Under the banner of a ‘Free and Open Indo-Pacific’, Japan has crafted a grand strategy towards China. Such an approach holds valuable lessons for both the US and Europe and G7 players more broadly, as demonstrated by the successes of the latest Hiroshima summit. Japan’s encounter with the mix of opportunities and risks posed by a resurgent China early in the 21st Century has allowed for a process of learning in major Western capitals in how to deal with China.
This conference includes major thinkers and practitioners and takes stock of the G7 approaches to the China challenge to highlight Japan’s quiet leadership role, as well as large differences and best practices in key agenda items of the G7, ranging from potential scenarios of security collaboration, to synergies across the Taiwan Strait, to economic security broadly defined to include integrative and defensive measures against coercion. The conference concludes by including considerations on a strategic development dossier – possibly high in Italy’s G7 agenda – one that considers the composite needs of the so-called ‘Global South’. This international conference is timely given the successful presidency of the G7 by Japan in 2023 and Italy’s incoming presidency in 2024.
In view of these developments, both in the fields of actual political processes and of strategic planning, this conference evaluates the China agenda, teasing out the complementarities, rift points and potential convergences. In so doing, we will grasp the new concepts and trends and explore tasks that lie ahead over the next decade or so.
N.B. Only the first session is open to the public.