Forging China’s “Soft Power” Is a Wasteful “Second Cold War”

HRIC Interviews Zhao Yan

Human Rights in China (HRIC): According to a report from Hong Kong’s Phoenix Weekly earlier this year, the Chinese government is poised to invest 45 billion yuan ($6.6 billion) to forge a news, publishing, and media group that can establish a voice for the government internationally. As a researcher, what do you think about this?

Zhao Yan: This is a concrete plan for implementing “the forging of China’s national ‘soft power,’” raised in the Report at the 17th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC). Speaking of a nation’s soft power, we must first clarify its concept. Harvard University professor Joseph Nye defined “soft power” as a nation’s ability to attract or shape the preferences of others through its institutions, diplomacy, and cultural perceptions. It’s only natural that in the forging of a super-powerful news, publishing, and media group, there should be no shortage of financial support. However, financial resources are not the only decisive factor in creating “soft power.” The Chinese authorities’ investment of 45 billion yuan to create the news, publishing, and media group is a complete waste of money and manpower and is idiotic nonsense. In 1955, Mao Zedong had already declared, “We must greatly expand Xinhua News Agency so that, as soon as possible, we have our own voice throughout the world. We must take charge of the planet so that the whole world can hear our voice.”¹ But several decades later, although Xinhua News Agency does have bureaus all over the world and the size of its staff is first or second in the world, when has it ever had a voice internationally? It hasn’t in the past, it doesn’t now, and it will be very difficult for it to have it in the future. Why? Because China’s state-sponsored media violate the rules of the news business. They can hoodwink the public in China, but that won’t fly with international media.

HRIC: What concept in your opinion can expand the influence of news media and establish a voice internationally?

Zhao Yan: News media must be based on objective and truthful reporting, and be guided by the principle of universal values. Their goal must be the defense of justice and truth, and the news must be free. Only if you use this concept to guide the operations of news media organizations can you hope to expand your influence and gain a voice internationally. Very few Chinese-language media can use this concept to guide their operations at the moment. Earlier this year, less than a week after China’s Ministry of Propaganda announced the 45 billion yuan plan, CCTV reported during their network news broadcast on how well-received the International Herald Leader, newly created in the U.S. by the Xinhua News Agency, was in New York, and even found an old American lady to act as prop and say on the TV screen, “This newspaper is really good, I like it a lot.” However, after I got to New York, I went all over the place but couldn’t find this newspaper. A colleague in the news business later told me that the paper went to press for only one day and then became an Internet publication, so it was all fabricated. I couldn’t help but be reminded that after the Xinhai Revolution  of 1911, Yuan Shikai (袁世凯) restored the monarchy and proclaimed himself emperor. His crown prince, Yuan Keding (袁克定), wanted to make Yuan Shikai happy, and printed a newspaper especially for him that was filled with fabricated cheers in support of the restored monarchy. Yuan Shikai played emperor for 83 days under this ruse, and died soon thereafter. The deceptive machinations of Xinhua News Agency and CCTV smack of Yuan Keding’s duping of Yuan Shikai. How could a media organization like this establish a voice internationally? It can only continue to act as a tool for its master in keeping the people ignorant.

When Mao Zedong was alive, he used the money earned by the blood and sweat of the Chinese people to buy himself the title of the leader of the Third World. During Deng Xiaoping’s and Jiang Zemin’s era, the tone was very low-key, meaning that they did not wave any big flags but silently made big money. Now, just as China is breaking away from poverty and solving the problem of feeding and clothing its people, the government media are inflating the fourth generation leadership into global leaders. If you count on this kind of media to forge “soft power,” you will only get falsehood, exaggeration, and empty talk; you will only be deceiving yourself.

HRIC: Forging “soft power” cannot rely on the media alone; it has to depend on the political system of a country, too. What is your view on China’s present political system?

Zhao Yan: Although the Chinese government professes that China is a socialist country, its political system is not the socialist system designed by Marx more than 100 years ago. It is a political system strongly colored by a mixture of feudal autocracy and crony capitalism. I saw the news on the Internet the other day that even Kim Jong Il has forsaken communist ideology.² Clearly, the market for communist ideology is shrinking by the day. There is hardly any possibility of exporting revolution.

HRIC: China once exported socialism and Mao Zedong thought. For a time it even influenced a few Asian and African countries.

Zhao Yan: Back then, China exported Mao’s revolution, but not really because of its appeal. It was the result of Mao’s fakery—he let the Chinese people starve and used money earned through their blood and sweat so that he could look like a big shot. Back then, in order to maintain good relations with Albania, the “beacon of socialism” in Europe, he did not hesitate to spend upwards of 10 billion yuan ($1.5 billion). Also, China’s relations with Vietnam were propped up by “hard power.” Whenever there was a territorial dispute over the Spratly or Paracel Islands,³ Vietnam would immediately use Chinese-manufactured arms to confront China. Where was your “soft power” then? This was even more the case with African countries. Back then, billions of yuan were used to build the Tanzania-Zambia Railway,⁴ and only then did Mao Zedong gain the title of “leader of the Third World.”

HRIC: How does the Chinese government resolve the obvious conflict between its distinctly non-socialist economic development and the professed socialist foundation of its regime?

Zhao Yan: By ramping up the ideological rhetoric. After Hu Jintao took power in 2004 during the Fourth Plenary Session of the 16th CPC Central Committee, he turned the Institute of Marxism-Leninism-Mao Zedong Thought at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences into the Research Academy on Marxism (RAM), elevating it to a research body on a vice-ministerial level while keeping its original lower-level institutional structure. During Deng Xiaoping’s and Jiang Zemin’s time in office, the government was never “leftist” to this degree. Marxism originated in Germany. If Marxism was such a good thing, why have the Germans not kept it? Leninism is a Russian product; after toying with it for 70 years, the former Soviet Union finally gave up on the use of force and dictatorship during the Gorbachev and Yeltsin era. After more than a decade of reforms, Russia is rising yet again. Actually, everyone knows that all this Marxism-Leninism is only meant for China’s domestic consumption, for duping its own people. It doesn’t work abroad. That’s why the government is setting up Confucius Institutes in so many countries, to use the traditional Chinese culture to trick the world.

This may seem like a manifestation of the rise of China’s “soft power,” but it is actually an act of resignation by a culture that finds it hard to blaze new trails. At the core of the traditional Chinese culture is Confucianism—namely, the doctrines of Confucius and Mencius. So why isn’t China establishing Mencius Institutes? Because Mencius said people come first, then comes country, and then ruler. Confucius’ philosophy was that the individual is subordinate to the whole, that the individual must obey the state. This is in precise conflict with the universal values of respect for freedom, democracy, fraternity, and equality. If you are advocating a revival of Chinese culture, you must have self-confidence. If you have no self-confidence, it will be very difficult for you to have a cultural revival and to create something new. If you have no self-confidence, international exchange and dialogue will be very difficult. Without self-confidence, you are placing yourself in a precarious position because as the ancient Chinese saying goes: “stopping people’s mouth is more dangerous than stopping the flooding river” (防民之口，甚于防川). And, without self-confidence, you are reduced to guarding against peaceful evolution abroad, fabricating lies and inventing enemies, and keeping alive the conviction that imperialism is there to destroy us. This impedes the development of China’s “soft power.”

HRIC: What concrete examples are there of the Chinese government’s lack of self-confidence and its cold-war mentality?

Zhao Yan: The authorities have spent huge amounts of capital to develop the Golden Shield Project to set up a firewall on the Internet. This and the recent Green Dam Internet filtering software incident are both good examples. One firewall is blocking the channel of international communication for 1.3 billion Chinese people, making it difficult for them to learn the truth about domestic and global events. If your “soft power” can compete with the culture of other countries, if your “soft power” is acceptable to the world and the international community, then why are you so lacking in self-confidence? This firewall is in reality a device for keeping people ignorant, the dregs of traditional Chinese culture: it is a manifestation of “stopping people’s mouths.” Furthermore, it is not only stopping their mouths, but also their ears and their eyes. Back when Reagan called on Gorbachev to tear down the Berlin Wall, thereby ending the Cold War, the totalitarian countries of Eastern Europe began to move toward the ranks of democratic countries. So when China’s Great Firewall stops 1.3 billion people from moving toward political civilization, I believe that this is the beginning of an “Second Cold War.” This kind of “Second Cold War” destroys a nation’s true “soft power,” jeopardizes the peaceful coexistence of humankind, and amounts to no less than the Berlin Wall during the Cold War and terrorism in the new century.

HRIC: You’re critical of the “soft power” forged by China. So, what kind of “soft power” do you admire?

Zhao Yan: American “soft power” is something that all countries should learn and borrow from. The U.S. has never erected walls of one kind or another, but its system, its diplomacy, its culture, and its ideas all have an unforced appeal that unfolds from a foundation of openness, tolerance, and pluralism.

HRIC: On October 10, 2009, at the World Media Summit in Beijing, Hu Jintao once again made his promises—to the foreign public, to safeguard the right of foreign news organizations to report, and to the domestic public, to expand the powers of public opinion and oversight, and to improve China’s international image. What are your views on this?

Zhao Yan: An old Chinese saying puts it well: “Listen to the words and watch the actions.” It doesn’t matter what Hu says. The key is to see what he does!

Translated by HRIC