China’s Soft Power Hanseok Ryu

Two extreme cities I’ve been living in recent two years…

Hard Powerv.s.

Soft Power

Soft PowerHard Power

Explicit / Direct Implicit / Indirect

Force Charm

Make Let

Top-down Bottom-up

Linear / Hierarchy Non-linear / Network

60th AnniversaryPeople’s Rep. of

CHINA

Crouching tiger slowly begins wielding

its influence over the world…

“We can achieve in one week what they(the U.K.) can

achieve in one month. That's the reason ourperformers give such brilliant performances.

I think other than North Korea, no other country anywhere in the world can achieve this.”

Yimou Zhang

Cultural DifferencePut into abstract icons by Liu Yang

The Boss Me

The Way of Life Party

UniformityOver

Individuality

Hard Power

Explicit / Direct

Force

Make

Top-down

Linear / Hierarchy

Communist Control + Cultural Background

The Boss

The Way of Life

IndividualityOver

Uniformity

Meanwhile in the U.S it is…

Microsoftized

We are …

Starbuckti-fizedGooglized

Soft Power

Implicit / Indirect

Charm

Let

Bottom-up

Non-linear / Network

Democratic Freedom + Cultural Background

The Boss

The Way of Life

Two extreme things I saw and heardin China last year.

Case #1

Ethnic clashes in Urmuqi last July

Case #2

Lu Guang's "Pollution in China" project

國進民退

State rises while people fall back

In Status Quo,

You’re anonymousYou’re a number

However, history says Chinese culture is…

fundamentally soft(Even softer than the U.S. gov’t)

Soft PowerHard Power

The best of man is like water,Which benefits all things, and does not contend with them,Which flows in places that others disdain,Where it is in harmony with the Way.

- Laotse

Empty your mind, be formless. Shapeless, like water. If you put water into a cup, it becomes the cup. You put water into a bottle and it becomes the bottle. You put it in a teapot it becomes the teapot. Now, water can flow or it can crash. Be water my friend.

- BRUCE LEE

Thanks!