China may get a more level playing field in terms of self-positioning when dealing with the United States amid the economic downturn, but Chinese leaders should beware of the potential traps behind U.S. flattering, scholars and senior editors said Friday.

Speaking at a Financial Times forum on Sino-U.S. relations in Hong Kong, the scholars said they expected the bilateral relationship to remain generally healthy in years ahead as both sides want stability and were pragmatic.

China is currently preoccupied with tackling the challenges facing itself, such as the need to further restructure the economy, finding an alternative development model to the export-driven growth of the past decades, and even the pressure of social instability.

The decisions made by Chinese leaders in dealing with the current crisis "will set the way for the long-term reinvention of the Chinese economy," said Jonathan Fenby, author of A History of Modern China published by Penguin.

China will emerge stronger if it can deal with the issues rightly, he said.

Lifen Zhang, editor-in-chief of FTChinese.com, said China does not have the strength to be the economic savior amid the current crisis and should handle self-positioning carefully when dealing with the United States.

"There is a lot of flattering going on at the moment, but be careful. What do the Americans really want?" he said, adding that a number of scholars have recently written on the topic.

On the top of the U.S. agenda was currently the need to restore confidence and integrity in the world's most developed economic system, which calls for cooperation from China, the world's fastest growing developing economy, said Simon Schama, professor of history at the University of Columbia.

But Schama said China should bear in mind that the next election in the United States will be in 2010 and avoid overplaying the leverage in its hand.

"What the Chinese government ought to be aware of is not so to overplay in its hands this leverage as to encourage a ... backlash" as the conservatives may seize certain popular issues, including trying to present an image of the Obama administration as being too soft, he said.

(Xinhua News Agency March 14, 2009)