with Chinese diplomacy and relations with other countries, especially the
major powers. This is really important to both my academic experience at
SUNY Albany and my future career aspirations. Back at SUNY, I am in the
honors college and Political Science honors program, therefore, I must
conduct a senior thesis. I really had not the slightest clue what to
write about but because I did a teaching internship last summer in a more
rural area of China and had declared my minor Chinese, I decided to focus
on Chinese relations. In Professor Asal's 496z Great Ideas in Political
Science, we learned the different types of research and had to conduct a
prospectus. After MUCH research, the PATIENCE and guidance from Professor
Asal and Professor Weiss, I decided to take a challenge and focus my
thesis on the HIV Crisis in China, trying to prove that the structure of
the Chinese government has limited the role that nongovernmental
organizations can play in China, therefore, not allowing China to handle
the crisis effectively. I planned to use a case study between China's
handling of the crisis and Thailand in the same situation to show the
major differencs, especially since Thailand controlled the crisis with
help from nongovermental organizations. Thailand was a key comparative
choice because the HIV crisis in Thailand was so much worse then China so
if Thailand can get help, so can China. By proving this or acknowledging
this, we can figure out the factors of why HIV continues to spread and why
the policies have been ineffective, and how to change it. It is probably
the most challenging assignment of my college career besides the Chinese
language course, but it is what I get most excited about and what I put
the most work into. After successfully finishing my prospectus, I did an
independent study with Professor Asal on the role of nongovermental
organizations in China and I am working independently with Professor Weiss
in the fall to finish research for my thesis.
The point of that background is to show that these lectures, notes,
slides, professors, and sites in China are CRUCIAL to my research and
undersanding of what I am researching. It gives me a better understanding
of the structure of China in a way that many top journals and books cannot
do. In order to understand an environment, you must first put yourself in
that environment. I almost lost the book of lecture notes they gave us and
I was going crazy looking for it. No one understood why I was acting like
that but to me these notes are KEY to my understanding and progression of
my thesis. Also, I knew I wanted to go to law school with international
relations but with more exposure to a particular country such as China and
more actual research, I am pretty sure I want to work with China ( let's
keep our fingers crossed).
With that background, back to these seminars. We had Professor Wu Xinbo
back to back. On the first day, we discussed Chinese Diplomacy in the
21st Century. While he spoke for two hours, I understood it perfectly and
can summarize it clearly. China basically has four goals in their
diplomatic relations. 1. Economic Development ( which I believe they are
doing quite well at, dont you?) 2. Security and Stability 3. National
reunification and 4. International status. Number 3 was most interesting
to me becase Professor Wu Xinbo put heavy emphasis on the need for
urbanization and modernization because there is a huge split and uneasy
transition from the rural areas to the more modernized areas such as
Pudong, Shanghai. What has helped to modernize China is worldeEvents such
as the Olympics and the World Expo.
What gets complicated or more detailed is the four dimensions by which
these goals are reached, especially International Status. The first
dimension is relations with the major powers and the key relations in
Chinese diplomacy are Sino- US relations, Sino-Russian relations, Sino-EU
relations, Sino-Japanese relations and Sino- Indian relations. I was only
surprised to hear Sino-Indian relations but that is because I do not know
much about India at all. The next dimension dealt with relations with the
neighboring countries which was really important for security and economic
cooperation ( exports and imports from different ports and travel
connections). Relations with developing countries was probably the most
emphasized dimension and I was really surprised by that until Professor Wu
XInbo explained his reasoning. These countries are going to be most
imporant in the years to come especially with their natural resources and
market access. A particular focus was on China- African economic and
political ties and throughout his whole lecture , he really supported
African relations. I now understand why so many Africans, specifically
Nigerians, are migrating to China. Lastily, he talked about relations with
multilateral insitutions such as Chinese participation in the United
Nations, World Bank, CRIT ( China-Russian-Indian Trilateral), etc. He
believes these institutions lead to addressing common challengings facing
the world and promote a "healthy" globalization. My IMMEDIATE thought or
criticism was, "then why is China so hesistant to let in nongovermental
organizations and the United Nations to solve problems?" Before I could
really ask the question, the first criticism or hint of fear/distrust in
U.S. actions was brought up and that took up ALL my attention. Our
professor said that Xiao Bush ( "Little Bush" as in our last President)
was famous for unilateralism, which made China very concerned about the
United States because they thought it would damage international
cooperation and the U.S. would be to blame because it was a leading
support for this belief in unilateralim. With thoughts like that, I began
to understand the thought process of the Chinese government or Chinese
people. If another country has such a strong difference in relations to
institutions, why would you then let them in to help fix your own
country's problem of an HIV Crisis? Both countries must be on the same
page, especially on political issues.
This lecture was CRUCIAL to my thought process of my thesis. The next one
is specifically on New Landscape in Sino-US Relations I could not be more
excited! Hope this did not sound like a lecture and you undersand the
importance of these seminars to me ! ( I hope you did because I felt like
I learned a whole course!) Stayed tuned! Zaijian!
--
Posted By: Alicia Tambe, Shanghai, China
