{"title":"China’s soft power and US public opinion","authors":"Yao‐Yuan Yeh, Charles K. S. Wu, Wei-hao Huang","doi":"10.1080/20954816.2021.1933766","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/20954816.2021.1933766","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract In recent years, China has been using its soft power (most notably, the establishment of Confucius Institutes) to influence public opinion in foreign countries. However, the literature on soft power has yet to provide a definitive answer about whether that has led to a positive image of China in the foreign audience. Additionally, it is not clear if a positive image would influence public attitudes concerning foreign policies in those countries, such as policies related to trade and military conflicts. Based on an online survey experiment in June 2018, this research shows that soft power information (about positive contributions of Confucius Institutes to the American society) does make the US public feel warmer towards China and become more willing to support trade negotiations. However, the warm feeling does not alter public attitudes towards a potential military conflict with China over disputed islands in the South China Sea. Our study provides both empirical support and advice to policymakers interested in the influence of China’s soft power on US public opinion.","PeriodicalId":44280,"journal":{"name":"Economic and Political Studies-EPS","volume":"9 1","pages":"447 - 460"},"PeriodicalIF":2.4,"publicationDate":"2021-07-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/20954816.2021.1933766","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47061312","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Engaging the dragon: UK government documents on doing business with China","authors":"Yue Ming, M. Plouffe","doi":"10.1080/20954816.2021.1933770","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/20954816.2021.1933770","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract China’s rise as a global economic and political power has created a policy puzzle for established global players. For the United Kingdom (UK), the policy towards China has pursued a dual emphasis: seeking commercial benefits and promoting a positive social and political change. We explore the scope and tone of official UK policy publications on doing business with China. We argue that, while these documents reflect some of the predominant concerns of public debates over the UK’s relationship with China, the political neutrality of the civil service and insulation from external forces enable the relationship to continue. We conduct content and sentiment analyses of government publications focussing on China from 2013 to 2018. During this period, the key policy focusses have remained stable, while the extent to which the main topics are discussed changes slightly with time. Sensitive topics are dealt with using a neutral tone, while publications have become increasingly positive on the prospects of business interactions with China.","PeriodicalId":44280,"journal":{"name":"Economic and Political Studies-EPS","volume":"10 1","pages":"387 - 415"},"PeriodicalIF":2.4,"publicationDate":"2021-06-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/20954816.2021.1933770","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44102047","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Economic relations and the public image of China in Latin America: a cross-country time-series analysis","authors":"Yi Feng, Qingjie Zeng","doi":"10.1080/20954816.2021.1914414","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/20954816.2021.1914414","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract This article investigates the impact of Chinese economic activities in Latin America on the national image of China in the region. Using economic and public opinion data from 17 Latin American countries from 2001 to 2016, this work relates cross-national time-series variations regarding China’s image in Latin America to changes in the economic ties (such as trade, FDI, and contracts) between the perceiving countries and China. Controlling for the size of the economy and the level of its development, the statistical analysis indicates that trade surplus against China in Latin America has a positive effect on the public perceptions of China in the region, while Chinese FDI outflows to Latin America lead to a negative effect. The effects of Chinese contracts, imports, and exports tend not to be statistically significant. We also find less developed Latin American countries with low life expectancy and low educational attainment tend to have a more positive view of China than their richer counterparts in the region. Finally, we find that Latin American countries under presidents with left-wing ideology have a much more positive view of China than countries under presidents with other ideological preferences. Diplomatic relations with China and China’s soft power influence as indexed by the presence of Confucius Institutes do not exhibit a strong impact on China’s national image in Latin America, compared with the dominant political ideology in a Latin American country as reflected in the president’s ideology.","PeriodicalId":44280,"journal":{"name":"Economic and Political Studies-EPS","volume":"10 1","pages":"181 - 207"},"PeriodicalIF":2.4,"publicationDate":"2021-06-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/20954816.2021.1914414","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41589434","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"US economic and trade sanctions against China: A loss-loss confrontation","authors":"Liang Guo, Sizhu Wang, Nicole Z. Xu","doi":"10.1080/20954816.2021.1920195","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/20954816.2021.1920195","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract The economic and trade sanctions implemented by the United States (US) against China have lasted for a few decades and the structural imbalance of the US–China trade relationship has ultimately been escalated to a trade war recently. We examine the economic impacts of US sanctions against China on both sponsor and target countries during the last 20 years. We find that such impacts have significantly changed over time. On one hand, US economic sanctions have gradually extended from China’s labour-intensive to high value-added products and they have largely slowed down China’s trade growth for the last decade. On the other hand, US consumers and businesses have faced higher prices and production costs for Chinese imports (or import substitutes) in the wake of the increasing US trade sanctions, leading to great deadweight losses to the sponsor country. In addition, US economic and trade sanctions against China have largely impacted other economies involved in US–China trade as well. The intermediary status of the Hong Kong SAR has been greatly challenged. Overall, US economic and trade sanctions have caused pain on both China and the US, but their impact on China (the target country) has been largely weakened.","PeriodicalId":44280,"journal":{"name":"Economic and Political Studies-EPS","volume":"11 1","pages":"17 - 44"},"PeriodicalIF":2.4,"publicationDate":"2021-06-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/20954816.2021.1920195","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49280417","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Urban wage inequality: The reform of state-owned enterprises in China’s great transition","authors":"Shiyu Sun, Xixi Chu, Xiangbo Liu","doi":"10.1080/20954816.2021.1914417","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/20954816.2021.1914417","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract Along with the further reforms of state-owned enterprises (SOEs), urban China has experienced an evident increase in wage inequality. Using provincial-level data for the period 1993–2013 and individual-level data from five waves of the China Household Income Project from 1988 to 2013, this paper investigates how the SOE reform affects wage distribution in urban China by considering three mechanisms: wage determination, ownership structure and institutional segmentation. The results of this study show that overall inequality increased with the reduction of SOEs’ share in the economy. Moreover, through a detailed Oaxaca–Blinder re-centred influence function decomposition, this experiment obtains consistent and robust results. Based on the theory of soft budget constraint, this study demonstrates that the increase in urban wage inequality has been mainly caused by wage structure effects. Since the SOE reform in the 1980s, the wage determination mechanism has changed with the increase in the return of the labour force to education. During this period, institutional segmentation was of less significance in explaining the wage gap between SOEs and non-SOEs. Furthermore, the accelerating ageing process of China’s population had no significant effects on the trajectory of urban wage inequality throughout this period.","PeriodicalId":44280,"journal":{"name":"Economic and Political Studies-EPS","volume":"10 1","pages":"442 - 461"},"PeriodicalIF":2.4,"publicationDate":"2021-05-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/20954816.2021.1914417","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46489609","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The path, value and limits of the Confucius Institute in carrying out public diplomacy","authors":"Yanwei Wang, Chinenye Gerlof Uzodinma, Caoyuan Niu","doi":"10.1080/20954816.2021.1914416","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/20954816.2021.1914416","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract On the basis of Chinese language teaching and cultural communication activities, the Confucius Institute carries out a variety of cultural exchange activities between China and the host country, which has become an effective way for China to carry out public diplomacy and participate in global cultural governance. By analysing the concepts of public diplomacy, cultural diplomacy, people-to-people exchange and cultural governance, this paper summarises three typical paths of Confucius Institutes in carrying out public diplomacy: ‘from the government to foreign nationals’, ‘from the government to Chinese citizens and then to foreign nationals’, and ‘from the government to foreign nationals and then to foreign nationals’. The value of the Confucius Institute in carrying out public diplomacy is reflected on the level of national diplomacy, international exchange and global governance. Furthermore, the capability of the Confucius Institute as a language and cultural communication institution initiated by China and in cooperation with other countries in carrying out public diplomacy is limited. This limitation, on one hand, originates from the nature of the Confucius Institute as a language and cultural communication organisation, and on the other hand, is related to the difficulties and challenges that China faces in its participation in global governance. Public diplomacy and cultural diplomacy are based on national interests. They also transcend national interests and, furthermore, become a way for a country to actively participate in global cultural governance. The experience of and challenges faced by the Confucius Institute can have important implications for China in participating in global cultural governance.","PeriodicalId":44280,"journal":{"name":"Economic and Political Studies-EPS","volume":"9 1","pages":"217 - 229"},"PeriodicalIF":2.4,"publicationDate":"2021-04-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/20954816.2021.1914416","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44514591","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The intention of banks to adopt green banking in an emerging market: the employees’ perspective","authors":"Eugene Okyere-Kwakye, Khalil Md Nor","doi":"10.1080/20954816.2021.1899621","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/20954816.2021.1899621","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract Green banking is a comparatively new development in the financial world. It is a form of banking that considers the social and environmental impacts of banking activities. Most studies on green banking focussed on customers, management, and other stakeholders without considering the perspective of employees, whose daily work is normally affected. To fill in the gap, the primary aim of this study is to assess factors affecting the intention of banks to adopt green banking from the perspective of employees. A questionnaire was used to collect data from 94 employees at selected banks in Koforidua, the eastern region of Ghana. Multiple regression was used to analyse the data. The study finds a significantly positive relationship between management support and intention of banks to adopt green banking. However, pressures from competitors and customers are found not to have a significant impact on banks’ intention to adopt green banking. While these results are unexpected and disappointing, they provide important insights in the context that changing initiatives from the perspective of common employees are internally driven instead of externally driven. This suggests the importance of management’s role in facilitating green banking initiatives.","PeriodicalId":44280,"journal":{"name":"Economic and Political Studies-EPS","volume":"9 1","pages":"497 - 504"},"PeriodicalIF":2.4,"publicationDate":"2021-03-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/20954816.2021.1899621","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42584578","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The political economy of city diplomacy","authors":"J. Manfredi-Sánchez","doi":"10.1080/20954816.2021.1899622","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/20954816.2021.1899622","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract City diplomacy is a major trend in the soft power development. As cities face daily political issues deriving from globalisation (such as mass tourism, migration, climate change, and commodification of culture), they demand for, rather than contesting with a nationstate, an operational reinterpretation of sovereignty oriented to solve problems. Political economy approach is a useful method to understand the role of global cities where the nation state has many deficiencies. The global city establishes rules to influence international legal development and practice, even without a traditional legal basis (such as sovereignty, monopoly on violence, and legal exclusivity). As these ‘superstar cities’ grow, other cities are losing opportunities to develop and take advantage of globalisation. The risk of inter-urban inequality feeds populism. Cities will become the middle power in global political organisations in the future, and political economy will shed light on how power and values operate at the urban level.","PeriodicalId":44280,"journal":{"name":"Economic and Political Studies-EPS","volume":"10 1","pages":"228 - 249"},"PeriodicalIF":2.4,"publicationDate":"2021-03-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/20954816.2021.1899622","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48973183","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The political economy of climate change: the impasse and way out","authors":"Fusheng Xie, Han Cheng","doi":"10.1080/20954816.2021.1885780","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/20954816.2021.1885780","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract Mainstream economics attributes climate change to negative externalities of carbon emissions and the lack of climate property rights. Although market-based strategies such as emission trading are widely implemented under the guideline of mainstream economics, there is no evidence that the accelerating trend of global warming has been contained. Marxian economists criticise the theoretical point of departure of the mainstream perspective about climate change and climate governance, and propose an alternative analytical framework focussing on the relationship between climate and capital accumulation. Following the Marxian perspective, we discuss the subject, nature, strategy, and possibility of a popular climate movement that could serve as an alternative to the existing mainstream climate governance.","PeriodicalId":44280,"journal":{"name":"Economic and Political Studies-EPS","volume":"9 1","pages":"315 - 335"},"PeriodicalIF":2.4,"publicationDate":"2021-03-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/20954816.2021.1885780","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47370810","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"News coverage of Confucius Institutes in the pre-Trump era","authors":"M. Akhtaruzzaman, N. Berg, D. Lien, Ying Wu","doi":"10.1080/20954816.2020.1870025","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/20954816.2020.1870025","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract A novel dataset is presented that reveals a general pattern of declining favourability in news stories about Confucius Institutes (CIs) from 2006 through 2015 in six English-speaking countries: the US, the UK, Canada, Australia, India and Kenya. There are significant differences in mean favourability and time trends across countries, however. Decreasing trends in favourability are observed in the US and Canada, in particular, whereas Kenya and India’s time trends are nil or possibly increasing. We report empirical models of favourability conditional on GDP per capita, trade with China and the number of CIs across country-year observations. Consistent with Pew polling data, our data reveal an interesting pair of conflicting income effects. High-income countries tend to be more negative and less positive on CIs than low-income countries overall. Within-country positive shocks to real GDP per capita, however, are positively associated with favourability after cross-country differences in income levels are absorbed by country fixed effects. The number of CIs in a country has mixed effects on the favourability of news coverage about CIs across country-year observations. Despite billions of dollars spent on public diplomacy by the Chinese government, our findings suggest that its return on investment in public diplomacy in the form of CIs may not be as expected.","PeriodicalId":44280,"journal":{"name":"Economic and Political Studies-EPS","volume":"10 1","pages":"155 - 180"},"PeriodicalIF":2.4,"publicationDate":"2021-02-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/20954816.2020.1870025","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45386581","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}