The CIW-Lowy China Forum

The China Forum was launched in August 2011 by the Australian Centre on China in the World (CIW) and the East Asia Program at the Lowy Institute for International Policy. It aims to bring together diplomats, professionals and academics to discuss developments within China and their impact on Australia and the region.

The China Forum is a continuation in modified form of the China Forum discussion series which the Lowy Institute Executive Director Dr Michael Wesley hosted in 2010. CIW and the East Asia Program are collaborating on this initiative and plan to host once a month – in either Canberra or Sydney – a roundtable discussion related to developments within China and how they affect the region and Australia. Other institutions in Australia are also welcome to co-host a China Forum.

For more information please contact Tanya Fan at tanya.fan@anu.edu.au

China Forum Series Discussions

'Chinese Exceptionalism in the Intellectual World of China's Foreign Policy'
Dr Feng Zhang (张锋/張鋒)
Lecturer, Politics and International Studies Programme, School of Social Sciences and Humanities, Murdoch University
Tuesday 21 February 2012

Although exceptionalism is an important dimension of China's foreign policy, it has not been a subject of serious scholarly research. This chapter attempts to examine the manifestations and sources of contemporary Chinese exceptionalism and explain its implications for foreign policy. Chinese exceptionalism is defined by great power reformism, benevolent pacifism, and harmonious inclusionism. While resting on an important factual basis, it is constructed by mixing facts with myths through selective use of China's vast historical and cultural experiences. Exceptionalism does not determine policy, but by being an essential part of the worldview of the Chinese government and many intellectuals, it can become an important source for policy ideas. It can be further seen as a normative theory for China's foreign policy, as one among six major schools competing for ideational influence in China's foreign policy formation.

'Plotting the course of EU-China relations after the Great Recession: A view from Italy'
Dr Giovanni B Andornino
Associate, China Research Centre, University of Technology, Sydney
Monday 24 October 2011

Once expected to be upgraded through a Partnership and Cooperation Agreement with a more effective post-Lisbon Union, China's relations with Europe have evolved markedly since the outset of the Great Recession, but not quite in the directions that had been anticipated. While the newly established European External Action Service struggles to produce a coherent strategy towards the EU's strategic partners, China's leaders appear to be focussing on deepening bilateral relations with single European countries through growing trade and investment. As for all other aspects of the EU's role in international life, the future of its relationship with China will depend upon how the contradiction between the progressively more inter-governmental scope of the Union's legal structure and the essentially supranational practices that are being enacted to prevent its economic failure plays out.

'Two generations of North Korea's leaders and their relations with China'
Ms Wuna Reilly
Wednesday 28 September 2011

Wuna Reilly lived and worked in Dalian, China from 2001-2010, representing the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC). She re-opened the first AFSC program office in China since 1949 and served as the AFSC China and North Korea Country Representative from 2006-2010. She co-founded the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation Center (APCEC) in Dalian, partnering with North and South Korean, US, Japanese, and Chinese institutions in dialogue and cooperative projects. She was responsible for all AFSC programs in North Korea, including agricultural development projects and economic training programs for North Koreans in China, Vietnam, and North Korea. She also established programs on women's migration, conflict resolution, and cultural exchanges between the US and North Korea. She has visited North Korea over twenty-five times since 2001. She is currently studying Social Policy and Development at the London School of Economics and Political Science.

'China's Antarctic Strategy and what it tells us about Chinese Foreign Policy'
Dr Ann-Marie Brady
Associate Professor, School of Social and Political Sciences, University of Canterbury (New Zealand)
Monday 22 August 2011

China seeks a more active involvement in Antarctic and Arctic governance in keeping with its growing polar interests. In the last five years China has invested heavily in polar affairs. Many observers are concerned that China's increased polar engagement will challenge the interests of other polar nations and could cause friction among them. This talk examined China's Antarctic strategy as a framework to better understand Beijing's global ambitions and the geopolitics which help to underpin it.