Experts: Youth exchanges vital to Sino-US ties

Scholars have called for enhancing youth exchanges between China and the United States to improve the future Sino-US relations and shape the world.

They made the remarks at a seminar themed "Dialogue between Chinese and Harvard Young Scholars" held at the Chinese Academy of History in Beijing on Tuesday.

The seminar was co-hosted by the Center for Promotion of Cultural Development of Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and Grandview Institution, a Chinese think-tank.

Zhao Zhimin, secretary-general of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said enhancing academic exchanges between young scholars from China and the US is vital for promoting future Sino-US relations.

The two countries have every reason to engage in friendly interaction and win-win cooperation, and no reason to repeat the past mistakes of the Cold War confrontation; the peoples have every reason to be good friends, and no reason to be misled into hostility, he said.

This event is one of the activities of the Harvard Students' China Trek 2024. From January 14 to 21, 30 students from the Harvard Kennedy School will visit Beijing, Shanghai, and Ningbo in Zhejiang province.

"People-to-people ties and cultural exchanges have always played a stabilizing role in China-US relations," said Zhao. "The seminar hopes to seize the opportunity to deepen bilateral friendship, in line with the consensus reached by the top leaders of the two countries in San Francisco last November."

Yuan Zheng, deputy director of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences' Institute of American Studies, said the year 2024 marks the 45th anniversary of China-US diplomatic relations.

"The China-US relationship has gone through ups and downs and moved forward overall. History has already proven and will continue to prove that mutual respect, peaceful coexistence and win-win cooperation are the right way."

The current atmosphere in China and the United States is not so good, Yuan said. "We should strengthen dialogue and communication, manage differences in a constructive way, and avoid strategic miscalculation. This is very important at a time when China-US relations are at a low ebb."

The two countries still differ in many aspects, but it does not hinder both sides from seeking common ground while respecting differences to develop bilateral relations, he said.

The two sides need to find ways to strengthen cooperation in areas where we can, such as climate change, public health, anti-drug policies, and nuclear nonproliferation, etc, he added.

At the event, experts and government officials also introduced Harvard Kennedy School students to important progresses in China, such as targeted poverty alleviation, green development, and technological innovation.

The Harvard Students' China Trek has been running for more than a decade, organizing 20-30 students from Harvard University to visit China every year.