Confucius Institutes: The Globalization of Chinese Soft Power

R.S. Zaharna is an associate professor in the School of Communication and affiliate associate professor in the School of International Service at American University in Washington, D.C. She specializes in intercultural and international strategic communication. Her public diplomacy research interests are in culture and relational approaches (networks and collaboration). In addition to more than twenty years of teaching strategic communication, she has advised on communication projects for multinational corporations, governments, and international organizations, including the United Nations, World Bank, and NATO. Since 9/11 she has testified on several occasions before the US Congress and has addressed diplomatic audiences and military personnel in the United States and Europe on strategic communication and public diplomacy. She has authored numerous articles and more than a dozen book chapters, including three for major handbooks: Routledge Handbook of Public Diplomacy (2008), The Global Public Relations Handbook: Theory, Research, and Practice, (Routledge, 2009), and Sage Handbook on Intercultural Communication Competence (2009). Her recent book, Battles to Bridges: U.S. Strategic Communication and Public Diplomacy after 9/11, discusses the United States communication efforts aimed at winning hearts and minds in the Arab and Islamic publics.

Falk Hartig is a post-doctoral researcher at the Frankfurt Inter-Centre-Programme on new African-Asian Interactions AFRASO at Frankfurt University, Germany. His research focuses on public and cultural diplomacy, political communication and issues of external perception. He received his PhD in from Queensland University of Technology in Brisbane, Australia. He holds a MA in Sinology and Journalism from the University of Leipzig, Germany. From 2007 to 2009 he was deputy chief editor of “Cultural Exchange”, Germany’s leading magazine for international relations and cultural exchange. Before coming to QUT he was a visiting fellow at Xinhua News Agency in Beijing and a research assistant at the GIGA Institute of Asian Studies in Hamburg. He writes for German journals and magazines and is the author of a book about the Communist Party of China. As a CPD Contributing Scholar in Reshaping Cultural Diplomacy in a New Era, Dr. Hartig is focusing his research on how China is presenting itself in Africa by means of cultural diplomacy with a focus on Confucius Institutes on the continent.

Jennifer Hubbert, Assistant Professor of Anthropology, Lewis & Clark College

John Layton, Assistant Superintendent, Lafayette School Corporation