Beijing Regains Some Soft Power

Andrew Peacock/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Following its spectacular success as host of the 2008 Olympic Games, Beijing’s successive attempts at increasing its “soft power” have often fallen short. Soft power is a concept developed by Joseph Nye of Harvard University to describe the ability to attract and co-opt rather than coerce, use force or give money to achieve power.  One significant attempt, the February 2012 launch of CCTV America (an English-language news channel run by Chinese state broadcaster China Central Television), has so far failed to capture significant worldwide audiences. Some of the soft power gained by building infrastructure in African nations has been offset by allegations of worker rights abuses, flooding local markets with cheap Chinese goods, and resource colonialism – some 85 percent of China’s exports from Africa are raw materials, such as oil and minerals. Typhoon Haiyan, which reaped devastation in the Philippines, was a lost opportunity for a Beijing which allowed its territorial disputes to dictate against giving substantial amounts of aid. In November, American journalist Paul Mooney was denied a visa, becoming the second correspondent, after Melissa Chan of Al Jazeera, to kicked out of the country in the past two years. Later that month, the bureaus of Bloomberg underwent unannounced inspections following their story on the financial ties between a Chinese billionaire and government officials. Most recently, Beijing appeared to delay the visa approvals of two dozen reporters at Bloomberg and the New York Times.

As a result of these actions, some prominent Western observers, such as Evan Osnos of the New Yorker, suggests Beijing may be losing interest in soft power – that “being liked is less important than simply surviving.” Perhaps Beijing, as an emerging superpower, has reached that point in time, where “it is better to be respected than loved”. More likely, the Communist Party is attempting to be survive in an increasingly challenging environment, while trying to be loved and “save face” both at home and abroad.

One recent event presented itself as an opportunity for Beijing to regain some of the soft power it lost. When the Russian ship MV Akademik Shokalskiy got stuck in Antarctic ice on Christmas Eve, the Chinese were among the first to respond. The Russian ship was on a research expedition to study climate change, but got stuck after high winds pushed sea ice around the ship. After maritime authorities received the ship’s distress signal, the Chinese Xue Long or Snow Dragon was the first to arrive at the scene, but could only venture as far as the edge of the dense pack ice surrounding the ship, some 12 miles away. A French icebreaker, further away, also came to the rescue but was turned back because of worsening conditions. An Australian icebreaker arrived over the weekend, but could not get any closer than the Snow Dragon. So the best hope for the stranded passengers was evacuation by the helicopter on board the Snow Dragon. After a number of false starts, a helicopter evacuation of the research vessel’s passengers began on Thursday evening, and some four hours later, all passengers were safely on board the Aurora Australis — an Australian government supply ship.

While Beijing may have acted purely on humanitarian grounds in coming to the rescue of the stranded ship, surely the actions will serve to increase Beijing’s soft power, and enhance its “face” abroad. Despite Western commentary declaring the end of China’s soft power, Beijing will always be overly concerned with “saving face” and its image abroad. The efforts to control the foreign press are indicative of Beijing’s concern with what gets printed abroad – if Beijing did not care about “face” or soft power, there would not be any visa problems or media restrictions. The Chinese government has always been and will continue to be sensitive to criticism, and will try to manage that criticism – an attempt at increasing its own soft power. The heroic efforts of the Snow Dragon crew in rescuing the stranded passengers aboard the Akademik Shokalskiy should be praised, and the Chinese government thanked for its actions as a responsible member of the international community.