On Equal Terms : Redefining China's Relationship with America and the West

On Equal Terms includes ten powerful chapters on the extraordinary changes taking place in China and China's relationship with America and the West. In this proposal, Zheng explains China's state-capitalist model of governance, how history affects her behavior in foreign policy, how China is emerging as an economic world power, that products are not made but assembled in China, that China is not one big market but many markets. In chapter six he talks about the essential and sometimes mysterious worlds of "Guanxi" and "Mianzi" - the notions of giving, saving and preserving "face" in business and cultural relationships. As Zheng suggests, "If you don't understand how these interactions work, you won't understand China and the Chinese people". China and America need to cooperate in order to solve the major problems of the world. As Zheng devotes more and more of his time to serving on boards and consulting for universities and East-West organizations, he hopes On Equal Terms will help promote a dialogue of mutual trust between the two countries that have nurtured his extraordinary life and career.

Born in China, raised in Hong Kong and educated in the United States, including an MBA from Wharton, Zheng Mingxun is a businessman and politician with an international career spanning many decades. His early working life was spent with U.S. multinationals on assignments in New York, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Bangkok, Manila and Hong Kong. In the 1990s, he chaired Inchcape Pacific Ltd., N.M. Rothschild & Sons (HK) Ltd., as well as the Hong Kong General Chamber of Commerce. Mingxun was active in politics as a Hong Kong legislator and a member of the Preparatory Committee on Hong Kong’s return to Chinese sovereignty and since retiring from politics and corporate life has chaired the Link Real Estate Investment Trust. He is now a board member and advisor to companies in China and Asia as well as being active in the private equity arena.

Zheng Mingxun is the author’s pinyin name in Putonghua. Like many in his generation in Hong Kong, he also has an anglicized name and is commonly known to his friends and associates as Paul Cheng.