The Foreign Service Journal, November 2003

12 F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L / N O V E M B E R 2 0 0 3 Debating America’s Role in the World A public education effort to stimu- late a national dialogue about the future of U.S. foreign policy is under way. “The People Speak: America Debates Its Role in the World” features more than 1,000 debates and discussions in communities across the U.S. during October, and a series of signature debates organized in partnership with the World Affairs Councils in major cities through early 2004. The signa- ture debates will feature leading mem- bers of the foreign policy communities. The programwas initiated by the Open Society Institute’s Cooperative Global Engagement Project in collaboration with the United Nations Foundation and the Rockefeller Brothers Fund ( http://www.opensocietypolicy center.org/html/debate.html ) . Sixteen organizations, representing the entire political spectrum, launched the debate series at a press conference at the National Press Club on Sept. 30. A Web site, The People Speak ( http://www.jointhedebate.org/ index.htm ), pr ovides all the materials needed to organize a debate, including downloadable debate “kits,” planned activities happening around the coun- try, and information on the mini-grant program that has been created to sup- port local citizens’ efforts. Additional resources include links to the Bush administration’s national security strategy document, “The National Security Strategy of the United States of America,” and a variety of indepen- dent analyses of national security issues. In June the Open Society Institute, United Nations Foundation and Rockefeller Brothers Fund financed a Council on Foreign Relations study that examines the current National Security Strategy as well as alternative ways to address the threats facing the United States. “A New National Security Strategy in an Age of Terrorists, Tyrants, and Weapons of Mass Destruction” offers three diferent approaches to national security policy in the form of presiden- tial speeches ( http://www.osidc. org/National_Security_CPI.pdf ). The study was used as the basis for debates over the summer in Chicago, San Francisco and Houston. OSI and its collaborators are also working to adapt this material for use by college students in holding their own debates on national security policy. The China Factor One of the most significant devel- opments at the periphery during the past two years has been the slow and steady rise of China as a world power. While China’s critical role in Korean diplomacy — 50 years after fighting on the other side on the Korean peninsula, it was China that brought the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea to the negotiating table in August — is well known, its assis- tance to Washington in intelligence and diplomatic matters as part of the war on terrorism has attracted less attention. On Sept. 11 the Senate Foreign Relations Committee took note of China’s emergence in hearings on “U.S. Relations with China” — in the words of Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs James A. Kelly, “one of the most important bilateral relationships of the 21st century.” The testimony by Kelly and several experts is a good place to start to get up to speed on China ( http://foreign.senate.gov/ hearings/2003/hrg030911a.html ). The May report of an independent task force sponsored by the Council on Foreign Relations on “Chinese Military Power” fills in a critical dimension ( http://www.cfr.org/publi cation.php?id=5985 ). Y ou can keep up with day-to-day news on China at http://news.yahoo.com/fc?tmpl =fc&cid=34&in=world&cat=china _us_relations . For background, the State Department’s “The United States and China” overseas Web page is a gold mine ( http://usinfo.state.gov/region al/ea/uschina ). H ere, regularly updat- ed, are official texts, key documents, reports and fact sheets, congressional testimony and statements bearing on the U.S. relationship with China. China’s energy situation is document- ed at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Energy Information Administration Web site ( http://www.eia.doe.gov/ emeu/cabs/china.html ). Th e Library C YBERNOTES I want you to understand that I’m not saying “white” because the Americans say “black.” – President Jacques Chirac of France, in an interview prior to his speech at the U.N. General Assembly, Sept. 22, www.nytimes.com .