Joseph Nye suggests next U.S. president put Sino-U.S. relations as top priority

On the campus where Barack Obama once studied, the renowned American political scientist Joseph Nye Jr. has said the next U.S. president should make Sino-U.S. relations a top priority regarding foreign policy.

Delivering a speech titled "American Power and the Next President" on Wednesday at the Occidental College in Los Angeles, where President Obama studied from 1979 to 1981 as an undergraduate, Nye said China should be the focus of U.S. foreign affairs.

China is a rising power, though it is not going to surpass the United States anytime soon. "If we work with China," he said, "there are major issues like climate change, cyber security, anti-terrorism, where we have common interests, there are also issues that we have divergence such as the South China Sea, if we are able to manage the relationship, we will have a better century."

"If we get it wrong, the consequence will be disastrous," said the political scientist who is famous for the "Soft Power" theory on international relations.

Talking about China's economic transformation currently underway, Nye said that it means the Chinese economy is advancing forward just like industrialized countries did last century. "I think it is heading to the right direction," he said.

He believed the Chinese economy is not going to collapse as some have suggested. "Slowing down, yes; collapse, probably not," he said.

In an interview with Xinhua after his speech, Nye said that previous leaders' summits and Strategic Economic Dialogues between the top leaders of both countries have been fruitful.

"If you look at the Obama-Xi summit of last September, it was very beneficial," he said, "It took a couple of very difficult areas and got a high-level agreement which then force both countries to start working together."

If the two want to strengthen bilateral relations then regular summits between the leaders of both countries are needed, Nye said. Endi