Building Bilateral Ties for Minnesota through Higher Education

Public universities are often a bellwether for the state of the US-China relationship. When times are good, universities see strong enrollments of Chinese students, many research collaborations are made, and requests for assistance from the business community pour in. Staff from the University of Minnesota’s China Center says these days there’s a noticeable chill in the air, with the simultaneous challenges of the pandemic and political tensions. 

Similar to other US universities, the University of Minnesota saw opportunity in China early. The first Chinese students arrived in 1914, and in 1979, seven years after President Nixon’s momentous visit to Beijing ended China’s almost 30 years isolation from the United States, it established a China Center. The university has maintained deep and valuable research exchanges with institutions in China, and the university continues to play a key role in the Minnesota-China ecosystem. 

“Chinese students globalize the campus and globalize the learning. They provide an excellent opportunity for our students to learn about China.”

According to Executive Director Joan Brzezinski, the China Center’s mission is to facilitate exchange and understanding between the two countries. “We’ve been involved in many activities including assisting trade missions led by governors, corporate training, sharing information about Chinese culture, language, and society, bringing people from China to campus and to the state, and promoting greater understanding of the nuanced relationship between the US and China.” 

A changing landscape 

While the university’s relationships in China remain strong, the pandemic and the increasingly tense US-China political relations have had an impact. 

The number of international students from China decreased during the pandemic but is starting to return to more normal levels. “In 2020, the university worked very hard to support enrolled students studying from their homes in China. This year, Chinese students faced difficulties getting US visas and flights became very expensive, but most have been able to arrive in Minnesota. Over the pandemic, we’ve also seen fewer visiting scholars and fellows,” she said.  

Brzezinski is concerned about the falloff in people-to-people exchanges. “Chinese students globalize the campus and globalize the learning. They provide an excellent opportunity for our students to learn about China.” She added that Fulbright and other exchanges are also important ways to promote positive relations, and she hopes they’ll resume. 

“We encourage collaboration between US and Chinese students in programs such as the China Bridge Competition, precisely because we think this provides hope and a way forward.”

The China Center’s community programming has also been affected. A new webinar series called Considering China was created during the pandemic to explore important topics related to China’s many facets and encourage meaningful conversations and reflections. The center’s signature program, the annual Bob and Kim Griffin Building US-China Bridges Lecture, was forced into a virtual format last year. Now in its twentieth year, the lecture brings China experts to campus to speak with students, faculty, and members of the public. Brzezinski said that while it was disappointing they couldn’t be together in person with their community of supporters, a virtual platform has allowed the center to reach a much broader audience.  

An evolving and unpredictable future 

Haiyan Wang works with Brzezinski as assistant director of the center. Born and educated in Shanghai, she attended graduate school at Stanford University and the University of California Santa Barbara, then taught at Cornell University. Her hope is that one day the US-China relationship will return to a more cooperative footing. 

“I don’t think the relationship will collapse in the near future, but it’s really evolving and hard to predict,” she says. “We encourage collaboration between US and Chinese students in programs such as the China Bridge Competition, precisely because we think this provides hope and a way forward.” 

Brzezinski agrees. She has been deeply involved in international studies with China as a focus since 1982 when she participated in the first university exchange program between Peking University and a private US university. “There have been ups and downs during this whole period. What’s different about this down, probably the lowest of all, is that the issues of trade and national security have hit us together.” 

She said that despite the challenges, the university remains keen on keeping doors open and connecting people. “One promising area for collaboration is connecting on achieving UN sustainable development goals. That should be an area where we can and must cooperate.”