During nine visits over 23 years, Milledgeville City Manager Scott Wood has seen China poise itself to become a dominant force on the world stage.

And returning from his most recent visit to the country with the International Center for Democratic Governance of the University of Georgia’s Carl Vinson Institute of Government, Wood said the Chinese dream of becoming a major world power is soon coming to fruition.

Wood recently returned from a trip to China in which he helped give career Chinese municipal government workers insight into the differences in applying municipal government in their country and how it is applied in the United States. For two weeks in June, Wood traveled inside China teaching local government administrators how to facilitate U.S.-style municipal government procedures in any number of different applications.

Wood said he works with the Carl Vinson Institute of Government to help build relations between the U.S. and its neighbor in the east.

“The U.S. needs to pay attention,” he said during a lunch meeting with city department heads Wednesday. “I told my boys — who are grown now — that when they grow up they will have to deal with China. But now I’m seeing that it’s people in our generation who are dealing with China.”

And that is because of the lightning fast pace with which China is working to fulfill its own manifest destiny. But as China reaches to meet its potential in this increasingly smaller world, Wood said that the influence of western society is becoming more and more evident.

“In Beijing you see the Lexus and BMWs, but you also see the horse-drawn wagon on busy thoroughfares,” he said. “It’ll be an interesting challenge for them to maintain their longstanding cultural values with the indoctrination of western values and culture.”

As China juggles this juxtaposition of communist ideals and emerging capitalist tendencies, a clear understanding of American ideals can benefit both societies.

“We hope that the positivity we make in China will pay dividends in the future,” he said. “China is going to be economically, historically and culturally strong. It is also going to be militarily strong.”

And as China grows stronger on all those fronts, Wood said it is increasingly important for America to work to emphasize how the two countries can work together and not against one another.

“If Milledgeville is helping to introduce them to democratic prospects and principles, then it is very probable that their military mite will not be targeted at us.”