In two decades, Chinese influence advances beyond the markets

Beijing. Rooted in a history of 5 thousand years, Chinese culture has taken on a new complexion. Not only does it advance in niches that have allowed it to enter new export markets, but it has also become a way of representing the diversity of this country beyond the geopolitical narratives that predominate in the West.

He soft power Chinese is taking off. According to a working document from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in which data from 66 countries are analyzed for the period 2007-2021, it is the fourth nation with the best indicators of soft poweronly below South Korea, Japan and Germany.

In past decades, as geopolitical tensions with the United States escalated, no country like China has improved in soft power (a reference attributed to Joseph Nye Jr to distinguish the ability of a nation to influence others through attraction, instead of coercion or payment).

The study divided soft power into six categories covering economic attractiveness, cultural presence, digital capabilities, educational influence, global reach and institutional strength.

Explain that Britain used to have a significantly higher level of soft power than China. However, this changed a couple of decades ago.

China’s soft power went from 0.70 in 2004 to 1.17 in 2021, while that of the United Kingdom decreased from 1.32 to 0.85 in the same period.

The IMF details that soft power among the countries analyzed ranges between a minimum of -0.59 points for the Dominican Republic, above which are Algeria (-0.55), the Philippines (-0.53) and Azerbaijan (-0.47). On the opposite side, South Korea leads, with a maximum of 1.68 in the measurement, followed by Japan (1.25), Germany (1.18) and China (1.17).

Overtakes Japan on a second stopover

A different methodology, Brand Finance’s Global Soft Power Index 2024 published in February 2024, puts China in third place above Japan and Germany and below the United States and the United Kingdom. However, it highlights that the socialist power had the greatest improvement of any nation on this year’s list, with an advance of 6.2 points.

Culture as a kind of soft power is often first referred to in the speech that then-President Hu Jintao gave in 2007 during the 17th National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party.

The great revitalization of the Chinese nation must be accompanied by the flourishing of its culture. It is up to us to bring into full play the role of subject that the people play in cultural construction and to display the enthusiasm of the numerous cultural workers, to promote with greater awareness and initiative the broad development and prosperity of culture and to undertake creations in the great practice of socialism with Chinese characteristics, making the people share the achievements of cultural development.

Seven years later, President Xi Jinping revisited the idea by emphasizing that give a good Chinese narrative and better communicate China’s message to the world. The great geopolitical struggle of our time is China/United Statesand at that point, part of the narratives go through the historical background of each country. The American one as a young nation, with around 200 years of existence, and on the other hand the Asian one, which was founded in one of the ancient empires, explains José Antonio Cervera, director of the Center for Asian and African Studies at El Colegio de Mexico.

Also in a talk with The DayLiljana Arsovska, from the same study center, explains that until a few decades ago the People’s Republic of China had little connection with what happened before 1959. Now, the researcher maintains, There is a kind of great mission to rescue history at all levels in order to generate ideological narrative for the present and the future..