Report: China should stress modern culture
Posted By Admin on February 26, 2011
Experts: Soft power should be used to promote modern Chinese
culture
BEIJING – China should strive to gain more cultural soft power by discussing
its current culture rather than lingering over its traditional culture, said one
of the countrys top think tanks on Friday.
We have emphasized our traditional culture to an extreme extent in the past
decade, but we dont have a strong voice in international dialogues, Yi
Junqing, director of the Central Compilation and Translation Bureau, said during
a press conference for the release of the Annual Report on Chinas Cultural Soft
Power Research (2010).
In general, a countrys soft power refers to its ability to get other
countries to share its goals and values through the use of attraction, rather
than of coercion or payments. Yi said he thinks China can reap great benefits
from wielding soft power, but so far has failed to do so.
Some Westerners take China to be purely an economic animal, since we have
been unable to explain and show our modern culture to the outside world in an
effective and proper way, he said.
The bureaus report includes explorations of the fundamental theory
research and strategic research that has been conducted into Chinas cultural
soft power, said Zhang Guozuo, chief editor of the document and director of the
Research Center for the Soft Power of Chinese Culture.
It also contains a general survey of research on the soft power present
within traditional Chinese culture, he said.
Minister of Education Yuan Guiren told China Daily in a previous interview
that the global expansion of the Confucius Institutes was a good way to promote
soft power and appeal to more students abroad.
By the end of 2009, some 282 Confucius Institutes and 272 Confucius
classrooms, both of which offer instruction in Chinese language and culture, had
been established in 88 countries. They had received more than 260,000 students
in 2009, almost doubled the number in 2008, according to the institutes
headquarters.
Experts conceded it will be a long time before China can become a strong
country by promoting its cultural soft power. But steps are already being taken
along that path.
A statue of the ancient sage Confucius was recently erected beside Tiananmen
Square. The 9.5-meter-tall bronze figure outside the National Museum of China is
the latest evidence of the countrys efforts to promote the great philosopher as
a symbol of traditional Chinese culture.
For similar reasons, a promotional video featuring some of the nations most
famous faces were showed in Times Square in New York from Jan 17 to Feb 14. The
display, which opened a day before President Hu Jintaos arrival for a four-day
state visit to the United States, is part of a major campaign to promote Chinas
image among Americans.
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