Opinion | In a world on the edge of a new cold war, abandoned G2 concept for China-US ties may find its moment in the sun

Name: US Vice-President Kamala Harris addresses China threat as she kick-starts her Asia tour
Uploaded: 2022-11-08T09:18:10.000Z
Duration: 3 min 26 s
Description: US Vice-President Kamala Harris addresses China threat as she kick-starts her Asia tour

As Obama became US president in 2009, G2 was held up as a way to redefine US-China ties as a comprehensive partnership to avoid a ‘clash of civilisations’

Amid uncertainty of post-pandemic disorder it takes on fresh relevance, although focus is shifting from cooperation towards reining in adversarial tensions

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The G2 approach to geopolitics took the approach that if China were conferred near-peer status by the US, it would be more likely to play by the rules and induce cooperation rather than zero-sum competition. Photo: Shutterstock

Shi Jiangtao

Published: 5:18pm, 8 Nov 2022

The world is entering a potentially consequential two weeks, with global leaders gathering for the United Nations climate conference in Egypt this week and the G20 summit in Indonesia the next.

The fate of those events, and the entire world, probably hinges on whether Beijing and Washington cooperate as a bipolar international order returns in the wake of Russia’s protracted war in Ukraine and rancorous US-China wrangling.

Also returning is the discussion of the concept of the unofficial “G2” relationship between China and the United States that was popular in the aftermath of the 2008 global financial crisis.

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US Vice-President Kamala Harris addresses China threat as she kick-starts her Asia tour

Thirteen years ago, Beijing was unexpectedly thrust to the centre stage of international climate talks in Copenhagen around the same time the G2 concept won endorsement by Barack Obama when he first became US president.

Promoted by American geostrategist Zbigniew Brzezinski and others, it was meant to redefine US-China ties as “a comprehensive partnership” to avoid a destructive “clash of civilisations”.

Conferring near-peer status on China, the thinking went, would encourage Beijing to play by the rules and induce cooperation rather than zero-sum competition.

In retrospect, it was a missed opportunity for China. If Beijing had accepted the G2, a rare initiative of joint US-China leadership on the world stage, it could have changed the trajectory of bilateral ties and the entire world.

It largely followed a similar logic to the “responsible stakeholder” concept that had been put forward by deputy secretary of state Robert Zoellick in 2005, calling on a rising China to shoulder greater obligation for global governance and regional security.