Research Strategy Report on the International Promotion of Chinese Language and Culture

The ‘Research Strategy Report on the International Promotion of Chinese Language and Culture,' totaling some quarter of a million characters, was produced in August 2008 by the Research Strategy Group of the Institute for the Promotion of Chinese Language and Culture at Renmin University. A special discussion of the report took place at the ‘Workshop on Developing Confucius Institutes' held by the National Hanban in August 2008.

The ‘Research Strategy Report on the International Promotion of Chinese Language and Culture' deals with 16 core questions:
1.Whenever any language is promoted, used or accepted as a medium of international communication, its significance greatly exceeds that of the original language itself. It not only symbolizes a kind of global ‘cultural ecology' and acts as a measure of the interaction and balance of ‘hard power' and ‘soft power,' but has also become in effect a basic symbol of ‘the rise and fall of great powers.' Compared with the cycle of influence of the force of military power or economic power, the force of language or cultural power is relatively slow, but long lasting. The historical example of the west shows us that as soon as a language or culture draws on ‘hard power' to build its influence, it can at a given level extend the periodicity of the influence of its ‘hard power,' even to the point where it can become a guiding factor in a state's power long after a downturn in its military affairs or economic power.
 
2. Historically, English, French and Spanish became transnational languages of international influence as a result of the full promotion their ‘hard power.' From the other end of the equation, a language which commands power is precisely the lasting mark of a state's ‘hard power,' and might even be seen as the basic mark of a ‘state' itself. The evolution and rise and fall of modern western nation states provides a model example of this.

3.The symbiotic interaction of the force of different people groups and languages in Europe provides a basic prototype and ideal for the expansion of colonization in the period following the Middle Ages. Wherever ‘hard power' reached, the expansion of the ‘language map' inevitably followed. To the present day, how to preserve cultural security, to stabilize the cultural ecology, and to strengthen cultural influence,   remain the main ‘problem consciousness' and target for consideration for western countries in promoting their languages  

4.Language export and promotion is also in fact a way of establishing standards. As Britain, America and such English speaking countries extended their power, English frequently became the implicitly acknowledged common international language of the era, and the platform for human communication and information exchange. In such a situation, English-speaking countries enjoyed preemptive advantages in the competition among nations.

5.A ‘Westerncentric' inertia for a long time determined the global flow of capital, technology and products, and in the realms of language, culture and values, there has also been a one-way export from western ‘developed countries' towards ‘developing countries.' Once the dominant military hegemony and economic hegemony gives way to the recessive language-cultural hegemony, those who are enslaved have often already lost consciousness of their situation.

6.The basis for the international promotion of Chinese is, in the same way, China's ‘hard power,' and the refactoring of world structures by its ‘hard power;' it is the ordered and healthy development of the Chinese economy and Chinese society which has furnished an unprecedented historical opportunity for the international promotion of Chinese. And how to grasp this opportunity well, and from this promote a national strategy for the ‘export' of Chinese culture, and promote the overall recovery of China's national strength and international standing to the greatest possible extent, and to change completely fixed ways of thinking that insist on ‘the west as the standard' and the ‘unilateral export' of language hegemony, and win a greater space for the peaceful development of China.

7.The international promotion of Chinese ought to act as a pivot for ‘relations between Chinese culture and the world', for abandoning the unilateral dissemination, unilateral export and unilateral influence of westerncentricism, for moving from the promotion of Chinese through to transcultural dialogue, for dispelling western linguistic hegemony through the equalization of culture, for leveling the global cultural ecology through the mutual interaction of culture, level.

8.The international promotion of Chinese ought to take as its premise ‘the modernization of traditional culture' and guard against a fossilization, a museumization, an exoticization, or a so-called ‘return to an original ecology/ primordialization,' but rather truly inherit and develop the essence of Chinese culture, those elements which can progress together with the era, can be continuously reinvigorated.

9.Chinese culture has never been an aggressive culture, but in discussing the extent of its territory, the strength of its state power, the volume of its population, the size of its markets, the length of its history or the brilliance of its culture, if there is inadequate communication and understanding, any one of the above factors could cause other peoples and states to feel a certain pressure. As a modernizing country which started late, China urgently needs at the same time as leveling the global cultural ecology, actively to construct anew China's image, to continue and develop a unified battle front for Chinese culture overseas. 

10.Since China ‘re-entered the world' it has already fully entered the world economic system, which also means that we will be ever more tied into, and even dependent on, world energy and other resources, finance and markets. And since such questions and the future security of energy and natural resources, and the future security of finance and world markets can no longer be resolved through unilateral measures, they must be mutually linked with the degree of cultural secutiry and cultural influence. The international promotion of Chinese will become an important means of protecting future national energy security, security of natural resources and financial security, and of protecting China's share of the world market.

11.‘Cultural Security' is ultimately a passive, negative, responsive standpoint – an active, positive, long-term comprehensive standpoint on cultural security has yet to be formed. How can we create an active, progressive view on cultural security? And how can we increase understanding, and avert hostility through transcultural dialogue? And how can we recreate ‘the image of China's culture' or ‘the image of a cultured China' in an intangible, slow and stable manner, and progress onwards to recreate the global cultural ecology? For a long period of time these problems have seemed intractable, but the international promotion of Chinese has provided a rare and timely opportunity.

12.Foreign sinology already has a long history and its own traditions. For several hundred years, Sinologists and those experts researching topics related to China have created the ‘image of China' in all shades and hues, and have expounded on everything concerning China to people in all walks of life and public media, to the point of influencing governmental policy towards China at various levels in their own countries – but in the past, ‘the teaching of Chinese as a foreign language' has had hardly any real effect on their portrayal. The international promotion of Chinese is a rare opportunity for mainstream Chinese culture to influence foreign sinology, and if we can use this to guide and consolidate the relevant resources within foreign universities' internal structures, its potential use will be inestimable.

13.The general situation in the international economy and field of international politics is unsettled and subject to much change. International competition is no longer just contended in the fields of economic development and military force – the force of cultural influence has become a new mark for measuring overall national power. For this reason, there is a window of opportunity in the world – an opportunity for us, and equally an opportunity for others. In the midst of such competition and contest, there is no other choice for the international promotion of Chinese – we either rely on the strength of the ‘eastern wind' or we forfeit all that we have gained.

14.Following the 1964 Tokyo Olympics, Japan saw its own economic take-off. Amid all the various complicated experiences of the 2008 Beijing Olympics, one prominent revelation has remained: that we must continue unwaveringly to promote China's ‘soft power', and must resist ‘westerncentric' linguistic hegemony, and must change the unidirectional broadcasting of information, technology and cultural products, and create beneficial international conditions for China's peaceful development.  This means that the international promotion of Chinese must set medium and long term strategic development goals from a new starting point and perspective, with new goals and new vision.      
 
15.Since the start of the international promotion of Chinese in 2005, and with limits on the period of favourable opportunities set at 2020 for the basic construction of Chinese capital markets and the completion of structural change in the mode of China's economic growth, and in line with the ‘three step' strategy of 3, 5 and 8 year plans, a strategy of ‘integration' in state strengthening,  a multi-structural ‘strategy of symbolization,' a strategy of ‘popularization' towards the masses, and a strategy of ‘indigenization' in entering target countries' set-ups,  and with the appropriate regulatory, public finance and legal guarantees, we must continue to deepen the intensity of our overseas dissemination of Chinese culture, and enable the Confucius Institutes to become an important brand name in the dissemination and enhancement of Chinese culture. From there, with a five-fold basis of people groups, land, language, script and culture, we can move on to create more broadly ‘interlocking rings diplomatic relations' centred on the Chinese mainland, moving outwards to Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macao, other spheres of Chinese language culture, overseas groups of Chinese, and all like-minded people within our global culture.

16. Current capital investment in the Confucius Institutes as a proportion of GDP was only 0.0000549% in 2005, and in 2007 just 0.000422%. Using a Pearson analysis on the investment in various countries' Confucius Institutes with foreign trade export totals, we can see that in 2005 capital investment and foreign trade export is conspicuously below the 10% level, and the average for 2006 and 2007 appears below the 5% level, and moreover the related figure has risen 0.37, which shows that increased investment in Confucius Institutes in all likelihood has had an effect on foreign trade export production. If we consider the experiences of western countries, the latent economic gains from the external promotion of language are also great.