Research On The Spokesperson’s Discourse Strategies Of The Ministry Of Foreign Affairs

With the continuous improvement of China’s comprehensive national power,China has taken up more and more international responsibilities and gradually moved into the center of the world stage.China’s international status is becoming more and more important in the international community,however the discourse power,which is an important soft power,can hardly match China’s hard power.Enhancing China’s right to speak has become an important strategic task for China’s international communication.The Ministry of Foreign Affairs,as an important official department for foreign voices,directly affects the maintenance of China’s national interests,the mastery of international discourse and the shaping of national image in its foreign discourse expression.This paper focuses on all the texts of regular press conferences of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs from 2011 to 2020.It builds its own corpus to study how MFA spokespersons use discourse strategies to safeguard national sovereignty,security and interests,and then examines whether the discourse strategies of MFA spokespersons have changed.This paper gains empirical insights into foreign discourse construction from the findings of the changes and constants therein.This study uses the discourse-historical analysis method as a theoretical framework.Using a combination of quantitative and qualitative methods,this paper quantitatively analyzes the high-frequency words and subject lines of the regular press conferences of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs,and qualitatively analyzes the use of discourse strategies and the relationship between discourse and society.This study finds that MFA spokespersons are able to clearly identify the essence of issues and reasonably use different discourse strategies to respond to various issues.In terms of referential strategy,spokespersons aims to solve problems and divide internal and external groups.However,they are always committed to promoting the construction of harmonious international relations and pursuing peaceful development.In the predictional strategy,the spokesperson sticks to the position in a clear and consistent manner,expressing China’s attitude and proposition.In the strategy of argumentation,the speaker uses facts,reason and law to firmly defend national interests.In the strategy of perspectivation,they borrowed words and views from multiple parties to reinforce their positions and views and create a more realistic image of China.In strategy of intensification and mitigation,they strengthen the tone and enhance the expression through allusions and tone,while using ambiguous strategies to weaken the impact of negative issues.Combined with the text and textual context,the diplomatic discourse strategy has undergone three stages of change: the construction period,the development period and the strong state period.The diplomatic discourse strategy changes from being mainly slow to being rigid and soft to implementing a more proactive discourse strategy.Comprehensive national power,national interests,foreign policy,and international discourse power are important factors influencing the discourse strategy of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.The use and transformation of the discourse strategy of the spokesperson of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs provides useful experience for the construction of China’s foreign discourse system.Firstly,we should continue to stand in the perspective of national strategic communication to develop a discourse expression system and formulate medium-and long-term discourse strategies based on national interests,international situation and foreign policy.Secondly,it is necessary to upgrade the concept,innovate the system of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs,and promote the upgrading and transformation of the functions of the spokesperson of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs,so as to cope with various issues and do a better job of making foreign voices.Thirdly,it is crucial to integrate the concept of the community of human destiny into the discourse strategy,integrate traditional Chinese culture and Chinese diplomatic wisdom,create a discourse strategy with Chinese style and Chinese temperament,and safeguard national sovereignty,security and interests with an effective discourse strategy,so as to enhance China’s discourse power in the international community and shape a three-dimensional image of China in multiple dimensions.