Sino-US youth exchanges are vital – and Hong Kong has a role to play
- Amid threats such as climate change, more exchanges and dialogues between young people in the US and China can help forge trust
- Hong Kong also has a crucial role to play when it comes to connecting youth across the Pacific, owing to its unique concentration of intellectual capital
The status quo is undoubtedly worrying. Only 211 Americans studied in mainland China between 2021 and 2022, with a slight rebound to 700 in 2023 – a downturn from around 11,000 before Covid-19. In 2023, for the first time in 15 years, China was no longer the top source of international students in the United States, overtaken by India.
Secondly, taking a youth-oriented angle to Sino-American dialogue circumvents the more politicised fault lines in the ongoing conversation. Youth-led sports and cultural partnerships, social media-powered dialogue and even research collaboration at high school and university levels could go a long way towards breaking down barriers.
The second requires educational institutions and youth associations to initiate more theme-specific working meetings and joint ventures. Chinese and American advocates and policymakers working on youth-related issues should diversify away from youth dialogues and shift into more focused collaborations.
Finally, Hong Kong has a crucial role to play, given our unique concentration of top academic institutions and intellectual capital. Not only can we play host to many critical non-governmental conversations, but we must strengthen our position as a foothold for American scholars and students who are seeking a more unfettered, balanced understanding of China.
President Xi has declared that China is ready to invite 50,000 young Americans to China. Hong Kong should pledge to take in at least 5,000 of them. This would also go a long way towards dispelling the exaggerated and often inaccurate portrayals of both the mainland and Hong Kong by segments of the international media.
This behoves us to keep our intellectual, academic and media environment as open as possible. We must steer clear of parochialism and self-censorship to show that “two systems” can serve China by articulating a more complete depiction of “one country” to the world.
This is all the more important for the Sino-American relationship. The future of China and the US may be shaped by the decisions of those who rose to power yesterday. Yet it will be defined by those who are coming of age today, and preserved through their ability to work together for a better tomorrow.
Brian Wong is an assistant professor in philosophy at the University of Hong Kong, and a Rhodes Scholar and adviser on strategy for the Oxford Global Society