Chinese PR, a Personal View

[Aepsilons]

Yea Narcissistic disorder results from obsession about prestige and how people perceives you. It can results in behaviours that can be harmful to others, even to your friends and family.

Another disorder that results from too much obsession about how people perceive you, is Social Anxiety Disorder. With this disorder, it results in behaviours that are actually harmful to yourself.

It would be interesting to see how these disorders can be projected onto the political realms, but yeah, we would then be off topic here.

@Black Flag ,

I am so tempted reply and expand on the Behavioral Health here and I do believe it could be an interesting exchange. Well, perhaps we can expand on this while applying it to the context of national psyche.

Alright, let's begin. Research mode. Now.

 

[terranMarine]

In this case, PR is integral because it is a reflection of China's overall development and caliber. In business management, this is an example of an organization's self actualization processes. China, as an organization, requires self actualization to provide legitimacy towards its various policies ranging from environmental protection, family structure, juvenile rights, business law, and political and military. So, despite your personal objection, its actually an issue within political organizations to procure an aggressive policy to increase one's PR. In fact, the fact that China had declared a War against Pollution starting in 2007 through its local magistracies is an example of the CPC's policy shift in bridging importance to both environment as well as economic development. Pleas read academic journals in Chinese politics, Chinese economy, Chinese environmental science before you say anything.

Bring some academic weight at least.

There's no need for academic paper for my view in this regard. I've seen the critics from the West plenty of times. Sure there are unbiased ones amongst them but that will not change whether China tries to improve its own self image or not. The Dalai Lama discussion, lack of freedom in speech or censorship applied for Internet, domestic issue with Uyghurs, Tiananmen Square will pop up all the time. It's hot to pick China as the black sheep and criticize it for whatever reasons come to mind for plenty out there. The latest food scandal in Taiwan is the perfect example, where mainstream media didn't make an elephant out of a mosquito. Did the scandal took place in Mainland, the whole world would be reading about it. Even here at PDF no Indians made a thread about it. To some extent such as improving environmental issues can be seen as improving PR but that alone will not cut it. Haters will always be haters my dear nippon jin.

 

[Aepsilons]

There's no need for academic paper for my view in this regard. I've seen the critics from the West plenty of times. Sure there are unbiased ones amongst them but that will not change whether China tries to improve its own self image or not. The Dalai Lama discussion, lack of freedom in speech or censorship applied for Internet, domestic issue with Uyghurs, Tiananmen Square will pop up all the time. It's hot to pick China as the black sheep and criticize it for whatever reasons come to mind for plenty out there. The latest food scandal in Taiwan is the perfect example, where mainstream media didn't make an elephant out of a mosquito. Did the scandal took place in Mainland, the whole world would be reading about it. Even here at PDF no Indians made a thread about it. To some extent such as improving environmental issues can be seen as improving PR but that alone will not cut it. Haters will always be haters my dear nippon jin.

Greetings @terranMarine ,

While there are many international commentators that opine on current policies enacted by foreign governments, it is the responsibility of a regime to take these criticisms and reflect on their truths or falsities. Note that China is not the only country that is surveyed and criticized by international watch groups, even Japan, South Korea, the United States, India, and key states in the European Union are also regularly criticized. The importance of these independent watch groups, be they the United Nations, Human Rights Watch, Environmental Working Group, is to provide a dedicated approach towards the protection of human rights and ending human rights abuses, through the use of strong public and international advocacy that sheds lights on some questionable policies of some governments. For an example, objectively, we see that the United Nations and other Environmental Watch Groups are targeting Japan’s whaling research program. Another example would be the NAACP in the United States that regularly criticizes some policies by the United States Federal Government on minority rights, most recently advocating for the rights of illegal immigrants, and related minority abuses. This is done in a public platform to allow the dissemination of knowledge, thus placing key government(s) responsible to their constituencies and answerable to key partners.

In regards to China, the same applies. Actually the 2008 Olympic Games in China provided the opportunity for China’s public relations industry to make a large breakthrough. One example was the implementation of the ‘Urban Safar’ to showcase China’s rich dynamic to foreign visitors. This has been repeatedly reiterated by Zheng Yannong, who is the Executive Vice President and Secretary General of the China International Public Relations Association (CIPRA). Its interesting that the top sponsors included Lenovo, illustrating a cohesive campaign on both Governmental agencies and even private agencies. China is spurred to enhance its PR image because ever since 2001 when she (China) became a member of the World Trade Organization, it realized that in order to bring in more multinational organizations to China, it needed to improve its image of China; to provide the image that China is:

1) Politically Competent

2) Culturally understanding

3) Socially harmonious

4) Industrially capable

As China is poised to take a more robust leadership role in the world, it requires not only economic power, military power, but also soft power potential. In order for China to exert this cultural and soft power influence to its global partners, it must improve its Public Relations Image as a responsible, accountable, fair and jurisprudential Power. By implementing policies to address ethnic and cultural sensitivities in its border, expand on a more independent legal policy to crack down on unregulated environmental stress, enact business reforms – will lead to the self actualization that will benefit China’s long term geostrategic posture. This is why PR matters for China.



Best,
@Nihonjin1051, Ph.D-c, M.S.


Reference:

Projecting the Right Image: China's public relations industry coming of age. (2007). BEIJING REVIEW, 50(5), 22-25.

 

[Genesis]

Nope, you are still not getting it.

Prejudice is not based in logic and thus it cannot be overcome with reason.

The media can make any pollution, human rights, etc. look 100000x worse than it really is, anywhere. It is simply a matter of cherrypicking facts, deleting opposing ones, and repeating the lie enough times, with a person that looks pretty credible.

I don't know why you care so much about image and prestige. Prestige comes not from trying to appease others but from hard power. It is a benefit, not a goal.

Know that fastest supercomputer? Largest radio telescope? Daya bay neutrino experiments? Alibaba IPO? Those are not for prestige - but they result in prestige, because they represent hard power. You have it all backwards.

I don't think you understand the power of prestige and soft power.

Take for example Americans can torture, bombing civilians, and any numbers of things really, but due to their soft power and prestige as well as freedom and record of human rights ON THEIR OWN ground, they are brushed aside or at least makes you mad one second, and forget the next.

China on the other hand, does way less than that, but we are the personification of evil.


Hard power result in Nazi Germany, soft power is useless in one without hard power, see India. Only the chosen few with both can do what Americans can do.

You want people to fear you, well they could, but it's far better to be admired, because nobody thinks poorly of celebrities, with their pretty smiles, but they could be the most vile people on earth, on the other hand, I seen ugly people, suspicious people turn out to be the best people. Now obviously this is a generalization, but you get my point, hopefully.

 

[FairAndUnbiased]

I don't think you understand the power of prestige and soft power.

Take for example Americans can torture, bombing civilians, and any numbers of things really, but due to their soft power and prestige as well as freedom and record of human rights ON THEIR OWN ground, they are brushed aside or at least makes you mad one second, and forget the next.

China on the other hand, does way less than that, but we are the personification of evil.

No, you still don't get it. Prejudice cannot be overcome by reason because it is not logical. You are trying to reason with prejudiced people and that will not work. In your everyday life, do you try to reason with some random dumb*** that talks sh*t about you? That is all due to repetition of media, and control of global media. You have it backwards. They don't control the global media because they have prestige, they have prestige because they control the global media.

 

[Genesis]

No, you still don't get it. Prejudice cannot be overcome by reason because it is not logical. You are trying to reason with prejudiced people and that will not work. In your everyday life, do you try to reason with some random dumb*** that talks sh*t about you? That is all due to repetition of media, and control of global media. You have it backwards. They don't control the global media because they have prestige, they have prestige because they control the global media.

control of media, if America cedes that to China what would you say? You can paint any number of pictures, but the fact remains America can stay unchallenged even in sun light.

I'm not saying reason with people, you can't really do that, but that's what makes it good, cause once you have it, you have it. Philippines is still thinking America will come when in reality no way in hell will they do that. America has shown time and time again it is tired of allies who can't do crap, hence Japan they will protect.


You think control of the media starts with what? Let's put all the cards on the table and see who says uncle first. Right now even if we say exactly what America is doing, which btw is also pretty well documented, but China isn't really that documented, yet people still have that perception.

You need people to believe your media, where do you think that comes from. China is buying up media but that's not really working is it. China has control of media in China, but that's also not working too well with the younger generation is it.

Sorry to break it to you man, there is no big conspiracy, you are who you are, either improve or die.

 

[FairAndUnbiased]

control of media, if America cedes that to China what would you say? You can paint any number of pictures, but the fact remains America can stay unchallenged even in sun light.

I'm not saying reason with people, you can't really do that, but that's what makes it good, cause once you have it, you have it. Philippines is still thinking America will come when in reality no way in hell will they do that. America has shown time and time again it is tired of allies who can't do crap, hence Japan they will protect.


You think control of the media starts with what? Let's put all the cards on the table and see who says uncle first. Right now even if we say exactly what America is doing, which btw is also pretty well documented, but China isn't really that documented, yet people still have that perception.

You need people to believe your media, where do you think that comes from. China is buying up media but that's not really working is it. China has control of media in China, but that's also not working too well with the younger generation is it.

Sorry to break it to you man, there is no big conspiracy, you are who you are, either improve or die.

I still don't understand your point and your arguments basically boil down to "no but thats how it is". I am not understanding your English so let us speak plainly. My point is extremely simple. Let me condense it down to a series of very simple yes or no questions.

1. There is no perfect country, society or culture on this planet.
2. As such, all countries have certain flaws.
3. Media is used to cover news stories about a small fraction of these flaws.
4. The party which controls the media can choose to use this control to emphasize the flaws of certain countries and downplay those of others.
5. It is not possible to eliminate all flaws on your end, so there will always be fuel for negative news coverage.
6. The media, controlled by one party, is consciously choosing to emphasize negative coverage on a certain country and positive coverage on another.
7. Because this is a conscious choice, you cannot reduce the overall volume of negative coverage, since they can simply report a larger fraction of flaws.
8. Your argument only works if the sampling of reported events is random and by increasing the proportion of positive events, prestige increases. I am arguing that the sampling of reported events is heavily skewed towards negative reporting.

All other points you have made are irrelevant.

 

[jkroo]

@Genesis

I admire your good wish and analysis. I also agree with you that China need some PR.

But, with different races, civilization, culture, value and philosophy systems. PR really don't work (at least not be so efficient) and we should use money to where we need to use. You can find many articles about civilization conflict theory that the westerner created though our people don't buy this theory.

It's about dominance that US(westerner countries) really/only concerned and they used to carry on any measures/tricks to destablize any other civilizations in power if you are not belong to their system. (see Soviet Union / Arabian countries) You can also find that most discriminations occured in western countries. With this dominance in their mind you cannot conviince them at one day. I think what we should do is to show our economic/military/civilization power with facts and change their mind gradually with PR involved.

The image has been created for China for more than half century and I think this image will still last for decades untill the dominance is broked by China/Russia.

A multipole world with diversity will do good to everyone in the world and the humanity. A democratic world community will integrate people and countries and will not divide people with idealogy/technology as some countries are currently doing.

So you should be patient and contribute to our country as possible as you can. I think we will see a better world in 2030-2050.

 

[55100864]

it's not about PR, it's all about geo-politics, when China and the west were allied against Soviet during 70s, no western media talked about democracy and human right in china, but actually, 70s was the worst period of social development in china, hell, when Nixon visit china, all the western media were told to not report any bad news, but try to paint china as a capitalist and progressing country, and a American ally. when Nixon landed on beijing airport, the slogan on the wall were still wrote as "down with west imperialism" , but not a single shit was given.
After the collapse of the Soviet, and china became increasingly assertive and powerful, the west started to paint china as evil. the so called soft power will follow when the time china's hard power surpass the west. when the US was rising, it was also demonised by the british，same as the rise of germany and japan. don't expect the west show benevolence to china, who cares about tibet, human right and pollution, if we bring infrastructure and education to tibet, west will say we destroy the tibet culture, if we keep tibet as natural, they will say we discriminate against tibetans.
A rising power is supposed to be hated by others, nobody hate Fiji.

 

[BoQ77]

We expect a nice China with nice and friendly people; nice environment and cleanliness for the country.

 

[Raphael]

As others have noticed, China's image in the West has not evolved organically or objectively, but is entirely manipulated by foreign geopolitics interests. It's impossible to play this rigged game. So instead of wasting money on PR, China's foremost priorities should be economic and military advancement. The West has made it clear they won't respect China's territorial sovereignty no matter how many hoops China's formerly gullible leaders jumped through. I wonder if they will change if their mind if we stick a gun to their heads. Violence is the only language they understand.

 

[BigDaddyWatch]

China will never recieve a positive image in the West no matter what. People especially journalists looks at the world through ideological spectacles. There are both positive and negative aspects in every country. So people can see what they want to see. In the case of China they prefer to look at the negative rather than the positive because China is being seen as a economic, political, strategic and ideological rival of the US and the West. You always look at the negative aspects of your rival its human nature. Trying to please the mass media and public opinion in the West is a non starter. Unless we just lay down in front of America's feet and kiss their boots we will always be seen as a threat. Even then with the size of China we will still be considered a threat. Just look at Russia when the drunk Boris Yeltsin was running Russia to the ground the West loved Russia, but now that Putin has got Russia back on the rails again and Russia is looking to carve out a role for itself on the international stage all of a sudden Russia is now the new boogyman. PR in the international context is like every other aspect of international politics it is not about morals but its about interest.

 

[XiaoYaoZi]

“价值有了，价值观就有了”
this can answer all.

 

[tonyget]

Hate to say this but Chinese PR is a totally failure

 

[Zsari]

China will never recieve a positive image in the West no matter what. People especially journalists looks at the world through ideological spectacles. There are both positive and negative aspects in every country. So people can see what they want to see. In the case of China they prefer to look at the negative rather than the positive because China is being seen as a economic, political, strategic and ideological rival of the US and the West. You always look at the negative aspects of your rival its human nature. Trying to please the mass media and public opinion in the West is a non starter. Unless we just lay down in front of America's feet and kiss their boots we will always be seen as a threat. Even then with the size of China we will still be considered a threat. Just look at Russia when the drunk Boris Yeltsin was running Russia to the ground the West loved Russia, but now that Putin has got Russia back on the rails again and Russia is looking to carve out a role for itself on the international stage all of a sudden Russia is now the new boogyman. PR in the international context is like every other aspect of international politics it is not about morals but its about interest.

Yes, China will never receive a positive view from the West, but the West is only a small fraction of the world. The rest of the world except for those nations the West has alienate however still follow the western narrative. Aside from the hard power, the west have fostered a giant PR machine that enforces its soft power around the world. This is what China should come to challenge. Remember you not only need media assets to tell the story, but a plethora of NGOs that creates many of these stories in the first place. However, China cannot do this alone, but need to work with friendly states to create an resonating effect. Speak louder and be more forceful. I think there are enough resentment against the western hegemony around the world that when there is a strong voice, it could become mainstream.