Abstract
The idea of soft power – the ability to attract others by means of culture, political values and policies – is broadly debated in the context of the re-emergence of China. Less attention has been given to public diplomacy, the actual instrument governments use to mobilize these soft power resources. This paper goes beyond the literature on China’s soft power and focuses on the instrument of public diplomacy. The two paradigms of old and new public diplomacy help to tackle the idea that China is an undifferentiated, monolithic entity acting with a single, unitary logic across cultural domains. Confucius Institutes (CIs), as one important tool of China’s public diplomacy, illustrate this as they include non-Chinese non-state actors into China’s external communication efforts. This approach requires and encourages more dialogue and greater exchange between the stakeholders which co-create messages about China for foreign audiences. Nevertheless, the paper argues that CIs at the same time also illustrate that China’s public diplomacy system largely remains state-centric which limits its influence to shape China’s image and project its soft power.
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©2014 by De Gruyter
Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Introduction
- Rethinking China’s Soft Power
- Articles
- Reporting for China: Cosmopolitan Attitudes and the “Chinese Perspective” among Chinese Correspondents Abroad
- Rewriting the Chinese National Epic in an Age of Global Consumerism: City of Life and Death and The Flowers of War
- Fei Cheng Wu Rao (非诚勿扰): Staging Global China through International Format Television and Overseas Special Episodes
- Exporting the Communist Image: The 1976 Chinese Peasant Painting Exhibition in Britain
- Projecting the Good Life at Home and Abroad: Lineages of the Chinese National Image from 1949 to the Present
- New Public Diplomacy Meets Old Public Diplomacy – the Case of China and Its Confucius Institutes
- The Politics of Affect in Confucius Institutes: Re-orienting Foreigners towards the PRC
- Book Reviews
- Nader Hashemi and Danny Postel: The Syrian Dilemma
- Jaesok Kim: Chinese Labor in a Korean Factory: Class, Ethnicity, and Productivity on the Shop Floor in Globalizing China
- J. H. Elliott: History in the Making
- Daniel Brook: A History of Future Cities
Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Introduction
- Rethinking China’s Soft Power
- Articles
- Reporting for China: Cosmopolitan Attitudes and the “Chinese Perspective” among Chinese Correspondents Abroad
- Rewriting the Chinese National Epic in an Age of Global Consumerism: City of Life and Death and The Flowers of War
- Fei Cheng Wu Rao (非诚勿扰): Staging Global China through International Format Television and Overseas Special Episodes
- Exporting the Communist Image: The 1976 Chinese Peasant Painting Exhibition in Britain
- Projecting the Good Life at Home and Abroad: Lineages of the Chinese National Image from 1949 to the Present
- New Public Diplomacy Meets Old Public Diplomacy – the Case of China and Its Confucius Institutes
- The Politics of Affect in Confucius Institutes: Re-orienting Foreigners towards the PRC
- Book Reviews
- Nader Hashemi and Danny Postel: The Syrian Dilemma
- Jaesok Kim: Chinese Labor in a Korean Factory: Class, Ethnicity, and Productivity on the Shop Floor in Globalizing China
- J. H. Elliott: History in the Making
- Daniel Brook: A History of Future Cities