China is a rising global power with enormous military and economic capabilities, three delegates said at the "Strait Talk" symposium lecture "China: The New 800-pound Gorilla?" held in Smith-Buonnano 106 Saturday. However, the panelists - like many student delegates - disagreed about the implications of China's rising position in the global order for the balance of U.S.-China-Taiwan relations.
The panel was one of a series of events organized as part of "Strait Talk," a week-long, student-run and student-focused symposium aimed at generating discussion among those involved in the dispute over Taiwan's status. Ten students from top universities in Taiwan and China were selected to come to Brown for the event to bring diverse perspectives and to enhance cultural, intellectual and social exchanges, according to Annie Wang '07, speakers coordinator of the symposium. Five Brown students were also selected through an application process to serve as delegates to the symposium.
Robert Ross, a professor of political science at Boston College; Jonathan Pollack, chair of Asia Pacific studies at the Naval War College; and Don Lee, chair of the Formosa Foundation, an advocacy group for Taiwan, were chosen as panel speakers because together they provided "as diverse a spectrum as possible" on the issue, according to Johnny Lin '07, a member of the steering committee of the symposium.
From Lee's perspective, China's growth poses a major political threat to Taiwan's stability. There is a tension in Taiwan between nationalism and a strong desire for peace, he said, and both are threatened by "China's military build-up directed towards Taiwan."
"The U.S. doesn't have a policy that reflects reality," he said, citing the United States' current "One China" policy that "supports the status quo." This policy causes miscalculations for the Taiwanese, he said, who do not know whether the United States would protect Taiwan if the Chinese were to attack.
Instead, Lee supported a "One China, One Taiwan policy," under which the United States would overtly express support for Taiwan and thereby give Taiwan time to figure out how to deal with China. The United States has good reason to back Taiwan, he said, because of its status as a democracy and its vital role in the international economy as a hub of computer chip production.
Lee said that he was not advocating independence but rather wanted to find an alternative to Taiwan's absorption into China because "the majority of people don't want to be part of China," he said.
For Ross, China's growth has not posed a major threat to Taiwan politically. "Taiwan's democracy is working very well," he said, adding that "the U.S. commitment to defend Taiwan is more credible today than any time since the Cold War." Furthermore, he doubted that tension between the two nations was rising, as he said that Taiwanese attitudes toward the mainland were becoming softer and an increasing number of people identify themselves as Taiwanese-Chinese. While he acknowledged that Taiwan is "acutely vulnerable" to China's economic power, he said that "there is no defense against economic warfare."
Ross described the main issue surrounding China's new position in the global order as one defined by economic competition with the United States that will inevitably cause the two countries to compete for power. While recognizing that the United States is "not naive or blind to the rise of China" and the U.S. defense budget is still China-oriented, a cold war is not eminent, he said.
As a whole, he emphasized that the region is increasingly stable and there is reason to see China's growing power through an optimistic lens.
Lying between the two extremes of Lee and Ross, Pollack described Taiwan as the first "virtual state" that enjoys much of the autonomy of statehood but does not hold equal recognition to a nation-state in world politics.
"Decisions about Taiwan's future should come from the people, but there are constraints," he said, noting that Taiwan's power can never match up to China's.
For Pollack, the central challenge and question posed by China's rising power is whether a mutually beneficial outcome is possible. Unlike Ross, he doubted the inevitability of adversarial U.S.-China relations, stating that the U.S. leadership has "defined a long-term enemy and it is not China."
