Chapter Fourteen
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Eastern revolutions and China’s rising, Nye appeals to people to better
understand the meaning of “power” in world politics. Generally speaking,
power indicates winning wars; however, in the information age, success
depends more on whose stories are more convincing.^13
There is a big gap between China and America in soft power. Nye has
recognized that China has poured huge resources into soft power
construction, such as the Beijing Olympics and the Shanghai Expo. Still,
he points out that Chinese leaders might not have noticed that the majority
of America’s soft power doesn’t come from the official actions of the US
government, but from the growth of civil society. Civil society is a
significant aspect of non-state actors, yet its development in China is
repressed by the current political structure.
In Nye’s theory, diplomacy is a vital part of soft power. After the
Copenhagen Climate Change Conference in 2009, China’s diplomacy has
been dubbed as “assertive,” which again boiled to the surface in the
disputes among China and its neighbouring countries at the end of 2010.
This weakened China’s soft power to some extent.
In April 2012, Nye gave a lecture at Renmin University titled “China’s
Rise Doesn’t Mean War.” In his opinion, China’s soft power benefits from
its attractive traditional culture, and the Shanghai World Expo, Confucius
Institutes, multilateral diplomacy, etc. will help strengthen China’s soft
power; but, if China wants to improve its soft power with pop culture, it
has to loosen censorship and give the citizens much more freedom of
speech and press. In current information times, politics is related to the
attractiveness of the “story,” and the freedom of getting information will
be a significant part of smart power.
In his recent articles, Nye maintained that the development of soft
power is not necessarily a zero-sum game. If China’s soft power is
strengthened in America, this may contribute to reducing the possibilities
of conflicts between them, and vice versa. China’s soft power strategy
should focus both on culture and politics. China has been focusing on
propagating the greatness of its culture and the significant historical
position of “the middle kingdoms,” rather than praising heroes that emerge
in the field of current civil society and arts and so on. Nye quoted
Professor Pang Zhongying’s point of view: this reflects China’s deficit of
soft power.^14
(^13) Nye, “Two forms of power in world politics.”
(^14) Zhongying, “The Beijing Olympics and China’s Soft Power.”