China’s soft power with Chinese characteristics: the cases of Confucius Institutes and Chinese naval diplomacy

Abstract

This article highlights the particular conception of China’s of soft power which reflects the dualistic nature of the Chinese strategic culture: it has two components, a direct (zheng) and an indirect (qi) dimension which are not in opposition; rather, they are integrated. The Confucius Institutes and China’s naval diplomacy are two relevant components of ‘soft power with Chinese characteristics’. Both carry political values and are policies that no other BRIC country has fully developed. They depend on and serve China’s political agenda since they mirror Beijing’s efforts to increase domestic cohesion, re-gain international recognition as a great power and avoid repeating the Soviet mistake of focusing exclusively on hard power.

Keywords:

• soft power
• BRICS
• China
• Confucius Institute
• public diplomacy
• naval diplomacy

Notes on contributor

Claude Zanardi is a PhD Candidate at KCL – War Studies whose thesis analyses how France, Germany, the UK perceive China’s military modernisation. In addition to China’s military modernisation, she works on China’s foreign policy and maritime history, Taiwanese history and Cross Strait Relations.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Funding

This work was supported by the KCL Faculty of Social Science & Public Policy (SSPP) & KCL Graduate School.

Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank the Editor, the anonymous reviewers and Fabrizio Bozzato at Tamkang University for their constructive comments. Finally, she would like to thank the King’s College of London Faculty of Social Science & Public Policy (SSPP) and the Graduate School for the grants that made this research possible.

Notes

1. For instance, Beijing University has a research group on soft power.

2. For instance, Yizhou, director of the Institute of Economics and Politics at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS).

3. http://www.bvbdelhi.org/.

4. http://www.iccr.gov.in.

5. Components of public diplomacy are: listening, advocacy, cultural diplomacy, exchange and international broadcasting.