It pays to be cautious rather than bold

I used to find flying on a Chinese carrier a dreadful experience. No more. A recent non-stop flight from Los Angeles to Guangzhou on China Eastern Airlines was as smooth as silk, and the return to Los Angeles from Beijing on Air China was a delight. Okay, it was business class both ways, but friendly skies indeed!

What has happened is that in modernizing and globalizing, China is becoming increasingly competitive. The overall national upgrade applies also to the caliber of its international diplomacy. Top entrants to China's foreign service, whose schooling might well include a degree from a university like Princeton or Singapore's National University, are qualitatively competitive with their best counterparts from Japan or South Korea, or even the United States. And, generally, their level of spoken English is amazingly good.

But the Chinese historical experience is an awesome span, and one dimension not always recognized is that, notwithstanding its economic renaissance (not to mention its territorial disputes with some of its neighbors) it retains a culture that can be strikingly cautious. Even in relations with the outside world, its foreign policy tends to tack toward core national interests rather than to float big ideas or daring initiatives. Its diplomacy, day-to-day, is risk-adverse. It prefers to work with particulars rather than universals. But it is very actively involved in all manner of international organizations, sometimes contributing positive energy, practical proposals and of course funding.

China's entry into the World Trade Organization was epochal - a watershed push away from self-absorbed inwardness and into a new intensity of global entanglement. But the decision to become a member of the WTO did not come easily to China. The quick varnish of a dozen years cannot wipe away millennia.