Michel Oksenberg: Brought China closer

Hawai‘i and the East-West Center have lost a good friend with the death of Michel Oksenberg, a top China scholar.

An aide to National Security Adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski during the Carter administration, Oksenberg was instrumental in implementing the normalization of U.S.-China relations.

His high profile from that experience, plus his solid and distinguished China scholarship, seemed to make him an ideal choice to be president of the East-West Center, from 1992-95. In practice, the fit was less than comfortable.

By the time Oksenberg left for a prestigious position at Stanford, the East-West Center was troubled on several fronts.

First, it was in dire financial straits. Congress seemed serious about pulling the plug altogether.

Second, internal strains boiled to the surface. Under Oksenberg, there were public flareups over the mission of the center, the role of student programs vs. high-level research and more.

The center seemed in danger of becoming just another defense-oriented think tank, eclipsing its role as the premier source of human understanding and inter-cultural cooperation in the Asia-Pacific region.

Under Oksenberg’s successors, Kenji Sumida and Charles Morrison, a more healthy balance and financial stability have been restored.

Despite that discomfort, Oksenberg left the center with good grace, and retained many friends and admirers in this community. He and Morrison had just written a chapter on China-Japan-U.S. relations, to be published in April.

Academia, U.S.-China relations and Hawai‘i all are the better for his influence.

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