Hannah Beech has been an Asia-based journalist for 20 years, most recently serving as TIME’s East Asia Bureau Chief and China Bureau Chief. While living in Shanghai, Beijing, Bangkok and Hong Kong, she has reported across Asia, from Afghanistan, Myanmar and Papua New Guinea to East Timor, Japan and Tajikistan. Her reporting honors include a Journalist of the Year award from the Society of Publishers in Asia and numerous Amnesty Human Rights Press prizes. Ms. Beech, who is half-Japanese and half-American, is currently a TIME contributor and is working on a long-term project about Asia and historical memory. She speaks Japanese, Mandarin and French.

James McGregor is the chairman of APCO Worldwide's greater China region and author of two highly regarded books: No Ancient Wisdom, No Followers: The Challenges of Chinese Authoritarian Capitalism, published in October 2012, and One Billion Customers: Lessons from the Front Lines of Doing Business in China, published in 2005. He was a veteran reporter for The Wall Street Journal, and prior to joining APCO, he was founder and CEO of a China-focused consulting and research firm for hedge funds. He also held previous roles as a senior adviser for Ogilvy Public Relations China and the China managing partner for GIV Venture Partners, a venture capital fund that focused on technology and Internet investments in China and India. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, the Atlantic Council, a Global Council member of the Asia Society, a board member of the U.S.-China Education Trust and a member of the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations.

Dr. Wu Xinbo is Professor and Executive Dean, Institute of International Studies, and Director at the Center for American Studies, Fudan University. He teaches and researches China’s foreign and security policy, Sino-U.S. relations, and U.S. Asia-Pacific policy. Prof. Wu is the author of Dollar Diplomacy and Major Powers in China, 1909-1913 (Fudan University Press, 1997), award-winning Turbulent Water: US Asia-Pacific Security Strategy in the post-Cold War Era (Fudan University Press, 2006), Managing Crisis and Sustaining Peace between China and the United States (United States Institute of Peace, 2008), and The New Landscape in Sino-U.S. Relations in the early 21st Century (Fudan University Press, 2011). He also has published numerous articles and book chapters in China, U.S., Japan, Germany, South Korea, Singapore and India. Dr. Wu is on the editorial board of The Washington Quarterly (published by the Center for Strategic and International Studies) and on the International Board of the Studies in Asian Security book series (sponsored by the East-West Center and published by the Stanford University Press).

Dr. Wu entered Fudan University in 1982 as an undergraduate student and received his B.A. in history in 1986. In 1992, he got his Ph. D. in international relations from Fudan University. In the same year, he joined the Center for American Studies, Fudan University. In 1994, he spent one year at the George Washington University as a visiting scholar. In the fall of 1997, he was a visiting fellow at the Asia-Pacific Research Center, Stanford University and the Henry Stimson Center in Washington DC. From January to August, 2000, he was a Visiting Fellow at the Brookings Institution. From September 2006 to July 2007, he was a Jennings Randolph Senior Fellow at the United States Institute of Peace.