He may not speak Mandarin Chinese but when Gary Locke, US commerce secretary, presents his credentials in Beijing as the new US ambassador he will be welcomed by many as a returning son of the nation. In a meeting in mid-2009, Wen Jiabao, the Chinese premier, congratulated Mr Locke and Steven Chu, energy secretary, for being Chinese-Americans who had achieved such high office, according to diplomatic cables obtained by WikiLeaks and seen by the Financial Times.

The ruling Communist party has an ambivalent relationship with overseas Chinese. The United Front Department, a party organisation, has cultivated overseas Chinese, encouraging them to consider themselves as much part of the motherland as their adopted homelands.

Overseas Chinese have also been key investors in China, especially in the earliest stages of the country’s opening in the 1980s.