Stephen Roach writes:

The US and China could escape the potentially destructive endgame of a codependent relationship by recasting their ties as a more constructive and sustainable interdependency. An interdependent relationship fosters healthy interaction between partners, who satisfy their own needs rather than relying on others to do so, and maintain their own identities while appreciating the relationship’s mutual benefits.

The upcoming Strategic and Economic Dialogue provides the US and China a platform of engagement to seize their collective opportunities. Both countries should press ahead with a bilateral investment treaty, which would enhance rules-based market access and eventually foster greater trade liberalization. That would allow the US, the world’s preeminent services economy, to seize the opportunity that is about to be provided by the emergence in China of a services-led consumer society. And it would enable China to draw on America’s expertise and experience to help master its daunting economic rebalancing act.

At the same time, the upcoming dialogue should aim to restart the military-to-military exchanges on cyber-security issues that were launched a year ago. These efforts were recently suspended in the aftermath of the US Justice Department’s decision to file criminal charges against five members of the People’s Liberation Army. Here as well, the goal should be a rules-based system of engagement – especially vital for all modern economies in an era of IT-enabled globalization.   US and China-From Codependency to Interdependence