Ezra Vogel, Professor Emeritus at Harvard University Photo: VCG
The death of Ezra Vogel, Professor Emeritus at Harvard University and a leading American scholar on East Asian affairs, who is a major supporter of the effort to inject sanity and balance into US thinking about China, again raised concerns that Americans who think clearly and rationally about China-US relations are getting fewer in number and are losing their voice, while China hawks are rising in the US.
Experts have called it a “huge blow” to the public, especially at this “turbulent time” in China-US tensions.
Vogel died at the age of 90 on Sunday (local time) in Massachusetts, US, Japanese media outlet Asahi Shimbun reported on Monday. Vogel's translator confirmed the news with the Global Times on Monday.
Diao Daming, a China-US relations expert at the Renmin University in Beijing, told the Global Times on Monday that Vogel was a representative of the older group of US scholars who first understood China from the perspective of history and culture, with the main purpose of promoting the development of China-US relations and getting more Americans to understand China.
However, as this group of scholars is getting old and many have passed away, the voice of rational thinking about China in the country is getting increasingly weak, while more and more young scholars are holding an antagonistic sentiment to help the country suppress China and promote the “China threat theory,” resulting in a decline in the way Americans view China, Diao explained. “Vogel’s death has raised concerns about the trend,” he noted.
The White House trade adviser Peter Navarro was quoted by Fox News as saying, “We are all China hawks” because US President Donald Trump has raised the “concept of China as a significant, existential threat,” and has pushed both parties to take a tougher line against the country.
Vogel himself contributed greatly to the development of bilateral relations, and his death is a great loss for the US, Diao said.
Michael D. Swaine, Director of the East Asia Program at the Quincy Institution for Responsible Statecraft, published the news on Twitter on Monday 10:05 am, saying, “It is with enormous sadness that I convey the news that Ezra Vogel, stellar scholar of China and Japan, mentor, colleague and friend passed away today in Mt. Auburn hospital in Cambridge.”
He noted that Vogel’s death is “a huge blow to the field, especially at this critical time, because Ezra was a major supporter of the effort to inject greater sanity and balance into US thinking about China.”
A few minutes later, Japanese media Asahi Shimbun reported the news.
The Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies of Harvard University, a world-leading center on China, also tweeted on Monday 10:27 am: “It is with great sadness that we announce the passing of our former director Ezra F. Vogel (1930-2020). Professor Vogel served as director from 1973-75 and from 1995-99...”
Vogel’s death prompted floods of online tributes from Chinese netizens.
One netizen said, “Paying tribute to him is not simply because he, as an American, sometimes said things we might like to hear, but because he also objectively said many things that we should pay attention to... Those are the words that help China-US relations make progress.”
Another said, “We lost a smart mind at such a turbulent moment.”
Just before his death, Vogel said on December 1 at the Beijing Xiangshan Forum video workshops that US president-elect Joe Biden has brought new opportunities for China-US relations, and the US should recognize China's contribution to the world and treat China fairly.
Vogel told GT in an exclusive interview in July that China and the US face the historic task of managing their rivalry and avoiding conflict.
He said in the interview that “the mood in Washington is anti-Chinese... But I believe after the election, whoever is elected... there is ａrecognition that even while we promote our own national interests, we must find new ways to have better relations with China and work on our common issues. I think we can expect a change after the election.”
Vogel has written a number of seminal works on Japan and China, such as Japan as Number One: Lessons for America, and Deng Xiaoping and the Transformation of China published in 2011, which gave more people a wider understanding of Asian countries.