“Closed Door”: the Chinese Crisis and Models of Colonial Order as Assessed by the US Expert Journalistic Community in the Early 1930s

Abstract

The paper is devoted to the problem of approaches and assessments of the Chinese crisis of 1930s in the US press. No research in China’s image and image of “open door” during the china-japanese war would be complete without studying the press of the participating parties. In order to give a detailed analysis of the international relationships in terms of the global transformations from the American point of view, the authors analyze relevant newspaper articles published after the 1930s. The paper is based on materials of democratic and republican editions of the USA press. The materials of the American press of 1930s, dedicated to the search for the most efficient optimal strategy of building relations with China and Japan, show that among other things there is a steady interest of American mass media towards negative and positive experience of Asian policy. All the complexity of the crisis perception was reflected in the press, which tried to form an understanding of the new process in which America was involved. In the course of a difficult search of an optimal way and a view on the crisis, several polar points of view were formulated in the American press. The image of China was an important factor in the US information policy. Thus, the study of the attitude of the major American press and the positions of the most prominent journalists is of interest to the analysis of how the USA after the Chinese crisis gradually realized the place of the country in the new system of international relations. In addition, the press shows how the United States planned to develop interaction with the warring states in the Pacific Ocean.