Illustration: Liu Rui/GT

One of the biggest challenges that we are confronted with in the 21st century is how to manage and shape the relationship between China and the US. With this in mind, I would take this great opportunity to talk about my understanding of the "new type of major power relationship" and what the media could do to promote the concept.

Since the dawn of the new century, the world has witnessed extraordinary events in China. The result has brought about great changes in the economic strength, as well as the international status and role of China. 

Thanks to the hard efforts by the Chinese people as well as the world community, China has surged to be the world's second largest economy, and it is believed it will overtake the US in the next decade to become the largest economy in the world.

At the same time, China has moved so far and so fast up the international rankings on all dimensions of power that it has been in a position to play a very active role in international affairs. As a result, it is now inconceivable that any major global issue could be resolved without the active participation and support of China.

Against such a backdrop, some people began to talk about the "Thucydides Trap." The term comes from an oft-quoted line from the Greek historian Thucydides, who famously wrote, "It was the rise of Athens and the fear that this inspired in Sparta that made war inevitable."

The term is used to describe the phenomenon of a rising power provoking so much fear in a status quo power that it ultimately leads to conflict between the two. Unfortunately, China is wrongly perceived as such a rising power even though it has no intention whatsoever to rival the US as a ruling power.

Why is there the perceived fear in the minds of some Western scholars and government officials? The answer lies in two aspects, in my view.

The first, the lessons they draw from history, which tell them that more often than not, the subsequent competition between the rising and ruling powers results in increasingly bitter conflicts and ultimately ends in all-out war.

For example, 11 of 15 cases since the year 1500 where a rising power emerged to challenge an existing power, war occurred. And what Athens did in the 5th century BC and what Germany did at the end of the 19th century serve as very convincing examples.

The second is the US' own behavior in the late 19th century and early 20th century.

Please allow me to quote a long paragraph from a Financial Times article. "As the US emerged as the dominant power in the western hemisphere in about 1890, how did it behave? In the years before the first world war the US liberated Cuba, threatened Britain and Germany with war to force them to accept US positions on disputes in Venezuela and Canada, backed an insurrection that split Columbia to create a new state of Panama - which immediately gave the US concessions to build the Panama Canal - and attempted to overthrow the government of Mexico, which was supported by the UK and financed by London bankers. In the half century that followed, US military forces intervened in "our hemisphere" on more than 30 separate occasions to settle economic or territorial disputes on terms favorable to Americans, or oust leaders we judged unacceptable."

When China is on its own way to the status of a global power following three decades of peaceful development, it is simply understandable that some people in the West, especially in the US, will ask this question: Will China as the rising power inevitably challenge the dominant position of the US as a ruling power?

Let me tell you what an ancient Chinese sage said: "One should never gauge the heart of a noble man with one's own mean measures."

China's initiative of "a new type of major power relationship" is the answer to the above question.

Chinese President Xi Jinping initiated the concept of "a new type of major power relationship" with the vision of "no conflict or confrontation, mutual respect, and win-win cooperation."

The consensus reached by Xi and his US counterpart Barack Obama during their various meetings demonstrated the determination and political courage of the two countries to break the old pattern of inevitable major country conflict and confrontation, because there is no reason the US and China should repeat the so-called Thucydides Trap.

The olive branch overtures indicate that China aims to create and build a Sino-US relationship where the two countries can coexist peacefully and compete peacefully rather than confront in economy, military and other realms.

A widely used English word to describe the current Sino-US economic relationship is "codependency," as the two countries are so codependent of each other in economy, finance and trade, so confrontation in any form, in any realm would do good to no one.

In this process, what kind of a role can the media play?

I have been in the trade of journalism for over 20 years. It is natural for me to ask: What can media in both China and the US do to promote the "new type of major power relationship"? In the context of the new initiative, media in both countries can play a bigger role in improving and shaping the bilateral ties.

One of the media's many functions is to inform. So, as far as the Sino-US relationship is concerned, media in both China and the US can inform, and try to convince as well, their targeted audience the following points:

We should never presume an inevitable conflict between China and the US. China's peaceful development will not threaten the US; it will benefit the US as well as the world.

Looking back at the 35 years since the two countries established full diplomatic ties, China-US cooperation has not only brought benefit to our two peoples, but also contributed to the peace, stability and prosperity of the Asia-Pacific region and beyond.

Xi's remark "The Pacific Ocean is big enough for both of us" is a convincing statement that China's peaceful rise will not challenge US global dominance.

The factors that usually led to conflict and confrontation between great powers, such as territorial disputes, do not exist between China and the US.

As China increasingly prospers, Sino-US relations will definitely move from precarious codependency to stable, peaceful coexistence.

In a longer term, the US needs China, just as China needs the US.

Both the US and China are confronted with a series of global challenges, which could not be solved by any one country single-handedly.

Even US National Security Advisor Susan Rice tweeted recently that "Most major global challenges of [the] 21st century cannot be addressed effectively without [the] US and China working together."

The areas that call for effective Sino-US cooperation include economics, counter-terrorism, environmental protection, nuclear proliferation, the North Korea question, and security concerns in the Middle East and Afghanistan, among many others.

By proposing the concept of "a new type of major power relationship," China is confident that the two countries are fully capable of working together to make the world more peaceful.

Only by close Sino-US cooperation, and by the two cooperating with other countries at the same time, can joint development and lasting prosperity be achieved around the world.

The "new type of major power relationship" is a "skyscraper," which should be built up slowly upon a foundation of "strategic trust." The key to "strategic trust" is deeper mutual understanding and respect for each other's "core interests." The reality that China's peaceful rise to a global power should be accepted. I agree with Professor David Shambaugh that China is a just partial power, but it will become a truly global one sooner or later.

Differences will always exist between China and the US because of our different history, culture, social system, ideology, and level of economic development.

We must be aware of and respect our differences. We should respect each other's development path. We should respect our respective choices. We have to search for common ground, namely, to seek the greatest common divisor in terms of common interests, which would create a foundation for progress between the two countries.

We should note the fact that it is not just China that is becoming stronger and stronger in the world but so are other countries, such as India, Russia, South Africa and Brazil. In the long run, the US is going to have to accommodate this in a peaceful way.

In the years ahead when the US has to deal with other rising powers, the China-US cooperation will definitely play a role model. The US will not have to worry and fear every time it sees a new rising power jumping on the stage if it successfully manages its relationship with China.

Days before we came here, we just celebrated, on October 1, the 65th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China. This festive occasion reminds me of an article I read in the Wall Street Journal in mid-September. The article was entitled "Misunderstanding China" and was written by Michael Pillsbury. It was a popular read in China. The author argued that "after 65 years, we don't know what China wants because we haven't truly listened to some of the powerful voices that undermine our wishful thinking." He concluded "The answer that I've come to after studying the Chinese for 40 years is that the problem is not China, but us."

He also raised a question which I personally think has no ready answer: "How did Western policy makers and academics repeatedly get China so wrong?"

As a journalist myself, I have my own question to ask: Are Western policy makers and academics the only people who get China wrong? Have the Western media done their job to make China understood?

Now I would like to talk a little bit about my personal observation of the US and Chinese media in general terms. There is great discrepancy in Chinese media's and the US media's coverage of each other. Chinese media's coverage of the US is usually comprehensive. They report on almost everything American. But when some US media cover China, they seem to have a limited vision. In most cases, they just focus on topics such as Tibet, Xinjiang, human rights, and intellectual property rights. I am not saying it is not right to report on these topics.

What I mean is that US media, whether they have a presence in China or not, should keep in mind that China has the largest population in the world, China is developing rapidly and great changes are taking place in a now pretty much pluralistic Chinese society. This means there are much more topics to cover, more than what I listed here. If they just focus on their favorite topics, how could they paint a bigger and more accurate picture of China? A few US media outlets and a handful of US journalists are always prone to see China through colored spectacles, and their biased reports about China are detrimental to the sound development of the Sino-US relations.

In the past three decades, while there were twists and turns, Sino-US relations have kept moving forward and achieved historic growth. During the course, we read in the Western media in general and the US media in particular the "coming conflict with China in the 21st century", the "China threat theory" and the "China collapse theory"; we read about the US policy debates between "containment" and "engagement" which ended with a middle road strategy called "congagement." There are more similar examples. The audience must have been confused by all these perceived theories and fancy coinages. They deserve to have access to substantial coverage on China.

As the US media outlets enjoy greater discourse power than their Chinese counterparts do, a fact I have to admit and respect, and a reality we are trying to change, they can do much more than they have done to help US audiences as well as Western audiences understand China better. It is a matter of will rather than capability.

President Obama is set to visit China in November. I am sure his visit will give new meaning to the "new type of major power relationship." Let's wait and see in expectation.

The author is deputy editor of the Global Times. The article is an excerpt from a speech he delivered at a conference held at the National Press Club, Washington, October 5-6. chenping@globaltimes.com.cn