Kissinger hopes for a more transparent China

Former US national security adviser Henry Kissinger hopes that under new leadership, China will be “more transparent” and its opaque legal system “more predictable”. China’s ruling Communist Party is undertaking its once-in-a-decade leadership transition. Kissinger, who played a prominent role in American foreign policy between 1969 and 1977, is credited with being the person who opened America up to China.

Kissinger said he expects to see transformations in the Chinese economy and society as well as foreign policy in the coming decade. “I think it (China) will be more transparent, its legal system will be more predictable,” Kissinger was quoted as saying by China Daily as the Communist Party of China is poised to announce a new leadership on Wednesday at the end of a week-long behind-the-door meetings here.

“But it has huge adjustments to make,” Kissinger, 89, said. He said that one of the major transformations in China over the next 10 years will be the urbanisation of more than 400 million farmers, which will test the country’s infrastructure, economy and even traditional value systems. Kissinger, still thought of as an influential public figure, noted that China’s future generation will be unique: most of them raised in one-child families and the first generation in hundreds of years that has never experienced upheaval.

In foreign policy, he forecast that as China spurs domestic consumption and depends less on exports, it will be less dependent on foreign markets. “I can imagine a transformation, I think that is certain,” he said, adding that the US should not expect China to follow its path.

“What we must not demand or expect is that they will follow the mechanisms with which we are more familiar. It will be a Chinese version, but it will be, I believe, more transparent”. The CPC made clear before the 18th Party Congress opened on Thursday that it is determined to further enhance reforms at all levels. The Party will uphold the policy of reform and opening-up and set out specific goals, missions and guidelines for development, Cai Mingzhao, the spokesman for the congress, told reporters in Beijing last week. The reforms will include improving the economic system, market mechanisms, the basic distribution system, the socialist democratic system, cultural management and social management, he said.

According to Kissinger, “if you look at their own reform agenda, the things they have stated that they want to achieve in the next 10 years, you know that China will undergo enormous changes”.

During this period, he orchestrated the opening of relations with the People’s Republic of China. In 1971, his talks with Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai concluded with a rapprochement between the United States and the People’s Republic of China. Kissinger also said he believes that because China’s new leaders will have their hands full with domestic issues, it is unlikely that Beijing will have “great foreign adventures or confrontations with the United States” on its agenda.

Because China-US relations have become more complicated in recent years, Kissinger urged both to exercise “patience and understanding” to avoid conflict.

“A conflict between China and the United States would be a disaster for both countries. And it would be impossible to describe what a victory would look like,” he said. He added that firtunately, China’s policy has been the least partisan foreign policy of the eight US administrations since 1971, which have pursued essentially the same course. “So I am confident that this will be continued, and, after all, relations with China now are good,” he said.

“What we need to do now is to find something on which we can genuinely cooperate, not just mitigating problems that arise, something that is done on both sides of the Pacific and that engages the best minds of both sides on some common project”.

(With PTI inputs)

Related LinksHome

Retail FDI will make India’s trade deficit worse
China plays down row over disputed map
New leadership promises to transform China
US wants defence ties with both India, China