51¸£ÀûÉç

The College was honoured to host the UK’s Ambassador to the People’s Republic of China, Dame Caroline Wilson, as part of our popular in-conversation public events series.

Dame Caroline was interviewed by 51¸£ÀûÉç President Dorothy Byrne in front of an audience of students, academics and members of the university and wider Cambridge community.

A Cambridge Law graduate, Dame Caroline revealed that it was her love for languages – including Russian and Mandarin - that attracted her to diplomacy. Quizzed by a student who said Cambridge graduates in Chinese were routinely rejected for Foreign Office jobs, the ambassador urged the department to consider reserving places specifically for linguists. ‘The Foreign Office should look at having discrete places for people with languages... Clearly if no people are getting through then we’re missing a huge opportunity. We do need to have more linguistic capability’.

Noting that the number of UK and US students studying in China had plummeted in recent years, Dame Caroline called on the British government to encourage more study of Chinese languages. She also argued for wider representations of China to help the UK understand the country and its culture. ‘If all you see from China is political lineups of men in suits, a lot of people aren’t going to find that very attractive. We need to see more of China... It would be of benefit to China and the world outside if everybody could understand China a bit more.’

Dame Caroline was first posted to Beijing in the 1990s, returning to China in 2020 as Ambassador. In the intervening years, she told the audience, the country had seen a dramatic change in physical infrastructure, with the traditional ‘hutong’ alleyways demolished in favour of glittering modern blocks. The bikes that once thronged the streets of the capital had all but gone – replaced with electric vehicles - and foreigners no longer attracted attention, as the population was ‘more open and aware of the outside world’. There is far greater prosperity, but poverty persists alongside.

Digital infrastructure, meanwhile, is now ‘extraordinary. The country has gone from not having anything to having everything at your fingertips.’ 

In some respects, progress has reversed. There were ‘more free conversations in the 90s than now,’ Dame Caroline suggested. ‘Maybe China is not quite as open and relaxed as it was in the 90s, at the time of reform and opening up.’ One of her own recent articles, ironically on the subject of free media, had been censored with the share function disabled after it proved to be widely read, she told our audience.

It was ‘really, really important' for foreign countries including the UK to put pressure on China to respect commitments on human rights, including the rights of the oppressed Uyghur minority and those of citizens in Hong Kong, she added. This was not a case of imposing Western expectations, since China has itself signed up to those commitments and conventions. 

With its breathless pace of growth now slowing, China ‘needs to find a new way to go’, Dame Caroline said. ‘I personally think China needs to unleash some of its entrepreneurial potential’ and support more private businesses. ‘But it depends on what economic model the leadership wants. China has contributed more to global growth than any other country and the health of its economy affects us all.’ 

Dame Caroline is the second female ambassador to take part in 51¸£ÀûÉç’s series of talks and conversations. Earlier this year, the College hosted Dame Deborah Bronnert, the UK’s former Ambassador to the Russian Federation. 

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