ABSTRACT
This chapter provides an overview of United States (US) policy toward China and Taiwan during the formative years of the Clinton administration, 1993 through 1994. During the first two years of the Clinton administration, trade and human rights were closely intertwined in US China policy. Seeking full Chinese compliance with these multilateral obligations and its support for international nonproliferation goals was a top administration priority. Thus, from at the outset of the Clinton administration, US policy toward China was concerned with issues carried over from previous administrations: trade, human rights, security, proliferation, and Taiwan. To manage the growing interaction across the Taiwan Strait, Taipei and Beijing established institutions with quasi-official status to represent their interests. The Chinese leadership under Jiang Zemin believed that China needed cooperative relations with the US, but Beijing refused to accept the rules of international behavior defined by Washington.
