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A Current Study Of Chinese Soft Power: Strategy, Opportunity And Challenges

Posted on:2016-12-15Degree:MasterType:Thesis
Country:ChinaCandidate:A B A b i g a i l K i n g GoFull Text:PDF
GTID:2296330461956832Subject:International relations
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In recent years, the Chinese government has placed much focus on developing its soft power. From constructing the Confucious Institutes to spread Mandarin, to acting as a "responsible stakeholder" by contributing economic and human resources to building infrastructure in Africa, to improving China’s media power, China has been making great strides in improving its soft power. Despite these efforts, China’s soft power is still relatively weak compared to Western countries such as the US and UK, and even eastern countries such as Japan and South Korea. In 2014, according to Monocle’s 5th annual soft power survey China only placed 19 out of 30 countries, while the top five spots were occupied by USA, Germany, UK, Japan, and France respectively.Previous research on soft power has only focused on the foreign policy initiatives implemented by the Chinese government and the material benefits gained from said initiatives, but did not explain the gap between soft power initiatives and raising soft power. Also, Chinese government and academic interpretations of soft power heavily relied on Joseph S. Nye, Jr.’s definition, that soft power was an "attractive power," and often incorrectly conflate having culture as having soft power. By first explaining China’s interpretation of soft power, culture, and then examining the goals that China’s soft power hopes to achieve (strengthening national identity, and improving international image) this paper attempted to identify areas of strength and potential sources of soft power that have not been considered before.Furthermore, globalization and the Information Age are changing the soft power landscape due to the influx of information and interconnectedness of cross-border communities. Research results have indicated that due to cultural differences there is a gap between Western perceptions of Chinese soft power and Chinese intention with its soft power, however the Information Age has potential to ameliorate such misunderstandings through people to people interaction. As soft power was strongly focused in the realm of governments and nation state actors, modern communications is bringing soft power down to a grass-roots level. In other words, it is not the government with the biggest amount of soft power that will determine whether or not foreign policies are effective, but the people to people interaction.
Keywords/Search Tags:Chinese Soft Power, Cultural Power, Culture, National Image, National Identity
PDF Full Text Request
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