China in the World

China in the World
Author: Jennifer Hubbert
Publisher: University of Hawaii Press
Total Pages: 249
Release: 2019-03-31
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0824878531

Confucius Institutes, the language and culture programs funded by the Chinese government, have been established in more than 1,500 schools worldwide since their debut in 2004. A centerpiece of China’s soft power policy, they represent an effort to smooth China’s path to superpower status by enhancing its global appeal. Yet Confucius Institutes have given rise to voluble and contentious public debate in host countries, where they have been both welcomed as a source of educational funding and feared as spy outposts, neocolonial incursions, and obstructions to academic freedom. China in the World turns an anthropological lens on this most visible, ubiquitous, and controversial globalization project in an effort to provide fresh insight into China’s shifting place in the world. Author Jennifer Hubbert takes the study of soft power policy into the classroom, offering an anthropological intervention into a subject that has been dominated by the methods and analyses of international relations and political science. She argues that concerns about Confucius Institutes reflect broader debates over globalization and modernity and ultimately about a changing global order. Examining the production of soft power policy in situ allows us to move beyond program intentions to see how Confucius Institutes are actually understood and experienced in day-to-day classroom interactions. By assessing the perspectives of participants and exploring the complex ways in which students, teachers, parents, and program administrators interpret the Confucius Institute curriculum, she highlights significant gaps between China’s soft power policy intentions and the effects of those policies in practice. China in the World brings original, long-term ethnographic research to bear on how representations of and knowledge about China are constructed, consumed, and articulated in encounters between China, the United States, and the Confucius Institute programs themselves. It moves a controversial topic beyond the realm of policy making to examine the mechanisms through which policy is implemented, engaged, and contested by a multitude of stakeholders and actors. It provides new insight into how policy actually works, showing that it takes more than financial wherewithal and official resolve to turn cultural presence into power.

Confucius Institutes

Confucius Institutes
Author: Marshall Sahlins
Publisher:
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2015
Genre: Education
ISBN: 9780984201082

Drawing on reports in the media and conversations, the author shows that the Confucius Institutes are a threat to the principles of academic freedom and integrity at the foundation of our system of higher education

Confucius and Crisis in American Universities

Confucius and Crisis in American Universities
Author: Amy Stambach
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 144
Release: 2014-05-23
Genre: Education
ISBN: 1135020426

China’s investment in U.S. higher education has raised considerable debate, but little research has been directed to the manner in which this investment unfolds and takes shape on the ground in local contexts. Confucius and Crisis in American Universities fills this gap by closely investigating how Chinese-funded U.S. programs are understood and configured in the modern American university. Drawing on interviews with Chinese teachers and their American students, as well as conversations with university administrators, this book argues that Chinese investment in American higher education serves as a broad form of global policy, harnessing the power of intercultural exchange as a means of managing international diplomatic relations through the experiences of university students. A transnational study, Confucius and Crisis in American Universities questions and reframes conventional notions of economic globalization and flexible citizenship, demonstrating how Chinese investment in U.S. education advances the lives of the already-privileged by creating access to overseas labor and markets, but to the exclusion of middle- and working-class students. A valuable and timely resource for scholars of education and anthropology, this book will also be useful to anyone interested in education policy or international affairs.

China's Influence and American Interests

China's Influence and American Interests
Author: Larry Diamond
Publisher: Hoover Press
Total Pages: 223
Release: 2019-08-01
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0817922865

While Americans are generally aware of China's ambitions as a global economic and military superpower, few understand just how deeply and assertively that country has already sought to influence American society. As the authors of this volume write, it is time for a wake-up call. In documenting the extent of Beijing's expanding influence operations inside the United States, they aim to raise awareness of China's efforts to penetrate and sway a range of American institutions: state and local governments, academic institutions, think tanks, media, and businesses. And they highlight other aspects of the propagandistic “discourse war” waged by the Chinese government and Communist Party leaders that are less expected and more alarming, such as their view of Chinese Americans as members of a worldwide Chinese diaspora that owes undefined allegiance to the so-called Motherland.Featuring ideas and policy proposals from leading China specialists, China's Influence and American Interests argues that a successful future relationship requires a rebalancing toward greater transparency, reciprocity, and fairness. Throughout, the authors also strongly state the importance of avoiding casting aspersions on Chinese and on Chinese Americans, who constitute a vital portion of American society. But if the United States is to fare well in this increasingly adversarial relationship with China, Americans must have a far better sense of that country's ambitions and methods than they do now.

Chinese Public Diplomacy

Chinese Public Diplomacy
Author: Falk Hartig
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 218
Release: 2015-08-27
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 131761108X

This book presents the first comprehensive analysis of Confucius Institutes (CIs), situating them as a tool of public diplomacy in the broader context of China’s foreign affairs. The study establishes the concept of public diplomacy as the theoretical framework for analysing CIs. By applying this frame to in-depth case studies of CIs in Europe and Oceania, it provides in-depth knowledge of the structure and organisation of CIs, their activities and audiences, as well as problems, challenges and potentials. In addition to examining CIs as the most prominent and most controversial tool of China’s charm offensive, this book also explains what the structural configuration of these institutes can tell us about China’s understanding of and approaches towards public diplomacy. The study demonstrates that, in contrast to their international counterparts, CIs are normally organised as joint ventures between international and Chinese partners in the field of education or cultural exchange. From this unique setting a more fundamental observation can be made, namely China’s willingness to engage and cooperate with foreigners in the context of public diplomacy. Overall, the author argues that by utilizing the current global fascination with Chinese language and culture, the Chinese government has found interested and willing international partners to co-finance the CIs and thus partially fund China’s international charm offensive. This book will be of much interest to students of public diplomacy, Chinese politics, foreign policy and international relations in general.

Winning American Hearts and Minds

Winning American Hearts and Minds
Author: Xiuli Wang
Publisher: Springer Nature
Total Pages: 152
Release: 2020-01-30
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9811531846

This book explores the effectiveness of the Chinese government’s recent public diplomacy efforts aimed at building its national image, and how these efforts may influence foreign public's view of China. Based on in-depth interviews, media-content analysis and public opinion-poll data, the book discusses Chinese leaders’ foreign visits, Chinese media’s overseas expansion, Confucius institutes, global mega events, and Chinese government’s new policies to attract foreign students, providing not only background information, but also insights from scholars and experts. Although intended mainly for students majoring in communications, Chinese studies, public relations and international relations, it is also of interest to anyone studying China or public diplomacy.

Language Management and Its Impact

Language Management and Its Impact
Author: Linda Mingfang Li
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 174
Release: 2018-10-17
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 1351064045

This book provides a comprehensive account of language management and planning at Confucius Institutes in the UK, implementing an ethnographic approach grounded in language management theory. As a global language promotion organization, Confucius Institutes have previously been discussed in the literature with respect to socio-political issues, but this volume will shed particular light on their role in shaping and informing Chinese language policy, at both the institutional and individual classroom level. The book focuses specifically on Confucius Institutes in the UK, demonstrating how language teaching practice in these organizations is informed and shaped not only by organizational paradigms but local language needs and institutional attitudes of host institutions. In turn, Li highlights these organizations’ unique position in a multilingual region such as the UK can offer new insights into language management by illustrating their roles as platforms for both individuals and institutions to become involved in the making and implementation of language policy. This volume will be of particular interest to students and researchers in language policy and planning, language education, applied linguistics, and Chinese linguistics.

China's Cultural Diplomacy

China's Cultural Diplomacy
Author: Xin Liu
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 262
Release: 2019-10-02
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1000721787

This book examines China’s contemporary global cultural footprints through its recent development of cultural diplomacy. The volume presents an alternative analytical framework to examine China’s cultural diplomacy, which goes beyond the Western-defined concept of ‘soft power’ that prevails in the current literature. This new approach constructs a three-dimensional framework on Orientalism, cultural hegemony and nationalism to decipher the multiple contexts, which China inhabits historically, internationally and domestically. The book presents multiple case studies of the Confucius Institute, and compares the global programme located around the world with its Western counterparts, and also with other Chinese government-sponsored endeavours and non-government-initiated programmes. The author aims to solve the puzzle of why China’s efforts in cultural diplomacy are perceived differently around the world and helps to outline the distinctive features of China’s cultural diplomacy. This book will be of much interest to students of diplomacy, Chinese politics, foreign policy and International Relations in general.

The Power of Culture

The Power of Culture
Author: Priscilla Roberts
Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing
Total Pages: 603
Release: 2016-01-14
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 144388782X

China and the United States, two massive economic and military powers, cannot avoid engaging with each other. Enjoying what is often termed “the most important bilateral relationship in the world”, the two sometimes cooperate, but often compete, as their interests come into conflict. Both countries are separated not just by the Pacific Ocean, but also by their very different histories, experiences, societies, customs, and outlooks. Non-governmental, unofficial relationships and exchanges are often as important as formal dealings in determining the climate of Sino-American relations. For several decades in the mid-twentieth century, Chinese and Americans were virtually isolated from each other, trapped in icy hostility. Chinese scholars are now making up for lost time. This assortment of essays, most by mainland Chinese academics and students, focuses upon the role of culture – very broadly defined – in Sino-American affairs. Taking a holistic approach, in this collection over thirty authors focus on such topics as the influence of ideology, the impact of geopolitics, the use of rhetoric, soft power, educational encounters and exchanges, immigration, gender, race, identity, literature, television, movies, music, and the press. Cultural factors are, as the authors demonstrate, enormously significant in affecting how Chinese and Americans think about and approach each other, both as individuals and at the state level.

Confucius

Confucius
Author: Michael Schuman
Publisher: Basic Books
Total Pages: 322
Release: 2015-03-03
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 0465040578

Confucius is perhaps the most important philosopher in history. Today, his teachings shape the daily lives of more than 1.6 billion people. Throughout East Asia, Confucius's influence can be seen in everything from business practices and family relationships to educational standards and government policies. Even as western ideas from Christianity to Communism have bombarded the region, Confucius's doctrine has endured as the foundation of East Asian culture. It is impossible to understand East Asia, journalist Michael Schuman demonstrates, without first engaging with Confucius and his vast legacy. Confucius created a worldview that is in many respects distinct from, and in conflict with, Western culture. As Schuman shows, the way that East Asian companies are managed, how family members interact with each other, and how governments see their role in society all differ from the norm in the West due to Confucius's lasting impact. Confucius has been credited with giving East Asia an advantage in today's world, by instilling its people with a devotion to learning, and propelling the region's economic progress. Still, the sage has also been highly controversial. For the past 100 years, East Asians have questioned if the region can become truly modern while Confucius remains so entrenched in society. He has been criticized for causing the inequality of women, promoting authoritarian regimes, and suppressing human rights. Despite these debates, East Asians today are turning to Confucius to help them solve the ills of modern life more than they have in a century. As a wealthy and increasingly powerful Asia rises on the world stage, Confucius, too, will command a more prominent place in global culture. Touching on philosophy, history, and current affairs, Confucius tells the vivid, dramatic story of the enigmatic philosopher whose ideas remain at the heart of East Asian civilization.