Presidents Donald Trump and Xi Jinping reached an agreement over the weekend at the Group of 20 meeting in Argentina on a framework for trade dialogue that will delay the imposition of new US tariffs. While surely better than the alternative, this step does not address any of the fundamental tensions in the economic relationship between the US and China.

Few observers doubt that China needs to make significant changes in areas such as intellectual property, the rights of foreign investors and subsidies to state-owned companies if it is to meet international norms. Antipathy toward Chinese economic practices is hardly confined to Trump. Recent months have witnessed attacks on the existing economic relationship from members of previous US administrations, noted China experts and the American business community. Indeed, it can be fairly said there are no China accommodationists left in Washington. When foreign governments get past their frustrations with the Trump administration, they acknowledge that they, too, are frustrated with Chinese commercial practices.

Yet it is also easy to sympathise with Chinese leaders who insist that China's political system is for it to choose, and that economic negotiations should focus on the pragmatic identification of win-win opportunities, rather than on questions of ideology. At the same time, it is hard to see how anyone with a modicum of historical knowledge could fail to be concerned by a combination of increased domestic repression, centralisation of power in one man, rapidly increased military spending and rhetoric about enlarging China's role in the world.

It will be difficult for the US to acknowledge China's size -- but it must. Mark Schiefelbein

The US requires a viable strategy for addressing its legitimate grievances. Unfortunately, neither rage nor proclamation constitutes such a strategy. A viable approach would involve feasible objectives clearly conveyed and supported by carrots and sticks, along with a willingness to define and accept success.

At the heart of the problem in defining an economic strategy towards China is the following awkward fact: Suppose China had been fully compliant with every trade and investment rule and had been as open to the world as the most open countries at its income level. China might have grown faster because it reformed more rapidly, or it might have grown more slowly because of reduced subsidies or more foreign competition. But it is highly unlikely that its growth rate would have been altered by as much as 1 per cent.