1. Contradictions in China’s Domestic and International Communication:
The Problem of China’s Global Image
Dr. Jeanne Boden /06/2019

2. Research Chinese propaganda
Research material: 2500 photographs, movies
Period: 1993 – 2018
Locations: People’s Republic of China
From Jilin to Xinjiang
From Beijing to Tibet to Guangzhou
From Shanghai to Chengdu
Point of view: Sender
Central discourse: 1 ‘truth’ + censorship

3. Research Chinese propaganda
Content: CCP’s changing ideology
Who is addressed
What is requested
Methods
Contradictions: national and international
China’s global image

4. Early 1990s

5. 1994
2004
Shanghai Pudong

6. 2003
“Long live Marxism, Leninism and Mao Zedong Thoughts”

7. Content: CCP’s changing ideology
Mao Zedong: Communist discourse, destroy 4 olds
Deng Xiaoping: Opening up
Jiang Zemin: ‘Capitalists’ into the CCP
Hu Jintao: Confucianism
Xi Jinping: Amalgam of ideologies
Communist
Confucian
Western democracy

8. Prosperity, Democracy, Civility, Harmony Freedom, Equality, Justice, Rule of Law Patriotism, Dedication, Honesty, Friendliness

9. Who is addressed The People
Mao Zedong: farmers, workers, soldiers, CCP members
Deng Xiaoping: PRC, huaqiao/overseas
Today: all Chinese across the globe
Individual is never addressed as individual
Always part of nation/ family/ group
Majority and Minorities

10. One big united family

11. Minority Park Beijing: Minorities dancing for the Han Majority

12. What is asked Patriot – Spirit for the nation
Raise your children for the nation
Defend the nation
To be civilized
Solidarity in society

13. What is “Chinese civilization”
To be civilized:
Being educated and moral
Being polite and well-mannered
Having the right spirit for the nation
“Chinese civilization”
Mao Zedong: destroy the “four olds”
Today: (Re)constructing ‘Ancient civilization’: rituals, heroes, architecture, …
12 “Socialist core values” amalgam of ideologies

14. Conflating political and personal aspirations

15. Reversing a (Chinese) narrative
River Elegy
Heshang 河殇
Pro-western
End of China
Chinese culture is doomed to disappear
2013
Ocean Elegy
Haishang 海殇
Pro-China
End of the West
West is doomed to disappear

16. National Top down discourse | Bottom up dissent
Xi Jinping App: Study the Great Nation (Photo: Reuters)
Silencing dissent Xu Zhangrong Law professor at Tsinghua University

17. Contradictions National
Absence of civil society
Solidarity is asked
‘Open China’
Great Firewall

18. International “Global China” One Belt One Road Win – win Common goals
Exchange …
Opium War rhetoric
Anti-western propaganda

19. Contradictions International
Win-win and ‘Open China’
Rule of Law, democracy, equality, freedom (Why?)
Opium War rhetoric, anti-western propaganda
“Make the West serve China”
Censorship of what is unwanted
Explosion of chemical plants
Uyghur detentions
Hong Kong demonstrations
Dissident voices

20. China’s global image It is not clear what China really stands for
Media across the globe report on what China hides
Positive image that China wants to establish is undermined