Time to get to know one another

Informality of setting seen as ideal way of forging lasting relationship

The leaders of the world's two largest economies — the United States and China — will gather on Friday at a private estate in Sunnylands, California.

It will be the first face-to-face meeting between President Xi Jinping and US President Barack Obama since Xi took office in March, and expectations are high.

The two-day summit will provide what many say is an opportunity for the two men to get to know each other better and to build trust between their nations.

Susan Shirk, deputy assistant secretary of state during the Clinton administration, said it is an "excellent idea" for the two leaders to spend time at a private retreat. "Past meetings between Chinese and US presidents have been too short, formal and scripted for them to develop a genuine personal relationship and understand one another's real intentions."

"Now Obama and Xi will have the same opportunity to develop the rapport that can help them solve problems and manage crises during their terms."

Shirk, an expert on Chinese politics who now teaches at the University of California, San Diego, said the meeting is likely to be more focused on establishing the personal relationship between the two than to produce any major agreements or other "deliverables".

It is a way for the two leaders to "explore ways to dispel, or at least better manage, the mutual suspicions that have recently been dragging down the relationship," Shirk said. "Both leaders are seeking to reassure one another that their intentions are not hostile."

James Steinberg, a former US deputy secretary of state, said the two countries need to provide "strategic assurance" and address with concrete measures the fears and anxieties from each side.

"Each side needs to be more than simply giving verbal assurances," he said. "In each of these domains which we have to worry about — whether it's space, maritime or cyber — there are steps to be taken."

Highlighting the military-to-military relationship is one area that sets a challenge and the two presidents need to manage it carefully, he added.

With the increasing interdependence of the two major powers, differences and tensions also grow. Issues experts expect to be brought up during the two-day summit range from trade and military ones to the two countries' roles in Asia, with many speculating that cybersecurity will top the list.

"Identifying and discussing common concerns like climate change, terrorism and unstable regions like the Middle East are a better start than arm wrestling over contentious bilateral issues," Shirk predicted.

Orville Schell, director of the Center on US-China Relations at the Asia Society in New York, said: "In any event, if there is a reset button to be found, it will doubtless reveal itself more readily at an informal setting like Sunnylands, where the two leaders will be sequestered without armies of security stuff and functionaries."

Schell sees the meeting in such an informal setting as a test for the new Chinese leader.

"Just by accepting such a venue for his first official meeting with President Obama, President Xi reveals himself as someone who is at least willing to dispense with the trappings and niceties of protocol and, we may hope, someone willing also to roll up his sleeves in a more informal way to see if he can forge a new and pragmatic kind of partnership with his American counterpart."

His visit to the US last February — including a stop where he had a reunion with old friends in Iowa whom he met during his trip to the state in 1985 — made headlines.

His devotion to people-to-people relations as a foundation for the two countries to understand each other resonated with many US citizens.