The Success of Chinese Soft Power in the West - Essay Example

SUCCESS OF THE CHINESE “SOFT POWER” IN THE WEST By and Submission: Success of the Chinese “Soft Power” in the West Introduction China is one of the countries with the largest economies in the world and in contention to become the world superpower. Despite possessing a strong economy, China’s quest for power is debatable. The country has adopted completely different policy in its international presence as compared to the other powerful countries. China approaches the world political, economic and social-cultural landscape from soft foreign policy. Consequently, people regard China as applying soft-power in its practices to influence the world situation. The country does not use coercive power, but rather persuades other countries through economic and social-cultural practices to gain power (Hunter, 2009). The China’s soft-power activities in the international world include the use of foreign aids and investment, exchange programs, diplomacy, peacekeeping and humanitarian assistance, and multilateral involvement. These vary in application over the western countries as compared to the African and other Asia countries. Nevertheless, the China’s soft-power activities are not successful in the West as evident in other countries, despite experiencing positive outcomes in the economy and reputation. Determining the China’s success in the west would help evaluate the usefulness of the soft-powers towards the western countries. This paper will evaluate the success of Chinese soft-power in the west that will be achieved by analysing the economic and social-cultural gains as well as the limitations to great successes as obtained in other regions. Successes Increased trade activities capital investments with the western countries China has used its soft power to grow its trade activities with the western countries and this has borne positive outcomes in the American and European economies. China has attained increased persuasion in the west through use of her economy and rich culture to enter into trade deals as well as increase levels of the exports to the western countries. China has increased favourable trade relationships, notably with the Latin American countries through bilateral agreements (Gill & Huang, 2006 p.20). This has promoted economic activities between the citizens of both regions by attaining apt environment for businesses to thrive. The exports and financial transactions with countries such as Brazil have been on a rise in the recent years. A similar observation is made on the Chinese trade with the United States. China is the largest single exporter in the American market with a range of products such as in the telecommunication and textile industry (Gill & Huang, 2006 p. 24). The increased exports are facilitated through mass production and rich resource endowment, which enable creation of cheaper and quality products fit for the American market. Chinese exports to the European market have also been on a strong growth, especially, in the clothing industry. Nevertheless, Europe and America have criticized China for dumping practices and would develop regulations to limit Chinese exports. The Chinese financial sector has attracted the attention of western investors, leading to increased financial cash flow. The Chinese economic growth presents wide opportunities to investors domestically as well as from the international world. The European investors have moved to exploit the opportunities and reap capital gains. They have made high capital investments to support the economic activities in China. The European Union as a block is involved in intense capital investments in China. In fact, China is the largest foreign investment partner for the European Union (Gill & Huang, 2006 p. 31). American investors also hold huge investments in China through development of businesses and partnerships with domestic firms. Some of the top American businesses in China include Yahoo and Coca-Cola. Increased telecommunications and information media activities China has experienced success in the promotion of her telecommunication businesses and services in the Western countries that helps in diversifying the economy as well as impacting the shape of the world media (Kalathil, 2011). China is a leader in production of telecommunication and information products using rare mineral components. These industries have a great influence of major changes in the world and China is able to make great significance as a powerful nation. Technological advancements are powerful in transforming the ways of doing things and possession of telecommunication capabilities hand China an opportunity to shape the world in line with its policies. The country has enjoyed strong growth in the supply of telecommunication items to the western countries as well as development of media services that could potentially influence the entire world. These include the CCTV and Xhinua media entities designed according to Chinese techniques (Kalathil, 2011 p. 6). Moreover, the country has developed the media to reach international audiences using multichannel techniques. The western countries have increased consumption of these developments, though they it is a China’s way of countering the west, especially through the media powers. China has allocated huge funds to expand the operations of the media activities abroad and targets the western media houses. Using this industry, China has increased sales of material related to the local culture to both the developing and western countries. The country has also developed English channels that would reach the audiences in the West and hence promote the ambitions of attaining worldwide coverage with Chinese content (Kalathil, 2011 p. 3). There are increased journalists and reporters trained to collect and present information in the western countries. The western media have received these efforts from a perspective that China seeks to reshape the global media in order to fit in the country’s perception. Despite this, China has committed resources towards increasing the coverage of its media in the western nations. Increased Confucius programs that promote awareness of the Chinese practices China has attained tremendous success in the Confucius programs developed to promote the local social and cultural practices to the international world. Chinese Confucius programs seek to create awareness and sell the Chinese practices to other communities who know little about the Chinese social, cultural along with national policies (Zaharna, Hubbert & Hartig, 2014). The programs are carried out through institution developed in foreign countries and operation of the exchange programs. The Chinese Confucius institutions have increased in number in the western countries inclusive of the United States. The enrolment to the institutions has rose and more people are gaining interest in the cultural practices and traditions taught in the institutions (Zaharna, Hubbert & Hartig, 2014 p. 33). Through the institutions, more students in the American and European colleges have got opportunities to visit China through exchange programs with their fellows in China. In addition, the functions of the Confucius institutions have influenced the development of Chinese language course that are currently offered in the higher learning institutions in America and Europe. Through these efforts, more people in the world have acquired increased knowledge about Chinese ways of life that has promoted the recognition of the character of China. Teachings and festivals of the Chinese cultures have created interest among the people in the west to travel to China and enjoy the rich cultural practices (Zaharna, Hubbert & Hartig, 2014 p.36). Following this, the Chinese tourism sector has experienced growth not only from other countries, but also from the Western nations. In addition, the country’s sense of social life and cultures has earned it opportunities to hold world social-cultural events. Increased peaceful perception China has built a strong reputation as a peaceful player in the global social and political issues courtesy to the soft power approach applied. China does not strongly participate in the highly sensitive political issues in the world as seen with the United States and other western powerful countries. For instance, the country was not involved in the attacks on Iraq and Afghanistan over their involvement in terrorism activities unlike the west who sent military forces to the two countries led by America (Gill & Huang, 2006 p.22). Despite this, China has strongly stood against terrorism through more peaceful activities. It has been recognized through the international bodies such as the United Nations as a peaceful country. In addition, China has supported campaigns for human rights all over the world and on several occasions stood against military activities of the western countries. China has expressed disloyalty over use of military powers to achieve peace in the various war torn countries. The country has offered non-military support such as donations alongside sending peacemakers to nations faced with war incidences (Hunter, 2009 p.382). These activities are part of China’s international policy and have earned the country a positive perception from the people in western countries. This has been rewarded in various ways that have benefited China as well as passing a message of its objectives to impact the world. For instance, was selected to hold the world convention of Women Rights in Beijing. Top women leaders in the world, including the West were in attendance and the convention earned the country high status worldwide. Limitations to the success of China’s soft power in the West The success of China in the economic and social matter in the western countries is limited and would explain the differences seen in the outcomes of China’s soft power activities between the west and other regions. The west considers China’s soft as mainly for acquiring majority popularity, but not mainly for influencing world order. Gilll & Huang (2006) note that the China’s attractiveness associated with her cultural practices does not offer an equivalent perception like those of the western country. This would be seen in the present differences in the cultural icons of the western and Chinese origin that attract varied ubiquity. For instance, the cultural brands and icons of the United States such as the Microsoft, Big Macs and MTV have higher ubiquity than those of China such as the CCTV (Gilll & Huang, 2006 p.27). China has also experienced a decreasing performance in the international policies in the western countries, despite enjoying strong increments over a long time in the past. For instance, the enrolment of foreign students in Chinese programs in the United States has dropped in the recent years. An opposite trend is observed in the enrolments of students from non-western countries into the Chinese programs. This shows the performance of the Chinese soft power approaches in the west may not provide sustainable growth and hence contribute to low success in the West. Soft western perception The success of the Chinese soft power also suffers in the west from the soft notion accorded. The West has been exposed to hard power that has dominated the orientation towards development of world policies. This dominance has a large influence over the notion of the western people on the China’s soft power version to influence the global policies (Breslin, 2011 p. 1). The west is oriented towards the use of the economic relations alongside other material origins of power or influence that constitutes to hard power and would therefore have a light notion of any other form of power. Following this, the West has a soft notion over the China’s soft power activities and therefore feels a little drive to shift support to the China’s approach. The western people expect stronger world politics to be achieved through the use of hard power and hence the input of China’s power is taken with light weight since does not combine the items of hard power they are used to. The West recognizes the input of strong military forces to acquire power that is not observed in China’s approaches. In fact, the military input would contribute to the notion of power that people offer and where it is lacking other factors may not create a strong notion over approaches used (Breslin, 2011 p. 4). Despite China strengthening its military forces, it has not applied strong military actions in the world top issues and hence the west has a soft notion over Chinese military capabilities. Therefore, despite that increased Chinese commitment to impact that West orientation on power, it may not achieve strong support as accorded to the importance of hard power. Lack of credibility China’s soft power approaches have limited success based on the notion of the west on the country’s credibility. Hodge (2010) studied the limitations of China’s success of using soft power in Europe through surveys. He focussed the study, particularly on the diplomatic activities used by the China and gathered the opinions of the people in the European countries. The findings showed that the China’s diplomacy activities were limited by lack of credibility (Hodge, 2010 p30). Chinese diplomatic practices receive little trust, that does not play a strong role in improving the country’s image to the west. The mode of conducting the diplomatic programs influences the trust and poor presentation would greatly indicate lack of credibility. China does not use highly credible personalities or actors to pass diplomatic messages to the European countries and people perceive this from a negative perspective. For instance, the state organizations are part of the Chinese diplomatic campaigners and do not adequate pass the message of the China’s political character in more appealing ways to the eager foreign audiences. This practice portrays an unclear decision making of the Chinese government that raises concerns about whether the government is legitimate to speak on behalf of the people. Another aspect of the Chinese diplomatic practices is the belief that the Chinese organizations play a significant role in daily or continuous practice of presenting the image of China’s character to the European communities (Hodge, 2010 p. 30). The Chinese organizations such as the businesses, institutions, or individuals may not live up to this belief and would present unfavourable messages about the local issues in China. For instance, the actors could talk about the problems experienced in China during their normal operations and this fails to create an appealing image about the country. The China’s instruments for reaching the foreign audiences also express credibility concerns. The country has used the media to promote soft power associated with its rich culture through ways that create a poor impression of the government (Hodge, 2010 p. 31). Through the same media activities, the government has invested huge finances to develop new channels in the international world with the aims of countering the negative messages presented about China. This raises credibility concerns since the media is expected to apply the ethics of journalism and not act with bias. These credibility concerns work against China and limit the success of its soft powers in the West. Western counter soft power practices The western countries have integrated soft powers with the dominant hard power which acts to counter the success of China’s soft power policies. The western countries have responded to the China’s use of soft powers by expanding their soft power programs in China and the entire world (Eades, 2014). Their dominance in the world’s control for a long time hands them an added advantage to promote their economic and cultural practices so as to attract other countries. In addition, the countries have stability in their societies that is not observed in China, which further promotes their success in soft power. For instance, America has expanded cultural programs in China, which has yielded positive outcomes observed in the increased sales of cultural content. An example is the sale of the American movies, television content and pop music that most young Chinese people enjoy (Eades, 2014 p.1). These have attracted more Chinese people and there are increased exports to China besides growing the domestic appreciation of their cultures. The western countries are therefore capable of winning against China’s soft powers causing the low success of the latter in the west. Conclusion China has largely applied the soft power strategies to attract other countries into its objectives in the world conditions. The country has experienced enormous success in developing countries, unlike in the West. This paper has evaluated the success of China’s soft powers in the West focusing on situations of success and limitations to influence on western countries. It has showed tangible gains to the China’s economy and social landscape. The country has registered increased trade activities with the West through increased exports, capital investments and favourable trade agreements. In addition, it has experienced increased adoption of information media and telecommunication offers such as CCTV and Xhinua media developments. The country has also benefited from increased Confucius programs to create increased awareness of China’s culture and policies. Further, the country has earned high reputation as a peaceful nation. Despite these notable benefits, the country’s soft powers have generally experienced low success in the west due to several factors. These include lack of credibility in its programs, soft perception of China’s soft powers to lead the world, and development western counter soft powers. Reference List Breslin, S. (2011). The Soft Notion of China’s ‘Soft Power’. https://www.chathamhouse.org/sites/files/chathamhouse/public/Research/Asia/0211pp_breslin.pdf Eades, M. C. (2014). Soft Power, America vs. China: America Still Wins, Foreign Policy Association. http://foreignpolicyblogs.com/2014/01/22/soft-power-america-vs-china-america-still-wins-2/ Gill, B. & Huang, Y. (2006). Sources and Limits of Chinese ‘Soft Power’. Survival, Vol 48, no. 2, pp 17-36. http://people.hum.aau.dk/cgs-studier/siv_public/eksamensplaner/Eksamen_F14/4%20semester/Syntese/Kinesiske%20omr%C3%A5destudier/Sources%20and%20limits%20of%20Chinas%20soft%20power.pdf Hooghe, I. (2010). The Limits of China’s Soft Power in Europe- Beijing’s Public Diplomacy Puzzle. Netherlands Institute of International Relations ‘Clingendael’. The Hague. http://www.clingendael.nl/sites/default/files/20100100_cdsp_paper_dhooghe_china.pdf Hunter, A. (2009). Soft Power: China on the Global Stage. Chinese Journal of International Politics, Vol. 2, pp: 373–398. http://cjip.oxfordjournals.org/content/2/3/373.full.pdf Kalathil, S. (2014). China’s Soft Power in the Information Age: Think Again. https://isd.georgetown.edu/sites/isd/files/Kalathil_Chinas_Soft_Power.pdf Zaharna, R.S, Hubbert, J. & Hartig, F. (2014). Confucius Institutes and the Globalization of China’s Soft Power. https://uscpublicdiplomacy.org/sites/uscpublicdiplomacy.org/files/useruploads/u25044/Confucius%20Institutes%20v2%20%281%29.pdf Read More