society, said political de-globalization led by US isolationism is still a major worry.

"America has lost credibility and moral authority in front of many of its allies," he said.

"No one can cut down the credibility of the United States, hard-earned during WWII, and the economic engine it served as after that, except one country – and that is the United States, surely not China," Chan said.

"China cannot, does not want to, nor will it replace the United States as the leader of the world. So we are facing a fragmented world, which makes me very uncomfortable," Chan said.

"I have always believed that China's rise was in the interest of the Chinese people, its neighbors and the world, including the United States," said John Thornton of the Brookings Institution, a US think tank.

The Trump administration has in fact "done the US and the world a good turn by exposing and laying bare, sometimes in unappealing ways, underlying realities that for too long had been allowed to persist through inertia, a bias to the status quo, an understandable desire not to risk rocking the boat", Thornton said.

"The practical result of this has been to accelerate the inevitable evolution of the US-China relationship. The relationship today, who some see as in peril, I see it as much more real, honest and ripe to become constructive, forward leaning and mutually beneficial to both countries in the world," he said.

Zhu Guangyao, China's former vice-minister of finance, highlighted the importance of getting the global economy back on track in the face of the pandemic.

"We've had many, many years of cooperation. We have different opinions and that's normal. However, we must base each country's interests on a global view, for peace and development through real dialogue," he said.

"We can work together, the Chinese people and American people, based on mutual respect, because these are two great peoples and two great countries … turning challenges into opportunities," Zhu said.