U.S. Governors Flocking to China

With unprecedented frequency, American governors, lieutenant governors and big-city mayors are flocking to China these days, seeking to make contacts that they hope will bring trade and jobs to their states.

If the current pace continues, one observer said with some hyperbole, it may not be long before the National Governors’ Conference could hold an impromptu meeting in Peking or Shanghai. Since the beginning of 1985, eight governors have come to China, and at least two more are expected before the end of the year.

This week, Gov. George C. Wallace of Alabama flew to the city of Wuhan, in central China’s Hubei province, escorting a group of bankers, university professors and businessmen from his state.

Last week, Gov. Bruce Babbitt of Arizona was in Xinjiang province, in northwest China, discussing investment possibilities. Gov. Richard F. Celeste of Ohio and Gov. Norman Bangerter of Utah were in China last month, and the governors of Washington and Kentucky will be coming soon.

“First of all, it’s an off-election year,” explained an American business official who is familiar with the visits. “Secondly, there’s increased interest at the state level in foreign trade in general and particularly in China. And there’s political impact for a governor in showing you’re trying to do something about promoting jobs.”

Political Advantage for Chinese

Further, the Chinese government has been actively courting the state and local delegations.

“The Chinese say they want these visits to have a commercial focus,” a diplomatic source said.

China also has political reasons for encouraging the governors’ and mayors’ trips: They give the Chinese government an opportunity to develop contacts at the grass-roots level in the United States, something that Taiwan has been doing for decades.

For the governors, the visits to China offer a number of benefits. The trips often make for good press coverage. Many of the political leaders try to bring along a television reporter. And the trips give the governors a chance to cement ties with some of the business leaders that they take overseas with them, people who can become important campaign contributors.

Professional diplomats welcome the governors’ visits because they are eager to develop as much sophistication as possible about China among political leaders who are in a position to influence public opinion in the United States.

“Of course these trips are worth it,” an American official said. “A lot of these people have never been here before. It gives these governors exposure to China.”

But another American diplomat here grumbled that “all of a sudden, zap, we’re turning into delegation handlers.”

The politicians’ visits to China are not without comic aspects. The governors and mayors sometimes engage in a bit of American-style campaigning rarely seen in China.

Translator Left to Wonder Who’s Really Hot

At a St. Patrick’s Day reception last March, Gov. James R. Thompson of Illinois began pinning shamrocks on the lapels of Premier Zhao Ziyang and other high-ranking Chinese officials and then used American slang to describe how successful his delegation’s tour of China had been. “When you’re hot, you’re hot,” he said.

The Chinese translator, who had never heard this expression, could only stammer.

No one is able to point to any mammoth business deals concluded during the gubernatorial sojourns. The agreements that are signed usually involve small-scale exchanges.

During his trip, for example, Thompson announced that he had arranged for the province of Liaoning, in northeast China, to provide University of Illinois researchers with soybean plasma and hog embryos. In exchange, he said, Illinois had agreed to give the Chinese province genetic material that will make pigs meatier.

An official on Wallace’s trip said an Alabama businessman who manufactures deep-fat fryers had gotten an encouraging reception in his effort to sell his products for fast-food equipment in Chinese hotels catering to foreigners.

Most of the American governors who come here sign deals to establish “sister state” ties with one or another of China’s provinces.

Since there are only 26 provinces, the states are being forced to double up. Wallace tied the knot between Alabama and Hubei province, even though Hubei has had such a relationship with Ohio for the past four years.

“It’s easier for us to get a handle on a Chinese province than to work with the central government,” said H. R. Vermilye, senior vice president of SouthTrust Bank of Alabama, who accompanied Wallace.

Experienced foreign business officials in Peking say these provincial ties have serious limitations.

China insists on the bureaucratic niceties, and so a relationship with one provincial government counts for nothing anywhere else in China. Alabama businessmen, for example, may find that Hubei province is unable even to book a hotel room in Shanghai.

Still, U.S. officials and foreign businessmen here say they think the governors’ trips may indirectly help foster trade.

“Nothing is signed, but the contacts help later on,” a diplomat said. “In this system, if you have contacts at high levels, it helps.”

A businessman who asked not to be quoted by name said: “If they come here with the expectation that they are going to sign something in three days, then they are not realistic. The real results will come in follow-up contacts.”

The United States is not the only country with which China has been courting local and provincial ties. Similar efforts are under way with the political subdivisions of other trading partners, such as Canada and Australia.