Last week, Secretary of State John Kerry and Vice Prime Minister Liu Yandong hosted the High-Level Consultation on People-to-People Exchange. This conference symbolizes the deepening ties between the U.S. and China as the numbers of social, cultural and educational exchanges continue to grow along with political ones.

After a few months of maintaining a low profile in its rebalance to the Asia-Pacific, the Obama administration appears to be revitalizing this initiative, writes Yang Wenjing.

The conference on diplomacy with neighboring countries signaled a new era for proactive interaction between China and its neighbors, writes Chen Xiangyang.

The US rebalancing to the Asia-Pacific has unsettled relations with China, and distrust between the two countries has deepened since the United States started relocating its massive military assets to the region.

United States allies in the Asia-Pacific nervously await Vice President Joe Biden’s visit to China, Japan and South Korea in early December, as they look for indications the Obama administration will continue its pivot to Asia. However, as Benjamin Friedman of the Cato Institute points out, the pivot is more symbolic than substantive.

China’s rapid rise to power has caught the attention of the world. China’s new diplomatic strategy of extending “olive branches” has some states worried and others intrigued. Can a balance be found between China’s national interests, the US pivot to Asia and the interests of regional actors such as ASEAN or Japan?

Although the recent S&ED and SSD discussions and the Xi-Obama summit highlighted many points of agreement between the U.S. and China, the coming months will focus on some of the more difficult issues in the relationship such as military-to-military exchanges and trade disputes.

As a new great power relationship develops between the United States and China, both countries must take steps to ensure that future military conflicts can be avoided.

This year’s Sino-US Strategic and Economic Dialogue yielded more than one hundred deals, writes Da Wei, and showed signs of accelerated advancement in the bilateral relationship.

As a result of the recently concluded U.S.-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue (S&ED) the relationship between Washington and Beijing has not only stabilized, but has taken a major step forward, writes David Shambaugh. That is the best news we have had in U.S.-China relations for several years, and is good news for global stability and development.