Cultural Origins and Possible Prospects of China’s Official Propaganda Overseas

• In Event: Poster Session: Comparative Politics

Abstract

Because of the polarized political landscape across democracies, notably the United States, the target audience of the Chinese regime’s foreign-facing propaganda is far from ideologically homogeneous. Meanwhile, left-wing and right-wing Americans exploit their own propaganda to generate divergent opinions. Where exactly are the cultural roots of the Chinese regime’s external propaganda messages? How will the ideologically polarized nature of their audience influence their effectiveness? What are the mechanisms involved? Can propaganda from the above different entities reflect such mechanisms?

This project attempts to answer all the above questions. The core of my theoretical framework is that the current Chinese regime’s propaganda is an extension of the traditional Chinese political thoughts of the “kingly way” (Wang Dao, 王道, emphasizing moral governance) and “hegemonic way” (Ba Dao, 霸道, relying on strength rather than morality), while left-wing and right-wing foreigners are the main recipients of the Chinese external propaganda.

My study predicts that the shared logic behind their lines of reasoning, i.e., deontological moral reasoning, drives these propaganda messages of the Chinese regime in a “kingly way” and the left-wing Americans to be similar in their texts and the leftist Americans are more likely to accept the Chinese propaganda in a “kingly way”. Meanwhile, the texts of propaganda from China in a “hegemonic way” and the right-wing Americans are similar and the Chinese propaganda in a “hegemonic way” is better at exerting desired effects among the rightists due to their shared utilitarian moral reasoning. Furthermore, the Chinese propaganda in a “kingly way” will exert a “backfire effect” on the right-wing Americans, while its propaganda in a “hegemonic way” a “backfire effect” on the leftists. The effect of China’s external propaganda in a “kingly way” and in a “hegemonic way” on the same group of American audiences counteract each other. The effect of the Chinese propaganda on Americans’ values and opinions about China is mediated by China’s ideological in-group or out-group image.

My first empirical task is to collect Tweets from the major propaganda accounts of the Chinese regime and Americans through Twitter API v2. The next empirical task involves natural language processing technology that helps me compare these collected Tweets. More specifically, I will use the method of machine learning to categorize a large number of propaganda Tweets posted by the Chinese regime into the “kingly-way” and “hegemonic-way” ones. Then, I will analyze the text similarity between each kind of these Tweets and those posted by influential left-wing and right-wing American accounts on Twitter. By adopting the topic modeling and classification, I can check whether the Chinese regime applies different strategies on different issues.

The third stage of my empirical work will consist of survey experiments in the U.S. I plan to recruit respondents through the crowd-sourcing website CloudResearch, which provides census-matching samples. I will randomly assign participants to one of the experimental conditions, which will require my subjects to read foreign-facing Tweets from the Chinese regime in the “kingly way” or “hegemonic way”, or read two Tweets, one of which is in the “kingly way” and the other in the “hegemonic way”. To further compare the effect of Tweets from the Chinese regime and that of Tweets from Americans, I plan to let some participants read Tweets posted by different ideological groups in the U.S. as well.

This study not only traces the roots of the contemporary Chinese government’s rhetorical strategies to the ancient Chinese ideas of the “kingly way” and “hegemonic way”, but also systematically compares these Eastern thoughts with Western utilitarian and deontological moral theories. Moreover, I apply these insights to a systematic analysis of the practical effects of the Chinese government’s foreign-facing propaganda. Finally, I employ a variety of methods to test my predictions and provide a multifold assurance of both the internal and external validity of my empirical results. To summarize, the findings of my study may contribute to the literature on comparative political communication.

With respect to the broader impact of this study, its findings explain why many Americans accept the Chinese regime’s claims and sympathize with China even when their interests are in serious conflict. Furthermore, its broader implications for American citizens and policymakers include demonstrating that any message sent by the Chinese regime may be deliberately crafted and not accurately reflect the real situation, thereby alerting Americans, and reminding Americans how holistically they should view information from China. It also reveals the importance of thinking differently and not sticking to one mindset, which may help Americans deal with social problems like affective polarization and democratic backsliding.

Author

• Shuli Zhang, University of Pittsburgh