Book review: Debating China, edited by Nina Hachigian

China and the United States have the single most important bilateral relationship in the world, so it is worrying that the two countries appear to spend a great deal of time talking at cross purposes.

On the subject of the Diaoyu Islands, for example, China demands territorial integrity; the US demands a peaceful and secure Pacific. The US raises the issue of human rights; China notes the importance of political stability.

Recognising this disconnect, Nina Hachigian, a senior fellow at the Centre for American Progress, has brought together leading thinkers from both sides of the US-China divide in an effort to kick-start a dialogue on a relationship that is "more important to the future of humanity" than any other.

Debating China takes a rather novel approach to the issue, pairing 10 American academics and experts with 10 Chinese counterparts. The reader is then presented with the resulting correspondence.

Beyond the introductory pleasantries, none of the participants pull their punches: "I do not think it is fair to blame China for manipulating the exchange rate," argues Yao Yang in an exchange on economics with Barry Naughton, "while failing to mention the Federal Reserve … is doing the same."

Hachigian, the volume's editor, hopes the project will help involve the broader public in the type of policy debate normally carried out behind closed doors. But if Debating China succeeds in this aim, it might actually cause the public some concern - there remains a great deal of distance between America and China on many important issues.

All too often, well-intentioned debate descends into whataboutery. America must stop trying to remould China in its own image, argues one Chinese academic; but what about continued civil rights violations, responds the American counterpart.

There remains a clear distrust between both sides, and it is concerning that even these writers - many of whom have dedicated their careers to the understanding of each other's countries - often struggle to find common ground.

This shouldn't be surprising. There are fundamental differences between the countries that make reaching a consensus on certain issues - Taiwan and currency manipulation immediately spring to mind - an impossibility.

Perhaps a more productive approach might be to create a framework in which disagreements, even major ones, cannot escalate into something much worse.

But there is still value to engagement, and it is heartening to see that not a single author deems serious conflict between China and the US as inevitable. The relationship does not have to be a zero-sum equation.

As long as this remembered, a healthy discourse, even if it includes disagreements, can only be a good thing.