By Dr. Wenshan Jia, Professor of Global Communication Chapman University USA and Chief Advisor, Qingdao TriWon Global Inc., Shandong, China,
On November 23, 2018, Black Friday, right after Thanksgiving, accompanied by my family members, I finally had a chance to visit and tour the Sunnylands, “a place of history, hospitality, and diplomacy in Southern California” USA as is self-styled on its website. The Sunnylands was originally intended as a private winter palace for a successful communications entrepreneur Walter Annenberg and his wife Leonore Annenberg who owned famed media outlets such as the TV Guide and the Seventeen Magazine. Purchased and built in the 1950s with the MidCentury Modern style of architecture, it was first turned into a center of hospitality or public relations where the Annenbergs befriended high-profile public figures such as Dwight Eisenhower, Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan to restore honors to the Annenberg clan. Walter’s dad had been once imprisoned by the Federal Government for tax evasion back in the 1940s before Walter inherited the media business from him.
In the process, the Sunnylands gradually transformed itself into a center of public diplomacy for which both Walter and Leonore were granted the title of “ambassador” for their significant contributions. The couple had not only endowed two world-class schools of communication, the Annenberg School of Communication in University of Pennsylvania and the Annenberg School of Communication in University of Southern California, but also hosted a series of high-profile meetings of the US leaders with other significant world leaders such as the British Royalties, the Obama-Xi Jinping Summit (2013) and with Arab leaders such as his Majesty King Abdullah II of Jordan (2014). Many significant international policies and strategies were contemplated, vetted and discussed here before their publicity and implementation. People nickname the Sunnylands as the Camp David of the West. By this time, the owners of the Sunnylands have transformed themselves from pillars of their family clan into propellers and shapers of world peace who brought about stability and prosperity to their own country and the world.
However, contrary to the media reports, I discover that the Sunnylands is more than just the Camp David of the West. It is also a center of political consultation and negotiation on issues of a domestic relevance. I saw in the short film that the Sunnylands also hosted several meetings on issues of mutual concern among representatives of different political parties in the US across a range of ideological positions.
Last but not least, the Sunnylands is a center of intercultural engagement and integration. Luckily, during my tour with my family, I encountered the weekly yoga class which is free and open to the public. Through the glass window inside the visitor center, I saw a 100 some people standing in a semi-circle on the green lawn gesturing uniformly. At first, I thought it might have been a demonstration or something. Out of curiosity, we hopped out onto the lawn, only to discover that it was a yoga class in action! Seeing that no Asian was among the participants, I took off my shoes and joined them. A minute after, I felt a hand from a Caucasian lady beside me on my shoulder and found my hand on the shoulder of another, shirtless black male participant, all in sync with the yogamoves directed by the yoga instructor! What a beautiful human chain on such a beautiful lawn! It was real action of unity in diversity, I thought to myself! I also became aware that the Saturday program is tai chi! These public programs were started at the Sunnylands a few years ago and last till early May every year since then. As is widely known, yoga and tai chi, originally from India and China respectively, have become new routine practices to heal body and mind at the Sunnylands, and indeed more and more in the rest of the US and Canada.
By looking at the historic trajectory of the Annbergs’ transformation from a family member patriarch, then a patriot to a global citizen and the Sunnylands’ transformation from a center of familial and business-related public relations into a center of public diplomacy, political consultation, and intercultural engagement and integration, one can not only see the Annenbergs’ growth from “the me/I –family/clan focus” to the country/world focus, but also the transformation of their earlier industry-based philosophy of communication as mass-mediated and one-way communication to humanism-oriented, two-way, face-to-face interaction and communication, be it in the form of partying, golfing, consultation, negotiation, even debates and heated arguments. The Annenbergs believed in playing together as a great form of communication and relationship building, as I heard our tour guide say. In conclusion, the Annenbergs discourage one-way mediated communication, bickering, divisiveness, disengagement, coercion, violence and war. By now, the Sunnylands has become one of the so-called “The Better Angels”, the name of a new documentary on the US-China relations directed by a two time Academy and Emmy Award winner Malcolm Clarke and produced by William Mundell. It seems to have picked up and carries on the better half of the American ethos.
Closer to the end of the 45-minute guided tour of the ranch of the Sunnylands, I asked the tour guide Aunia, an intern who is a communication major at a local satellite campus of California State University and originally from Bosnia: Has President Trump or any Trump administration official visited or conducted any meetings at the Sunnylands since he took offce or are there any such events re-scheduled in the Sunnylands events calendar? She answered: “No and not yet, but the Sunnylands is always open to him and his cabinet members. “ This reminds me of the Trump-Xi summit at Mar-a-Lago Club, President Trump’s own ranch in Florida in April 2017 which played a function similar to one of the functions of the Sunnylands, President Trump’s state visit plus to China in November that same year and their fourth, and upcoming meeting at the G-20 summit in Buenos Aires, Argentina on November 30, 2018. On that day, the US-China trade war will be formally turned into a trade negotiation. While one should not expect all of the issues will be resolved at this one meeting, President Trump and his administration are certainly expected by the Sunnylands interns such as Aunia, the Sunnylands visitors, and indeed people around the world to embrace the Sunnylands ethos of communication for peace for all and prosperity for all. Perhaps, it is not expecting too much if the US-China trade negotiation on November 30, 2018 will mark a new beginning for a “constructive and results-driven” US-China re-engagement to forge a new-type of relationship. I believe that the Sunnylands, as our tour guide informed us, would welcome President Trump and President Xi with open arms for a stroll there!
(originally published on the company wechat platform)
