I spent the last week meeting several hundred IP lawyers, people who make their living working with colleagues all over the world. You can’t spend more than two minutes in such an environment without realizing that almost everyone: 1) has business in China; and 2) has visited China personally. These days everyone, from virtually any nation around the world, has an interest in China.

Before I left to come to Boston, the news was chock full of pre-S&ED stories, detailing all the bilateral issues that representatives of the U.S. and China would discuss in Beijing during the Strategic and Economic Dialogue meetings.¹ These exciting issues would be dealt with by the so-called G2, what some folks think are the two most important nations in the world.

Well, the meetings are now over. Was any progress made? Not really, although these complex issues (e.g. currency, environment, security) will not be fixed overnight. However, some commentators are now starting to question this whole G2/S&ED format, pointing out that more progress seems to be made when the U.S. first obtains the support of the international community before attempting to pressure China towards a particular policy outcome.

Elizabeth Economy and Adam Segal at CFR believe some rethinking is in order:

Going forward, it makes the most sense to keep the S&ED, but to downsize it. The Treasury secretary and the secretary of State should continue their discussions with their Chinese counterparts about the broad strategic issues in the relationship, but everybody else should stay home. Issue-specific discussions should be carried out by individual agencies on their own timelines: The Joint Commission on Commerce and Trade will continue conducting negotiations on innovation and industrial policy will carry on in; and the Department of Energy, the EPA, and the National Science Foundation will continue their good work on energy and climate change.

Downgraded dialogues would also more closely resemble the true state of U.S.-China relations. It would be a symbol of the possibility of greater cooperation when, and if, there is a convergence of the values, interests, and capabilities of the two sides. It would recognize the importance of the bilateral relationship, but simultaneously acknowledge that less is likely to be accomplished just by Washington talking with Beijing.

With me, they are preaching to the choir. I’m already an internationalist and do not really feel comfortable when the U.S. and China sneak off to the corner of the room and talk amongst themselves, particularly on global issues like the RMB and the environment.

While there are situations where multilateral talks may bog down because of the large number of competing interests, there is a lot to be said for enlisting the international community’s support on these issues.

If there is one thing that the Chinese government likes less than being pushed around by the U.S., it’s appearing to do so in front of the home crowd. Bilateral talks lend themselves to zero-sum interpretations. The same decision that might be characterized by nationalists as “caving in” to U.S. demands might just as well be seen within an international context as playing a constructive role as a global citizen.

If the S&ED is downgraded in the future, and the G2 idea is sidelined, I wouldn’t mind at all. However, I’m not going to hold my breath. I seriously doubt that the Obama Administration will do anything that will open it up to attacks that it is not “taking China seriously.” Too bad.
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1. FYI, I’m still in Boston. Purists who look down their noses at any China blogger who isn’t in China may feel free to ignore anything I write for the next two weeks.[↩]

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