The history of APEC, the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum, is more interesting than it may first appear. It did not begin as the high-level leaders’ gathering we know today. In January 1989, then Australian Prime Minister Bob Hawke publicly proposed the idea of an Asia-Pacific economic cooperation mechanism during a speech in Seoul. In November of the same year, ministers from 12 economies met in Canberra for the first APEC Ministerial Meeting. That meeting marked the formal beginning of APEC.
The 12 founding members were Australia, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Indonesia, Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, New Zealand, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and the United States. So the United States was not a later entrant. It was there from the beginning. China joined in 1991, together with Hong Kong and Chinese Taipei. APEC’s use of the term “economies” rather than “countries” became an important institutional feature that made this particular form of regional cooperation possible.
In its early years, APEC was mainly a forum for ministers and senior officials. From 1993 onwards, the annual Economic Leaders’ Meeting gradually became an established part of the organisation, and APEC’s political and strategic significance increased accordingly. APEC is not a treaty-based organisation with strong enforcement powers. It works mainly through consultation, consensus and voluntary action. Even so, it has developed several enduring priorities, including trade and investment liberalisation, business facilitation and economic and technical cooperation. Over time, its agenda has expanded to include the digital economy, connectivity, energy, the environment, supply chains and new technology.
APEC meets every year, but not every meeting carries the same meaning. A summit does not automatically change the direction of a country or of the wider region. What it often does, however, is concentrate accumulated policy questions, strategic intentions and international relationships into one visible moment. The host economy in particular can use the meeting to signal how it sees the next stage of development. In that sense, APEC is not just an event. It is also a window through which changes in the Asia-Pacific economic order can be observed.
By 2026, China has hosted APEC three times. The first was in Shanghai in 2001, the second in Beijing in 2014, and the third in Shenzhen in 2026. If these three cities and three moments are placed within the longer history of China’s reform and opening-up, a revealing pattern begins to appear.
Shanghai in 2001 came at a crucial stage in China’s deeper integration into the global trading system. That year’s APEC Leaders’ Meeting adopted the Shanghai Accord and discussed trade and investment facilitation, globalisation, the new economy and structural reform. Even more importantly, China formally joined the World Trade Organization at the end of the same year. Strictly speaking, the rapid expansion of Chinese exports and manufacturing that followed cannot simply be attributed to the Shanghai APEC meeting itself. Nor was APEC the direct cause of China’s trade boom. But historically, the meeting clearly sat at an important turning point when China was accelerating its integration into the global economy. Shanghai was also a fitting symbol for that stage — an international Chinese city oriented towards trade, finance and global markets.
Beijing in 2014 represented a different moment. That meeting placed strong emphasis on Asia-Pacific economic integration, innovation, economic reform, connectivity and infrastructure. One phrase that many people still remember is “APEC blue”. To improve air quality during the summit, Beijing and surrounding areas introduced large-scale pollution-control measures. But it would be too simplistic to treat this as nothing more than a few days of temporary restrictions. China had already begun strengthening air-pollution control, and policies around the time of the summit were reinforced further. In the years that followed, air quality in Beijing and surrounding regions did in fact improve substantially. “APEC blue” began as a slightly ironic expression, but in retrospect it also became a symbolic marker of a broader shift in environmental governance.
For this reason, China’s own historical narrative often links its APEC host years with particular stages of national development. This should not be understood as a summit directly causing a policy turn. A more accurate interpretation is that the country had already reached a point where adjustment was necessary, and an event such as APEC made that adjustment more visible. It also provided an opportunity to restate policy priorities and concentrate resources. Shanghai symbolised deeper entry into the global trading system. Beijing reflected changes in China’s role in regional governance, infrastructure development, environmental policy and its broader international position.
That makes the choice of Shenzhen in 2026 especially worth watching.
Shenzhen carries a very different symbolism from Beijing or Shanghai. Beijing is inseparable from politics and state power. Shanghai has a firmly established identity as a centre of finance and international trade. Shenzhen, by contrast, carries less traditional political and cultural symbolism. Its strongest identity is reform and opening-up. It is a Special Economic Zone, a city built through manufacturing, foreign trade, private enterprise and technological innovation. Today, it is also home to a remarkable concentration of globally influential technology and manufacturing companies. From telecommunications and drones to electric vehicles, artificial intelligence, robotics and advanced manufacturing, Shenzhen increasingly looks like a showcase for the industries China wants to associate with its future.
China’s three stated priorities for APEC 2026 are openness, innovation and cooperation. Choosing Shenzhen therefore sends a fairly clear signal — a renewed emphasis on openness, on technological and industrial innovation, and on China’s continued desire to remain deeply engaged in Asia-Pacific economic cooperation. When Shenzhen was announced as the host city, it was also officially described as an important window for China’s reform and opening-up and for mutually beneficial engagement with the world.
This connects directly with the economic environment China is facing today. On my most recent visit to Shenzhen, one of my strongest impressions was that the economy no longer felt as energetic as it once did. The effects of the property downturn remain visible. Changes can be felt in retail, restaurants, commercial activity and even in the general mood of people. Huaqiangbei offers a very direct example. In the past, the crowds could feel like a cinema emptying after a film. Some areas are now noticeably quieter. Of course, personal observation cannot replace macroeconomic statistics, and China’s real growth rate cannot be inferred simply from what the streets look like. But changes at the micro level do reflect at least part of the economic pressure now being experienced.
I am also reluctant to describe China’s present situation simply as an “economic cycle”. In economics, the idea of a cycle is often a retrospective description. A true cycle implies at least some recurring mechanism, whereas the more than four decades of China’s reform era have not yet completed a repeating pattern that can be tested again and again. Reform began after 1978. Opening accelerated during the 1980s. There were price reforms and serious political and economic turbulence around the end of that decade. Growth accelerated again after 1992. China then entered a much faster phase of expansion in the late 1990s and particularly after joining the WTO in 2001. Later came the property boom, land finance, the gains of globalisation, industrial upgrading, policy shifts and a changing external environment. The causes behind each period of acceleration and slowdown have been very different. We are still inside this historical process, so it is difficult to claim that we already possess a reliable “cycle” that can predict the next turn.
Seen from this perspective, the position of the Shenzhen APEC meeting may be particularly important. China needs new sources of growth, and it also needs to explain more clearly what future growth will depend on. Some of the conditions that once supported rapid expansion — property development, land finance, low-cost manufacturing and a favourable phase of global trade — have changed. So where will the next support structure come from? The reform-oriented identity of Shenzhen, together with technological innovation, new energy, artificial intelligence and advanced manufacturing, may represent part of the answer China now wants to emphasise.
This is why APEC 2026 is more than a ceremonial international conference. It is, first of all, a cooperative forum among 21 Asia-Pacific economies. But for China it may also serve as a platform for restating its development direction. Whether that message can eventually be translated into effective policy and renewed growth is something we cannot know in advance. But from the choice of city, the meeting’s themes and the language surrounding it, the intended direction is already quite visible.
Another practical question is whether US President Donald Trump will attend. His participation has not yet been finally confirmed, and the importance of that decision is greater than the travel plans of most other leaders. The United States remains one of the most important economic, technological and military powers in the Asia-Pacific, and the presence or absence of the US president would directly affect the diplomatic weight of the meeting. Trump’s own political and diplomatic style also introduces an unusual degree of unpredictability, which means Shenzhen has to prepare on the assumption that he may attend.
A US presidential visit is also in a different category from most state visits. Presidential aircraft, secure communications, protection, medical support, vehicles and a large logistical system are all involved, and these American systems have to be coordinated with the host country’s airspace, airports, roads, security, communications and medical arrangements. Many details about aircraft movements, equipment and protection are not public, so some of the numbers circulated online should not be treated as established facts. But the overall scale of logistics and security surrounding an overseas US presidential visit is undeniably enormous. If Trump ultimately attends the Shenzhen APEC meeting, even a short stay would create a major operational challenge for transport, security and the normal functioning of the city.
At the same time, Shenzhen would not be handling this alone. Strictly speaking, this is not an ordinary large event organised by a city. China is the host economy, while Shenzhen is the principal venue for the leaders’ meeting. China already has the experience of hosting APEC in Shanghai in 2001 and Beijing in 2014, as well as decades of experience receiving foreign heads of state and organising very large international events. National-level diplomatic, security and logistical capabilities will therefore be brought into Shenzhen rather than leaving the city to build everything from scratch.
When I look at the Shenzhen APEC meeting now, I see several coordinates overlapping. One is APEC itself — an organisation that began in Canberra in 1989 and gradually became one of the Asia-Pacific’s most important mechanisms for economic cooperation. Another is China — from Shanghai in 2001, to Beijing in 2014, and now Shenzhen in 2026, each host year falling at a moment when China’s development model was being re-expressed. The third coordinate is Shenzhen itself, not a traditional political centre, but one of the clearest symbols of China’s reform era and today one of its most concentrated centres of technological industry.
For me personally, there is another interesting coincidence. I now live in Canberra, and I also have a deep connection with Shenzhen. APEC began in Canberra. More than three decades later, its third “China moment” brings the leaders’ meeting to Shenzhen. One city is the birthplace of APEC, while the other is one of the most representative cities of China’s reform and opening-up. Through APEC, the two cities are unexpectedly connected.
That is why what interests me most is not simply how many days the meeting will last, which leaders will attend, or how many documents will be signed. What I really want to understand is what China is trying to tell the outside world — and perhaps also itself — by choosing Shenzhen as the international stage for this particular moment. If Shanghai represented China’s deeper entry into globalisation, and Beijing represented a more confident display of China’s changing international position and domestic governance, then Shenzhen may correspond to another question altogether — once the old development model begins to reach its limits, what will China rely on to move forward?
Whether the Shenzhen APEC meeting of 2026 eventually proves to be a genuine turning point is something we cannot know yet. Turning points are rarely declared on the day they happen. We usually recognise them only years later, when we look back and see that something really did begin to change direction. That is precisely why this meeting is worth watching carefully.
Discover more from Geoffrey Chen
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.