The third lecture of the 'China's Grand Strategy' course represented the most youthful of the lecturers so far, Cui Shoujun, in charge of the Contemporary China Studies Program at Renmin University. And youthful indeed was his approach in his teachings, finding ways to bring interesting and relate-able examples to his three pronged approach to ‘Understanding China’s Energy Strategy’. Professor Cui worked his way through ‘China’s Energy Policy’ and ‘China’s Energy Governance’ in a free and open style that tickled both, interest and participation. Professor Cui is clearly enthusiastic about his topic, as well as about the political direction of China’s future as he started his lecture with an interesting comment on the recent 19th National Party Congress.
When presenting ‘China’s Energy Strategy’ Professor Cui highlighted the blurry, black and white picture foreign media outlets' depiction of China’s international strategy, and in turn added a detailed and colorful picture of China’s geopolitical situation and strategy. Professor Cui moved through topics such as China’s oil imports in relation to geographical positioning of resources, China’s energy consumption, and forecast and the strategic obstacles that China are addressing with the ‘One Belt and One Road’ initiatives. Importantly Professor Cui was able to interweave the discussion with various themes drawn from Xi Jinping’s recent speech during the 19th National Party Congress.
A provoking take-away from this lecture was Professor Cui’s open question; ‘a superpower needs to create a backyard for itself to be powerful, where is China’s backyard?’. Without a doubt, student’s walk away from this lecture with a new perspective on how to understand China’s international movements. We thank Professor Cui for his engaging and thought-provoking lecture.
