Learning Western Rhetoric For A Better Engagement With The West

The course of China's publicity has been carried out on two fronts, i.e., the domestic-oriented publicity and foreign-oriented publicity, since the day the PRC founded. As China is becoming increasingly open and powerful, China's core interests are correspondingly concerned with the outside world, which has a higher requirement for the quality of China's foreign-oriented publicity. However, when one conducts an in-depth examination of the status quo of China's foreign-oriented publicity, he/she would find that it is far from satisfactory when compared with the requirement mentioned above.A large number of academic works have been done, from the perspective ranging from national image, commercial communication, education to city advancement, by domestic academia on how to enhance and perfect China's foreign-domestic publicity. However, due to various reasons, few people have undertaken to study this issue from a rhetorical perspective. Much of such research, however, would inevitably remains uncertain and needs improving. This serves as the internal factor underlying this study.As a discipline of longstanding history, Western rhetoric (or rhetoric for short), has played a fundamental role in various sectors of western society. If China intends to convince foreign local audience in its foreign-oriented publicizing activities, to promote its national image via foreign-oriented publicity, to safeguard its national interests in the Western-dominated order of international discourse, it is supposed to enhance the sense of rhetoric in its foreign-oriented publicity sectors. This is the external factor that gives rise to the present study.This paper holds that foreign-oriented publicity is in fact rhetoric on a macroscopic scale. Consequently, the promotion of China's practical capability and China's foreign-oriented publicity effect should be followed by the observation of the guidelines in Western rhetoric.On the basis of analyzing the status quo of China's foreign-oriented publicity—especially that of the press release system, this paper brings out the discipline Western rhetoric. we then, through briefly presenting the fundamental concepts and theories of rhetoric, conducts a case study concerning the State-Council-level spokesmen's performance when they were confronted with an unforeseen event in both China and the U.S., putting forward both the guideline and concrete measures to promote China's foreign-oriented publicizing effect. This paper concludes that a paradigm shift, which is embodied in the employment of what Professor Liu Yameng has termed the principle of "Justify my position in your terms" as the methodological foundation, and in a heightened sense of rhetoric that results from efforts in popularizing rhetorical education, innovating the work scheme of foreign-oriented publicity sectors, utilizing the Internet as a new form of foreign-oriented media. These concrete measures, should be implemented if China intends to enhance its foreign-oriented publicity effect.