Obama’s Diplomacy: Gary Locke’s Moment

On March 9, U.S. President Barack Obama officially nominated the current U.S. Commerce Secretary Gary Locke as the new U.S. ambassador to China. Locke stated at the White House, “I’m going back to the birthplace of my grandfather, my father, my mom and her side of the family, and I’ll be doing so as a devoted and passionate advocate for America, the country where I was born and raised.”

Locke is 61 years old. His family originally immigrated from Taishan, Guangdong, China. One hundred years ago, Locke’s grandfather left China on a boat to the United States. He worked as a servant and settled in the U.S. Regarding his Chinese-American identity, Locke said, “I am proud of my Chinese ancestry and cultural heritage … Chinese-Americans have made many contributions to this state and indeed America.”

The nomination of Gary Locke adds special meaning to President Obama’s diplomacy to China. He is the first Chinese-American to be the ambassador to China, and as a cabinet member, this indicates how much attention Obama is paying to his foreign policy.

Chinese-American who knows Chinese well

Locke was born on Jan. 21, 1950, in Seattle, Washington. His parents worked at a Chinese restaurant. Locke spoke the Shandong dialect at home. He did not learn to speak English until he was five years old, when he went to elementary school. Locke’s family placed a high premium on immersing him in Chinese culture. According to the Chinese media, some friends of Locke’s father educated Locke based on traditional Chinese culture before he went to elementary school. Therefore, values such as family traditions and respecting one’s parents made big impressions on Locke. It was reported that Locke can still use the Taishan dialect to recite Tang and Song poetry that he learned when he was little.

Gary Locke’s family was poor, but he completed college with the aid of part-time jobs, loans and scholarships. He received his bachelor’s in political science from Yale University and a master’s in law at Boston University. He served as a prosecutor and also served as a representative in the Washington House of Representative. He was a former two-term Democratic governor of the state of Washington since 1996. He sparkled on the political stage.

In October 1997, after Gary Locke became the governor of the state of Washington, he led a group of state government officials on his first trip to China. Their destinations included Beijing, Shanghai, Chengdu and Hong Kong. They had conversations with the then Chinese leaders Jiang Zemin and Zhu Rongji on trade, agriculture and education. During that trip, Locke went to his family’s hometown, Jilong village in the town of Shuibu in Taishan City, looking for his family roots along with his parents, sister, brother and six other people. Adhering to tradition, Locke gave a kowtow, showed his respect and presented a roasted pig to their ancestors. In 2006, Locke funded a road in Jilong village.

While serving as governor of Washington, China became the third largest trading partner to the state. Companies headquartered in Washington, such as Starbucks, Microsoft, Boeing and other companies, started their business in China. Washington and Sichuan Province in China even collaborated as “sister provinces.”

In March 2009, Gary Locke became the commerce secretary. As a Chinese-American, he dealt well on issues of bilateral trade and protected the U.S. national interest. He played a vital role in the development of U.S.-China relations.

According to a report from Nielsen, although Gary Locke can’t speak Mandarin, he has broad knowledge of China. He studied Chinese issues for many years. Since his first term as governor, Locke has paid close attention to China’s development. In order to do research on China, Locke kept close relationships with some Chinese-American scholars from universities in the U.S., as well as exchanged ideas with specialists on Chinese issues at different intelligence agencies.

For leisure, Locke likes to read newspapers that mainly focuses on China issues, such as The China Daily and the South China Morning Post. Locke also pays close attention to books that focus on China written in the U.S.; books such as John K. Fairbank’s “The United States and China” and Kenneth Lieberthal’s “Governing China” were added to Locke’s reading list.

100 Percent American

Although Gary Locke has a broad knowledge of China, he was not friendly to China while he was the U.S. commerce secretary. He mentioned that the U.S. government has found it difficult to recognize China as a market economy. He also put pressure on China over issues such as clean energy subsidies and intellectual property rights.

In fact, before becoming secretary of commerce, Reuters ran an article about an imaginary scenario: Two secretaries sitting on two sides of table discussing U.S.-China trade have the same skin color and black eyes. The question that arose was: Would the U.S. secretary of commerce who has Chinese roots be more Chinese or American?

Two years after Locke worked as the U.S. secretary of commerce, the answer was very clear. Comparing him to Henry Paulson, the former U.S. secretary of the Treasury, Gary Locke’s power looked a little weak. He failed to lead U.S. foreign policy to China. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was the one who led the high-level Strategic Economic Dialogue between the United States and China.

On Nov. 24, 2009, the Commerce Department, led by Gary Locke, decided to implement countervailing duties on China’s oil companies. The tax rate ranged from 10.36 to 15.78 percent, involving about $27 billion. This was also the largest trade sanction case the U.S. has launched against China.

In response to this unprecedented Sino-U.S. trade dispute, Locke made repeated announcements during the visit with Obama in November 2011 that bilateral trade friction was normal. Compared with prior years, the United States’ action against Chinese companies was just a little more than a little.

In an interview with Chinese media, Gary Locke argued that from the point of view of the total volume of goods, the volume of goods affected was only approximately 1.3 percent. Obama allowing China to export poultry to the United States also indicates that the U.S. has not implemented a protectionist stance toward China. Meanwhile, Locke also urged China to implement the safeguard provisions that were promised by the Chinese government when China joined the WTO. Otherwise, China would be prosecuted within the WTO.

Among all of Locke’s policies toward China, the most novel one was the so-called “carbon tariff.” According to the cap-and-trade American Clean Energy and Security Act passed by the U.S. House of Representatives in June 2009, the U.S government can charge “carbon tariffs” on imports from any country that does not limit carbon emissions, including China.

In many analysts’ opinions, this was a new type of protectionist barrier in the name of “environmental protection.” As we all know, high-energy-consuming products are mostly exported from developing countries to developed countries. Among them, “made in China” goods occupy a big percentage. Once carbon tariffs become widely used by developed countries, China will suffer an incalculable economic loss.

However, Gary Locke has defended the “carbon tariff” since his first visit to China in November 2009. He has also intensively promoted new energy cooperation projects. Regarding the theory that developed and developing countries alike should share the responsibility of carbon reduction but in differentiated ways, Gary Locke believes that for Mother Earth, the origin of carbon emissions does not matter. No matter if it was from China, the United States, Europe or India. She does not care whether the mistakes were made in the past or present. As Earth’s inhabitants, the future of the U.S. and China is bound together.

In fact, Gary Locke is well aware of the benefits and opportunities brought by goods “made in China.” Locke himself is fascinated with the “made in China” concept. He has a lot of things at home that were made in China, things from mobile phones, computers and DVDs, to furniture, clothes and purses. He also admitted that it is the cheap “made in China” goods that have allowed Americans the chance to save money for education, housing or even retirement.

However, when he attended the U.S.-China Business Council luncheon on Jan. 13 this year, Gary Locke said, “Look at the issue of intellectual property. We have heard Chinese leaders condemn [intellectual property] theft in the strongest terms, and we’ve seen central government laws and regulations written or amended to reflect that sentiment. But American and other foreign companies, in industries ranging from pharmaceuticals and biotechnology to entertainment, still lose billions of dollars from counterfeiting and [intellectual property] theft in China every year.”

In response to Gary Locke’s speech, the U.S. media generally termed it Gary Locke’s most harsh speech since he became the secretary of commerce.

Disadvantages of a Chinese-American Ambassador

Although Gary Locke’s Asian face makes a lot of Chinese feel amiable toward him, the former Chinese ambassador to the U.S. reminds us that “We should remember that he is an American, and not just see him as of Chinese descent.”

Those who know Gary Locke are aware that although he has an Asian face, he can neither speak nor read Chinese. And as he always announces to the public, “I am American.”

Recently, Gary Locke was asked the question: Does your Chinese-American identity help you to gain certain advantages in the U.S.-China exchange? He answered, “I don’t know if my Chinese-American identity helped to gain any advantages on this trip to China. We are representing the United States, the U.S. president and U.S. citizens. American policy will not be altered by the participants of the negotiations.”*

An expert on U.S issues at Fudan University pointed out, “His identity as Chinese-American is a double-edged sword. He behaved tough on the China issue when he was the U.S. secretary of commerce. He needs to change his way of thinking as the U.S. ambassador to China, since deep communication with the Chinese is required for someone in this position. Otherwise he won’t be able to do an excellent job as the U.S. ambassador to China.”

*Editor’s note: This quote, while accurately translated, could not be verified.