Shivshankar Menon

on the relationship between India and China

Chairman of the Advisory Board, Institute of Chinese Studies; Distinguished Fellow, The Brookings Institution; former National Security Adviser of India Fisher Family Fellow, 2013-2014

India and China need to find a new equilibrium in their relationship after the clashes, face-offs and buildup on their border in 2020 which are yet to be resolved. There is no going back to the “live-and-let-live”-arrangement that kept the peace and the border as it was for almost thirty years. Today, as a result of both countries growing interests and interdependence with the world, they run up against each other in the periphery they share in the Indian subcontinent, Eurasia, and the maritime Indo-Pacific. The economic relationship, too, is being recalibrated. Whether and how India and China find a new modus vivendi will have far reaching effect on the future of Asian geopolitics. To do so, they will have to accommodate each other’s core interests and manage differences while working on common interests such as maritime security, connectivity and an open and inclusive Asian order.

What advice do you have for the next generation of diplomatic practitioners?

Stick to the basics: your credibility is critical. Give your opponent a way out—and ensure an interest on all sides in implementing agreements or understandings if they are to last.

China’s former Ambassador to the U.S., Cui Tiankai, gives an address to students on April 25, 2014.