Beijing Review: The past decades have seen China-U.S. relations grow and change. What are the key features of different stages of the bilateral relationship?
I divide the timeline of the modern relationship into three distinct parts. The first part captures the 1970s and 1980s, and the early part of the 1990s. I call that “a marriage of convenience” where both countries turned to each other after their own periods of economic, political and social turmoil. They came together—sparked initially by the visit of President Richard Nixon to China in 1972 and then reinforced by Deng Xiaoping’s visit to the U.S. in 1979. They offered each other important answers to difficult growth problems, with U.S. demand for Chinese goods providing benefits both for U.S. consumers and
