Understanding Influence in The Strategic Competition With China

C O R P O R AT I O N
MICHAEL J. MAZARR, BRYAN FREDERICK, JOHN J. DRENNAN, EMILY ELLINGER,

KELLY EUSEBI, BRYAN ROONEY, ANDREW STRAVERS, EMILY YODER
Understanding
Influence in the
Strategic Competition
with China
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Preface
Over the past two decades, China’s role in the geopolitical landscape has grown, particularly
as a result of the country’s rising economic and military power. Thus, U.S. leaders now view
China as a strategic competitor—one that seeks to upend the post–World War II liberal inter-
national order. An integral part of this competition is the contest for influence in the interna-
tional system. This report examines China’s drive for power and influence around the world
and the results of those efforts. More specifically, we assess China’s ability to use various mech-
anisms of influence to shape the policies and behavior of the 20 countries examined, as well
as the lessons that these examples offer for the wider issue of influence in the United States’
strategic competition with China. With this study, we aim to produce a transferable frame-
work and other tools of analysis that can provide reliable means of assessing bilateral influence
relationships in other cases.
The research to assess the factors described in this report was completed in mid-2020.
The analysis here does not evaluate developments after that time. However, as of June 2021,
we continue to believe that the basic findings in the report remain valid.
The research reported here was completed in June 2020 and underwent security review
with the sponsor and the Defense Office of Prepublication and Security Review before public
release.
This research was sponsored by the Office of the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense
for Strategy and Force Development in the Office of the Secretary of Defense. It was conducted
within the International Security and Defense Policy Center of the RAND National Security
Research Division (NSRD), which operates the National Defense Research Institute (NDRI),
a federally funded research and development center sponsored by the Office of the Secretary
of Defense, the Joint Staff, the Unified Combatant Commands, the Navy, the Marine Corps,
the defense agencies, and the defense intelligence enterprise.
For more information on the RAND International Security and Defense Policy Center,
see www.rand.org/nsrd/isdp or contact the director (contact information is provided on the
webpage).
iii
Contents
Preface. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . iii
Figures and Tables. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vii
Summary. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix
Acknowledgments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xiii
Abbreviations. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xv
CHAPTER ONE
Introduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
CHAPTER TWO
Defining Power and Influence. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Modern Conceptions of Power. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Types and Categories of Power. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Power in International Relations. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
Concepts and Definitions: Influence. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
Existing Literature on Influence .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
Theoretical Review: Lessons and Implications. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
CHAPTER THREE
Framework for Assessing Chinese Influence. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
Framework Components and Variables. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
Methodological Challenges to Measuring Influence. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
CHAPTER FOUR
Measuring Chinese Influence: Inputs. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
Economic Variables: Trade and Foreign Direct Investment. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
Security Variables: Security Cooperation and Military Posture. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
Diplomatic Variables: Programs and Activities. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
Informational Variables: State-Supported Broadcasting and Social Media Activities. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
Cultural Variables: Language Prevalence and Entertainment. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
People-to-People Variables: Education.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
CHAPTER FIVE
Measuring Chinese Influence: Intervening Factors. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
Shared Values and Cultural Experiences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
Common Interests, Purposes, or Perceived Threats .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
v
vi Understanding Influence in the Strategic Competition with China
Implicit Societal Influence, or Soft Power. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60

Mastery of the Local Context in the Targeted State. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
Vulnerability of the Targeted State to Outside Influence. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
Domestic and International Context. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72
Conclusions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
CHAPTER SIX
Measuring Chinese Influence: Outputs. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
Public Opinion Variables.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
Output Analysis. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
CHAPTER SEVEN
Case Studies of Chinese Influence-Seeking. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
Australia. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
Greece. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
Japan. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
Maldives.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
Mongolia. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
New Zealand. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96
Norway. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98
The Philippines.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
South Korea . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103
Sri Lanka. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106
Taiwan.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
Thailand. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111
CHAPTER EIGHT
Historical Influence Case: Finland in the Cold War.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
The Foundations of Soviet Influence in Finland.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
Degree of Soviet Influence. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
Costs and Benefits of Finlandization. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118
CHAPTER NINE
Overall Findings and Implications. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
Findings and Conclusions.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
Lessons of Chinese Influence-Seeking During the COVID-19 Pandemic. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127
Recommendations for a U.S. Response. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130
References. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135
Figures and Tables
Figures
3.1. Framework for Conceptualizing Influence. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
4.1. Total Trade with China, Each Focus Country, 2013–2017. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
4.2. Dependence on China for Trade Exports, Select Focus Countries, 2013–2017. . . . . . . . . . . 27
4.3. Total Trade with China, Average Across All Focus Countries, 2013–2017. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
4.4. Incoming Foreign Direct Investment from China, Each Focus Country, 2013–2018. . . . 28
4.5. China’s Overseas Lending Boom, 1998–2019.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
4.6. Total Arms Transfers, 2017. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
4.7. Chinese Arms Exports, by Region, 2013–2017. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
4.8. Top European Providers of Foreign Military Aid, 2013–2017. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
4.9. Number of High-Level Meetings Between China and Select Focus Countries,
2008–2018.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
4.10. Average Number of High-Level Meetings Between China and Select Focus
Countries, 2008–2018. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
4.11. Number of National Providers That Host a China Global Television Network
Channel, Select Focus Countries. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
4.12. Number of Chinese Films Released in Select Focus Countries, 2014–2018. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
4.13. Total Gross Income for Chinese Films in Select Focus Countries, Normalized by
Number of Film Releases, 2014–2018. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
4.14. Percentage of Chinese Exchange Students Enrolled in a Tertiary Education
Program in Select Focus Countries, Normalized by Total Outbound Chinese
Students, 2012–2016. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
5.1. Affinity Index. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54
5.2. Link Between Corruption, Governance, and Support for 2016 Hague Arbitration
Ruling. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
5.3. Vulnerability Index. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
9.1. Geopolitical Alignment Index.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126
Tables
2.1.
Variables Used in the Foreign Bilateral Influence Capacity Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
Forms of Chinese Inputs for Influence.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
3.1.
Economic Dependence on China, Focus Countries and Selected Others. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
4.1.
Total Chinese Military Aid, 2013–2018. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
4.2.
4.3.
Number of Chinese Students Enrolled in Select Focus Countries’ Tertiary
Education Programs, 2012–2017. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
5.1. Interest Alignment Between China and the Focus Countries.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
5.2. Economic Alignment of the Focus Countries. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
vii
viii Understanding Influence in the Strategic Competition with China
5.3.
Average Length of Chinese Ambassador Appointment, by Select Focus Country. . . . . . . . . 63
Details on the Chinese Ambassador to Each Focus Country, 2019. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
5.4.
Public Favorability Ratings on China, by Select Focus Country, 2014–2018. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
6.1.
Views of Chinese Military Power. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
6.2.
6.3.
Output Analysis: Each Focus Country’s Position on China’s Leading Strategic
Goals .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
7.1. Chinese Influence-Seeking: Case Study Details and Outcomes, 2010–2019. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
9.1. Evaluation of China’s Influence Efforts, by Input Type. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
9.2. Potential U.S. Responses to China’s Most-Effective Tools of Influence. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130
Summary
Issue
This deep-dive analysis represents one component of a larger study on the United States’ strate-
gic competition with Russia and China, which is the centerpiece of current U.S. national secu-
rity strategy. In this component analysis, we assess the competition between the United States
and China for influence in various countries around the world; specifically, we analyze how to
understand that competition, indicators of current standing, and possible futures.
Approach
To analyze Chinese influence around the world, we used various criteria related to regional
diversity and significance to U.S. and Chinese strategy. We chose to examine influence in 20
countries, including Australia, Brazil, Germany, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Mexico, Nigeria,
Thailand, and Vietnam, among others (the focus countries). To assess the degree of Chinese
influence in these countries, we undertook two main tasks. First, we developed a conceptual
framework for assessing how China seeks influence in specific relationships. Second, we used
this framework to assess the status of Chinese influence-seeking using four main sources of
data and qualitative insight:
1. We gathered available quantitative metrics that reflected the status of dozens of individ-
ual inputs and intervening factors (factors that affect how Chinese inputs affect outputs
in the targeted country) across the focus countries and looked for correlations and other
relationships among these variables.
2. We examined 12 case studies from the past decade of China’s efforts to employ its tools
of influence to achieve specific outcomes.
3. We drew on the research and interviews from recent RAND Corporation studies that
included field research on various aspects of Chinese influence in nine of the 20 focus
countries.
4. Finally, to assess some of the most-qualitative variables that demand in-depth, country-
specific analysis, we conducted more-detailed field work to assess Chinese influence in
Indonesia and South Korea.
The research to assess the factors described in this report was completed in mid-2020.
The analysis here does not evaluate developments after that time. However, as of June 2021,
we continue to believe that the basic findings in the report remain valid.
ix
x Understanding Influence in the Strategic Competition with China
Findings and Conclusions
This research produced multiple findings and conclusions about China’s efforts to influence
countries around the world and how those efforts affect the strategic competition with the
United States. Several of the most important findings are as follows:
• The most effective source of influence in the various cases and data sources that we investigated
was the weight of attraction of China’s economy. Countries’ desire for trade, direct invest-
ment, technology transfer, and other economic benefits far outweighed other potential
sources of influence, such as direct military threats or any form of the China model (e.g.,
development, sociopolitical). In addition, some of the most-powerful economic tools for
coercive influence were tourism, foreign exchange student programs, and regulations on
foreign companies investing in China—tools that China can meter and quickly reverse.
• The most easily measurable components of influence—the inputs (e.g., trade, foreign direct
investment, number of visits by senior officials, presence of an influence country’s media)—are
imperfect predictors of outcomes. Powerful intervening factors in the targeted country, such
as the role of specific interest groups, the head of state’s preferences, and the current eco-
nomic or political context, play a more decisive role in determining how much and what
kind of influence the outside actor will ultimately have on the policies of the targeted
state.
• As a result, inputs are not necessarily the best indicators of potential influence and go only so
far in defining the scope and severity of the influence challenge. The route to key outputs,
such as the geopolitical alignment of states, positive attitudes toward the influencer, or
changes to specific policies in the targeted state, can be long, winding, and filled with
barriers and unexpected variables. It has become common to count certain influence
inputs and make at least implicit assumptions about the resulting trajectory of influence.
But the connection between inputs and outputs is anything but linear, and our study
suggests that the most-important factors determining outputs are often abstract factors
highly resistant to quantitative assessment.
• The second most effective source of influence was China’s targeted, often clandestine
outreach—sometimes with financial incentives—to specific leaders, elites, and opinion-
shapers in targeted countries. China has demonstrated significant capability to build sym-
pathetic reservoirs of support among other countries’ elites and public officials.
• The contest for influence is primarily, indeed dominantly, nonmilitary in character. Although
China’s growing military power does provide a backdrop to the influence competition,
that power’s direct effects are mostly limited to countries with which China has a direct
territorial dispute. Few, if any, countries appear to be acceding to Chinese influence
because they fear large-scale, direct Chinese military aggression. China’s chief tools of
influence-seeking and its main areas of competitive advantage lie in nonmilitary areas of
statecraft: economic attraction and coercion; informational and narrative-shaping cam-
paigns; clandestine efforts to manipulate local political processes; diplomatic engagements;
efforts to enhance Chinese power in international organizations; and large-scale cultural
engagements through student exchange programs, popular films, and other means. The
contest for influence is first and foremost a nonmilitary endeavor and must be viewed as
such. Thus, bolstering U.S. military capabilities in Asia is a useful step in some ways but
cannot compensate for failures to address Chinese activities in other realms.
Summary xi
• China faces a dilemma in exercising influence: The more strongly China tries to use its clout to
force outcomes in other countries, the greater the backlash it foments and the more those coun-
tries reject its influence. This partly accounted for the limited success of China’s significant
soft-power influence activities. The dilemma was even present for private-power activities
but was especially true for coercive and public displays of power. This dilemma was very
much in evidence, for example, in Southeast Asia, where reactions to Chinese maritime
belligerence were overwhelming any positive influence results from Chinese investment,
aid, propaganda, or other tools of statecraft. The United States can seek to intensify this
dilemma with public diplomacy activities.
• The most generalized geopolitical reaction to growing Chinese power is hedging. Especially
in Asia, countries both fear and respect Chinese power. Their preferred approach is to
hedge—that is, to defend essential interests without unduly aggravating Beijing.
• Despite that predominant trend of hedging, the general geopolitical alignment of the focus
countries that we assessed for this study remains highly positive for the United States.
• The emerging competition for influence is not strictly government to government. Increas-
ingly, governments seeking influence in foreign countries operate in a complex network
of nongovernmental organizations, interest groups, and empowered individuals.
Recommendations
Considering those findings, we recommend that the United States take the following steps to
enhance U.S. strategies in the competition for influence:
• For countries that are the target of Chinese influence, continue to offer the credible
promise of assistance when they stand up to Chinese coercion.
• Develop a comprehensive approach to understanding, tracking, and responding to Chi-
na’s targeted influence programs aimed at specific leaders or elites.
• Do much more to develop investment tools capable of offering countries an alternative to
Chinese money—especially in infrastructure.
• Support independent research, journalism, and transparency initiatives focused on Chi-
na’s activities in key countries.
• Develop an influence strategy with a broader network (beyond journalists) to rally non-
governmental sources of opinion and action in targeted countries.
Acknowledgments
We would like to thank the sponsor, the Department of Defense Office of the Undersecretary
for Policy, Office of Strategy and Force Development, and particularly Michael Donofrio. In
addition, we would like to thank Christine Wormuth, Michael McNerney, and Michael Spir-
tas at RAND for their assistance with the project. We are grateful to Ryan Hass and Steve
Flanagan for their very helpful reviews of the draft report.
xiii
Abbreviations
ASEAN Association of Southeast Asian Nations

COSCO China Ocean Shipping Company
COVID-19 coronavirus disease 2019
EU European Union
FBIC Foreign Bilateral Influence Capacity
FDI foreign direct investment
GDP gross domestic product
IMF International Monetary Fund
NATO North Atlantic Treaty Organization
SIPRI Stockholm International Peace Research Institute
THAAD Terminal High Altitude Air Defense
UN United Nations
UN Comtrade United Nations International Trade Statistics Database
UNESCO United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization
xv
CHAPTER ONE
Introduction
Over the past two decades, China’s role in the geopolitical landscape has grown, particularly
as a result of the country’s rising economic and military power. Thus, U.S. leaders now view
China as a strategic competitor—one that seeks to upend the post–World War II liberal inter-
national order. An integral part of this competition is the contest for influence in the interna-
tional system. As part of a larger study on the United States’ strategic competition with China
and Russia, this report examines the contest with China for influence in countries throughout
the world. Topics examined in the larger study include how to conceptualize the strategic com-
petition, historical and theoretical perspectives on the current context, and priority areas for
U.S. investment.
For this analysis of influence, we did not attempt to provide a model or index for com-
paring the overall influence levels of countries throughout the world.1 Instead, we focus on
a narrower piece of that landscape: China’s drive for power and influence and the results
of those efforts. More specifically, we assess the dyadic influence relationships between China
and 20 countries of interest. Therefore, this analysis is not a bilateral comparison of U.S. and
Chinese influence, although some of the data do offer a comparative lens. Rather, we assess
China’s ability to use various mechanisms of influence to shape the policies and behavior of the
countries examined, as well as the lessons these examples offer for the wider issue of influence
in the United States’ strategic competition with China. With this study, we aim to produce a
transferable framework and other tools of analysis that can provide reliable means of assessing
bilateral influence relationships in other cases.
We chose to examine China’s influence in the following 20 countries (the focus countries):
• Australia • Laos
• Brazil • Malaysia
• Cambodia • Mexico
• Ethiopia • Nigeria
• Germany • Philippines
• India • Singapore
• Indonesia • South Korea
• Italy • Sri Lanka
• Japan • Thailand
• Kenya • Vietnam.
1 The analysis differs in this sense from the very useful Foreign Bilateral Influence Capacity (FBIC) Index described in
Jonathan D. Moyer, Tim Sweijs, Mathew J. Burrows, and Hugo Van Manan, Power and Influence in a Globalized World,
Washington, D.C.: Atlantic Council, January 2018. For more on the FBIC, see Chapter Two.
1
2 Understanding Influence in the Strategic Competition with China
We selected the countries using four criteria. First, we sought some degree of regional diversity.
Although many countries in Asia or near China are naturally important both to China and to
U.S. efforts to compete with China, we wanted to ensure that our analysis considered countries
across a wider range of regional contexts. Second, we looked for strategic significance, iden-
tifying the highest gross domestic products (GDPs) and military budgets in each region. We
did so to focus our analysis on countries that seem likely to be important in the United States’
competition with China. Third, we relied on existing RAND Corporation work on Chinese
strategy to identify countries that appear to be high-priority targets of influence for China.
Fourth, we sought to include countries that have been mentioned in at least one U.S. strategy
document as being significant for U.S. national interests.
We do not claim that this roster of countries is globally representative of all influence
relationships. We also do not claim that these countries represent the essential fulcrum of the
strategic competition—although many of these states are critical players. We merely sought
to identify regionally significant countries that are geopolitically important and meaning-
ful in both U.S. and Chinese strategies. There are obviously many other countries of strate-
gic significance to the United States and China; this analysis is meant to be illustrative, not
comprehensive.
To assess the degree of China’s influence in these focus countries, we undertook two
main tasks. First, we developed a conceptual framework for assessing how China seeks influ-
ence in specific relationships. To develop this framework, we surveyed the existing literature
on power and influence in international relations, looking particularly for any established
models, frameworks, or other analytical tools for assessing these factors. We also reviewed
existing RAND work and Chinese strategy statements to gather insights on the mechanisms
of influence-seeking that China has employed in recent years.
The resulting framework identifies inputs, intervening factors, and outputs for assess-
ing the status of Chinese influence and the relationships among these variables. Inputs are the
potential sources of Chinese leverage or influence, such as economic dependence and diplo-
matic activity. Outputs are the targeted states’ policies or changes in policy that China seeks to
use its leverage to achieve. Intervening factors are the variables that affect how or to what degree
Chinese inputs affect targeted states’ policy outputs. The framework is discussed in detail in
Chapter Three.
Second, we used this framework to assess the status of Chinese influence-seeking using
four main sources of data and qualitative insight:
1. We gathered available quantitative metrics that reflected the status of inputs and inter-
vening factors across our focus countries and looked for correlations and other relation-
ships among these variables. Not all the variables could be estimated using available
quantitative metrics, but these data did indicate the status of some key factors affecting
Chinese influence. (Notably, however, we did not identify any quantitative metrics of
output variables from our framework.)
2. We examined case studies from the past decade of China’s efforts to employ its tools of
influence to achieve specific outcomes. Cases include, for example, China’s punishment
directed at Norway and the Philippines during diplomatic crises and China’s attempt
to use economic coercion to force South Korea to refuse a deployment of U.S. Terminal
High Altitude Air Defense (THAAD) anti-ballistic missile system batteries.
Introduction 3
3. We drew on the research and interviews from other recent RAND studies that included
field research on various aspects of Chinese influence in nine of the 20 focus countries.2
Some of those studies included interviews with U.S. and partner-nation military and
civilian officials, scholars, researchers, and others. In some cases, RAND researchers
have investigated countries on multiple occasions.
4. Finally, to assess some of the most-qualitative variables that demand in-depth, country-
specific analysis, we conducted more-detailed field work to assess Chinese influence in
Indonesia and South Korea. These efforts involved research on the Sino-Indonesian and
Sino-Korean relationships, as well as field work in Jakarta and Seoul, including mul-
tiple semi-structured interviews with Indonesian, South Korean, and U.S. officials and
scholars on the goals of Chinese influence and the intervening factors that help deter-
mine its effectiveness.
Using the findings from this analysis, we draw conclusions about the status of Chinese
influence in each of these cases and more-general conclusions about the progress of Chinese
influence-seeking. The resulting conclusions are clearly subjective and offer inferential lessons
from the qualitative and quantitative data gathered. Ultimately, any assessment of the degree
of influence that a country has in another state is highly dependent on context, and the nature
of the outcome that the country seeks to achieve must be based, to some degree, on subjective
judgment. But we believe that this analysis offers two important contributions:
• a conceptual framework for considering the status of influence in any given case
• an expert judgment, grounded in both qualitative and quantitative assessments, on the
status of Chinese influence-seeking in key countries.
One of the most important findings of this analysis is that the most easily measurable
components of influence, the inputs (e.g., trade, investment, senior official visits, and propa-
ganda broadcasts), are highly imperfect predictors of outcomes sought by the influencer. Pow-
erful intervening factors in the focus country—such as the role of specific interest groups, the
head of state’s preferences, and the larger economic or political context—play a more decisive
role in determining how much and what kind of influence the outside actor will ultimately have
on the policies of the targeted state. But the intervening factors are highly context-dependent
and difficult to assess in general terms. In particular, few are connected to simple, reliable data
sets; most require in-depth field work to identify and assess; and most involve highly subjective
factors that must be qualitatively estimated with expert judgment.
Despite these difficulties, grappling with these intervening factors is also essential. Taking
an analytic shortcut by treating the more easily quantifiable inputs as sufficient proxies for
influence-related outputs is likely to confound attempts to anticipate the effects of Chinese
influence-seeking on the policy choices of other states.
2 See, for instance, Scott W. Harold, Derek Grossman, Brian Harding, Jeffrey W. Hornung, Gregory Poling, Jeffrey
Smith, and Meagan L. Smith, The Thickening Web of Asian Security Cooperation: Deepening Defense Ties Among U.S. Allies
and Partners in the Indo-Pacific, Santa Monica, Calif.: RAND Corporation, RR-3125-MCF, 2019. Several of these studies
with field research have not yet been published, including three studies for the U.S. Air Force and one study for the U.S.
Army.
CHAPTER TWO
Defining Power and Influence
To properly understand the concept of influence, it is essential to first define several related
terms. This is especially true with the term power, which is often difficult to distinguish from
influence. In fact, some scholars simply abandon the hope of distinguishing these terms and
define them as essentially equivalent. In other cases, scholars of power and influence have
not formally defined them as functionally equivalent but implicitly use them interchangeably,
without defining either term.1 To measure the effect of inputs and other variables on the out-
come of influence, we required a precise definition of that term.
Modern Conceptions of Power
The concept of power is highly contested, and various scholars differ about the essential char-
acteristics of this very abstract phenomenon.2 There are many often somewhat obscure debates
that populate these discussions of the definitions of power and influence; as one scholar has
noted, “Power has always been one of those words that everybody uses without necessarily
being able to define satisfactorily.”3 One definitional conundrum is the question of ability
versus achieved outcomes. Some scholars make a strict distinction between concepts that refer
only to the potential or ability to do something, distinguishing mere potential from the appli-
cation of that theoretical ability in practice to achieve specific outcomes. A second debate,
which is much more important for our purposes, is between direct and indirect effects. Some
scholars contend that power is, by nature, a more direct, often coercive phenomenon and that
influence primarily involves indirect effects.
In essentially all definitions, however, the baseline of a power relationship involves some
causal connection between two parties. As Dennis Wrong puts it, “The most general sense of
power views it as an event or agency that produces an effect on the external world. It is there-
fore obviously relational, postulating something that acts on its environment and brings about
some change in it.” He goes on to offer a simple definition: “Power is the capacity of some per-
sons to produce intended and foreseen effects on others.”4 Susan Strange offers a broad defini-
tion that still hews closely to original interpretations of power: “Power is simply the ability of
1 Ruth Zimmerling, Influence and Power: Variations on a Messy Theme, Dordrecht, Netherlands: Springer, 2005, p. 5.
2 Zimmerling, 2005, pp. 15–31.
3 Dennis H. Wrong, Power: Its Forms, Bases, and Uses, New Brunswick, N.J.: Transaction Publishers, 1995, p. viii.
4 Wrong, 1995, pp. ix, 2.
5
a person or group of persons so to affect outcomes that their preferences take precedence over
the preferences of others.”5
In such understandings of power, one party is attempting to shape the behavior of the
other party or achieve some other related end, and power is one way in which it does so; in par-
ticular, the exercise of power involves the intentional employment of specific tools to produce
specific outcomes. Power can rarely be said to be a significant factor outside of a relational con-
text between two or more parties. Even in the sense that a person has power over themselves,
this still involves some presumed relationship between conscious and unconscious motives,
even within the same person.
Beyond that relational aspect, one presumption of many definitions of power is that the
two parties involved have some degree of conflicting interests, although not all scholars adhere
to this. As the scholar Ruth Zimmerling puts it about one leading scholar’s thinking on the
subject, “[Steven] Lukes defends the idea that a negative impact on one of the parties’ interests,
and therefore conflict (if only latent)[,] should be a defining characteristic of power, against the
rival views of [Talcott] Parsons and [Hannah] Arendt whose conceptions emphasize consensus
and the pursuit of collective goods.”6
Perhaps the most traditional understanding of power is as a largely coercive enterprise.
This is often called the first face or first dimension of power, and it essentially involves one party
making a second party do something that it would not otherwise do. This definition presumes
a direct conflict of interests, defined as explicit preferences, and one party’s ability to enforce its
own conception of interests or preferences over the other party’s. The most prominent modern
statement of this view of power is by Robert Dahl, and it has been used as the departure point
by others.7 Harold Lasswell and Abraham Kaplan offered an even more pointed definition,
calling power “a special case of the exercise of influence: it is the process of affecting policies of
others with the help of (actual or threatened) severe deprivations for nonconformity with the
policies intended.”8
Many early conceptions and definitions of power thus focused on the ability of one state
or actor to force another state or actor to do something that it “would not otherwise do.”9 Max
Weber describes power and influence similarly—as the “ability of an individual or group to
achieve their own goals or aims when others are trying to prevent them from realizing them.”10
Elsewhere, he offered the definition that power is “any chance to impose one’s own will in a
social relationship, even against resistance, regardless of what that chance is based on.”11
A different conception of power has been offered in what has become known as the second
face or second dimension. Peter Bachrach and Morton S. Baratz developed this concept. In
many ways, this concept shares the essential assumptions of the first face of power—specifically,
that power emerges in a relationship in which there are conflicting interests and values, and
5 Susan Strange, The Retreat of the State: The Diffusion of Power in the World Economy, Cambridge, United Kingdom:
Cambridge University Press, 1996, p. 17.
6 Zimmerling, 2005, pp. 34–35.
7 Robert A. Dahl, “The Concept of Power,” Behavioral Science, Vol. 2, No. 3, July 1957b.
8 Wrong, 1995, p. 21.
9 Robert A. Dahl, The Concept of Power, New York: Bobbs-Merrill, 1957a, pp. 202–203.
10 Max Weber, The Theory of Social and Economic Organization, New York: Free Press, 1947, p. 152.
11 Zimmerling, 2005, p. 31.
Defining Power and Influence 7
the threat of force of some kind is used by one party to achieve effects in the other. Bachrach
and Baratz suggest that “a power relationship exists when (a) there is a conflict over values or
courses of action between A and B; (b) B complies with A’s wishes; and (c) he does so because
he is fearful that A will deprive him of a value or values which he, B, regards more highly than
those which would have been achieved by noncompliance.”12
This sounds very much like the first, more-coercive face of power, but Bachrach and
Baratz add a more indirect mechanism for achieving those outcomes. They describe ways in
which one party or state can enforce its will through control of the agenda rather than direct
effect on the other party’s actions. This agenda-setting aspect is what differentiates the second
face of power from the first. As they argue, “to the extent that a person or group—consciously
or unconsciously—creates or reinforces barriers to the public airing of policy conflicts, that
person or group has power.”13 It widens the scope of the concept of power from the direct
dyadic relationship to aspects of the broader context or system that can constrain or shape
behavior of the actors. This basic transition, from direct coercive effect on another to ways of
shaping the larger environment to get what one wants, is the critical step in the broadening of
the concept of power. We argue that this broader concept is also essential to understanding the
competitive dynamics between the United States and China and that a strategy for influence
must consider these contextual and systematic sources of power and influence.
Indeed, what has become known as the third face of power, as defined by Lukes, is
grounded in the argument that even the second face of power does not broaden the definition
enough. As Zimmerling has argued, Lukes believes that Bachrach and Baratz “[d]o not go far
enough in their attempt to overcome the shortcomings of the one-dimensional view: there is
still too much individual decision-making and too much visible conflict in their account.” She
continues that, when Lukes breaks from a Weberian understanding of power as the ability to
get someone else to do “something they would not otherwise do,” the key unexplored term in
that phrase is otherwise.14 If an actor can restrict the beliefs and perceptions of another so that
the targeted actor does not even conceive the capacity to take a certain action, stopping it from
doing so no longer requires direct coercion.
The third face of power therefore looks to the realm of ideas and beliefs, as well as such
processes as socialization and internalization, to examine how power can be indirectly wielded.
Dennis Wrong puts the concept slightly differently by treating power as “a highly generalized
capacity to produce effects or outcomes that would not otherwise have occurred.”15 Lukes also
argues that a presumption of conflict is inaccurate: It is possible to wield power in ways that
accord with others’ interests rather than necessarily opposing them. Apart from forcing some-
one else to do something, Lukes explains, one party “also exercises power over [another] by
influencing, shaping or determining his very wants. Indeed, is it not the supreme exercise of
12 Zimmerling, 2005, p. 37. See also Peter Bachrach and Morton S. Baratz, “The Two Faces of Power,” American Political
Science Review, Vol. 56, No. 4, December 1962.
13 Peter Bachrach and Morton S. Baratz, Power and Poverty: Theory and Practice, New York: Oxford University Press, 1970,
p. 8.
14 Zimmerling, 2005, p. 40.
15 Wrong, 1995, p. xx.
power to get another or others to have the desires you want them to have—that is, to secure
their compliance by controlling their thoughts and desires?”16
As a result, Lukes argues that “Power is most effective when least observable.” By the same
token, measuring material stocks of power is inadequate because “having the means of power
is not the same as being powerful.” He argues, “We should search behind appearances for the
hidden, least visible forms of power.”17
The third face of power has everything to do with “the ways in which one actor can
impact . . . another actor’s understanding of their interests.”18 Our analysis of the contest for
influence in a strategic competition, particularly in terms of assessments of the post–World
War II position of the United States, make clear that this distinction is absolutely critical in
understanding the true sources of international power and influence. The United States has
achieved much of what it has since 1945 in precisely the ways that Lukes describes. In some
cases, the United States clearly undertook direct coercion of others to get what it wanted. Much
more commonly, however, the natural echo effects of its dominant economic power and that of
its friends and allies, as well as conscious efforts to shape the global institutional context and
promote specific norms and values, created a larger environment in which states viewed some
actions and outcomes as inherently legitimate and feasible and others as inherently illegitimate
and unfeasible not because of any direct exercise of power but because of these indirect effects
of the larger paradigm.
One of the interesting aspects of power is that there are many ways or techniques of
acquiring and expressing it. Some theories of power remain very narrow and limited in their
understanding of these techniques—in particular, assuming that coercion is the only way for
one actor to influence the actions of another. But the decision of how to build and employ
power is one of the key strategic choices for any state or other actor. Any understanding of
power that is helpful for conceptualizing the current strategic competition must take seriously
this diversity of sources and techniques.
One way to measure the extent of power or its magnitude is to ask about the degree of
conformity that an actor can demand of the target.19 If a state is merely asking another to take
an action that is relatively low cost and uncontroversial among its domestic constituencies,
even if the influencer gets what it wants, this does not necessarily signal a high degree of power.
On the other hand, if the influencer is asking for something that is extraordinarily painful for
the target to do but the target nonetheless does it, that signals a very high degree of power.
This consideration would suggest that the United States and international economic institu-
tions have had very high degrees of power at various points since the 1990s because they have
been able to require many developing countries to enact extremely costly domestic economic
reforms. But it is not yet clear that China’s power has forced other states to make very painful
or challenging behavior changes.
16 Steven Lukes, Power: A Radical View, 2nd ed., New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005, p. 27.
17 Lukes, 2005, pp. 1, 70, 86. This idea is similar to Wrong’s notion of affecting another’s field or environment; see Wrong,
1995, pp. 28–29.
18 Valentina Feklyunina, “Soft Power and Identity: Russia, Ukraine and the ‘Russian World(s),’” European Journal of Inter-
national Relations, Vol. 22, No. 4, 2016, p. 777.
19 Zimmerling, 2005, pp. 51–52.
Types and Categories of Power
More-recent analyses of power tend to emphasize nonmilitary and noncoercive sources. As

explained in one analysis, “Power and influence are derived from more than just coercive
military capabilities, but are exercised through networks of economic, political, and security
interactions involving states as well as non-state actors. Influential states are able to effectively
deploy a broader portfolio of instruments-of-influence to modify the beliefs and/or the behav-
ior of other states.”20
This changing emphasis from military to nonmilitary tactics led to Joseph Nye’s famous
distinction between hard and soft power. The essential basis for the distinction is that “power
resources”—the raw materials of power—do not tell the whole story about power relation-
ships. Nye points to the importance of the second and third faces of power, noting, “I can
also exercise power over you by determining your very wants. I can shape your basic or initial
preferences.”21
Hard power is material power, military or economic, that achieves influence through
direct coercion or reward. Soft power is “an ability to get what you want through attraction
rather than coercion or payment”22 or “the ability to affect others through the co-optive means
of framing the agenda, persuading, and eliciting positive attraction in order to obtain preferred
outcomes.”23 For Nye, soft power has three primary sources: culture, political values, and for-
eign policies.
Nye argues that a critical precondition for exercising soft power is the pursuit of legitimate
policies: Attractive power cannot emerge from a history of illegitimate actions. “Soft power
depends upon credibility,” he argues, “and when governments are perceived as manipulative
and information is seen as propaganda, credibility is destroyed.”24 Nye’s definition also sug-
gests that states have great difficulty employing soft power in the explicit way that they employ
hard power; instead, soft power is a natural outgrowth of a state’s attractiveness. “To convert
soft power resources and tools into outcomes,” he argues, “requires the critical ability to create
in the target perceptions of such qualities as benignity, competence, and charisma.”25
One implication of soft power is that it is meant to be attractive and indirect. The use of
direct economic coercion is not, therefore, a form of soft power and indeed would potentially
risk the exercise of soft power in the targeted country by creating resentment and backlash.
Some analysts have referred to a related form of power termed sharp power, which has
typically been defined as the use by authoritarian states of tools that interfere in another soci-
ety’s functioning to promote favored narratives, cause disruption, or achieve other goals.26
Another useful distinction in discussions of power is between coercive and legiti-
mate power or authority. Both involve degrees of implied demand, but the coercive variety
involves “cowing others into compliance,” whereas legitimate authority involves some degree
20 Moyer et al., 2018, p. 4.

21 Joseph S. Nye, Jr., The Future of Power, New York: Public Affairs Books, 2011, pp. 9, 13.
22 Joseph S. Nye, Jr., Soft Power: The Means to Success in World Politics, New York: Public Affairs, 2004, p. 6.
23 Nye, 2011, p. 21.
24 Nye, 2011, p. 83.
25 Nye, 2011, p. 100.
26 See, for example, Christopher Walker, “What Is Sharp Power?” Journal of Democracy, Vol. 29, No. 3, July 2018.
of consent—an agreement that the state has an accepted position to set rules of the game. It
is a “power relation in which the power holder possesses an acknowledged right to command
and the power subject an acknowledged obligation to obey.”27 This right to command comes,
in part, from shared norms; legitimate authority typically is based on situations in which the
parties have partly overlapping interests and find that certain norms are of mutual benefit.
Dennis Wrong argues that, in stable political orders, coercive power becomes transformed
into legitimate authority.28 The importance of legitimate authority to major powers is a key
theme in recent international relations scholarship. To be legitimate, authorities are required to
exercise power in a sustainable and affordable way. As Wrong puts it, “there are psychological
pressures from both sides of the power relation to convert coercive into legitimate authority.”29
This concept arguably throws important light on sources of U.S. power since the end of World
War II: It is precisely because the United States has exercised a form of legitimate authority as
opposed to coercive power that the U.S. role has not generated balancing.
Power in International Relations
The literature on international relations also provides many treatments of power relation-
ships, although there is no simple or agreed definition.30 Perhaps the most straightforward
view comes from modern variants of realism, in which power is the essential objective in world
politics. Many varieties of realism equate power with the material resources of a state—and,
in some cases, explicitly with its political-military power.31 This approach guides the construc-
tion of most indexes of national power, which rely primarily on indicators of material power.32
Other variants of realism, including that of Hans Morgenthau, incorporate other foundations
of power, such as “national character, popular morale, and the quality of leadership.”33
Indeed, nonmaterial factors—such as personality, perception, reputation, pride, and
identity—were part of international relations analysis long before modern realism, from
Thucydides in ancient Greece through Morgenthau in the 20th century. International rela-
tions scholars have discussed many ways in which such nonmaterial factors form part of both a
27 Wrong, 1995, pp. 41, 49.

28 Wrong, 1995, p. 86.
29 Wrong, 1995, pp. 103–113.
30
Michael Barnett and Raymond Duvall, “Power in International Politics,” International Organization, Vol. 59, No. 1,
2005, p. 39.
31 John Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics, New York: W. W. Norton, 2001, p. 57.
32 See, for example, Hua Liao, Weihua Dong, Huiping Liu, and Yuejing Ge, “Towards Measuring and Visualizing Sus-
tainable National Power—A Case Study of China and Neighboring Countries,” International Journal of Geo-Information,
Vol. 4, No. 3, 2015; Ashley J. Tellis, Janice Bially, Christopher Layne, and Melissa McPherson, Measuring National Power in
the Postindustrial Age, Santa Monica, Calif.: RAND Corporation, MR-1110-A, 2000; Paul M. Kennedy, The Rise and Fall of
British Naval Mastery, London: Ashfield Press, 1983, pp. 264–265, 337–340; Norman Z. Alcock and Alan G. N ewcombe,
“The Perception of National Power,” Journal of Conflict Resolution, Vol. 14, No. 3, 1970; Gregory F. Treverton and Seth G.
Jones, Measuring National Power, Santa Monica, Calif.: RAND Corporation, CF-215, 2005; Erich Weede, “China and
Russia: On the Rise and Decline of Two Nations,” International Interactions, Vol. 29, No. 4, 2003; and F. C. German, “A
Tentative Evaluation of World Power,” Journal of Conflict Resolution, Vol. 4, No. 1, 1960.
33 Simon Reich and Richard Ned Lebow, Good-Bye Hegemony! Power and Influence in the Global System, Princeton, N.J.:
Princeton University Press, 2014, p. 28.
nation’s objective power and its perceived power. Perception is especially important: A signifi-
cant theme in recent studies is that power is a highly perceptual factor; it exists to the degree
that others perceive that it exists. Taken to its logical conclusion, this emphasis points to a
highly sociological conception of power—as the ability to rally support to narratives or shared
meanings.34
Some scholars contend that, as Klaus Knorr put it, “Power arises from an asymmetrical
independence.”35 This argument has been developed especially in terms of trade: When one
party depends more on an economic relationship than another party does, that asymmetrical
tie offers power to the side that is less dependent. The substantial literature on interdependence
that emerged beginning in the 1970s, and especially with the publication of Robert Keohane
and Joseph Nye’s Power and Interdependence, addresses the relationship between power and
trade dependence. Later generations of work on interdependence focus on its relationship to
the incidence of war, but works on the original approach examine whether such dependence
represents a usable form of power (and influence). In a 1945 book, Albert Hirschman argues
strongly that it does, stating that “the influence effect of foreign trade” arises when one party
is more desperate to sustain a bilateral trading relationship.36
Subsequent research suggests, however, that the connection between interdependence and
power is not always straightforward. Most generally, objective measures of potential power, such
as the materiel strength of a nation, do not always correlate reliably with achieving intended
outcomes.37 As Susan Strange explains, “enormous capability is not always translated into
power over outcomes.”38 In one analysis from bargaining theory, R. Harrison Wagner argues
that an asymmetrical economic relationship will produce leverage only when “the exchange
of economic resources for political concessions make[s] both parties to a relationship better
off than they would be if they bargained over the distribution of the gains from the economic
relationship alone.”39 The issue is not just potential economic power; there must also be specific
situations in which the parties can “trade economic resources for political concessions.”40 Quite
simply, political factors on one or both sides may obstruct the relationship between asymmetri-
cal power and outcomes.
One important 2016 argument points out that power, especially soft power, is likely to
be employed more effectively when the two states involved have some degree of shared iden-
tity. “Actor B’s interpretation of their interests,” Valentina Feklyunina argues, “is likely to
be more compatible with actor A’s interests if there is a compatibility between their socially
34 Alister Miskimmon, Ben O’Loughlin, and Laura Roselle, Strategic Narratives: Communication Power and the New World
Order, London: Routledge, 2013.
35 Klaus Knorr, “International Economic Leverage and Its Uses,” in Klaus Knorr and Frank N. Trager, eds., Economic Issues
and National Security, Lawrence, Kan.: University Press of Kansas, 1977, p. 102.
36 Albert Hirschman, National Power and the Structure of Foreign Trade, Berkeley, Calif.: University of California Press,
1945, p. 17.
37 See, for example, Bruce Russett, “The Mysterious Case of Vanishing Hegemony; Or, Is Mark Twain Really Dead?”
International Organization, Vol. 39, No. 2, 1985; and Susan Strange, “The Persistent Myth of Lost Hegemony,” Interna-
tional Organization, Vol. 41, No. 4, 1987, pp. 553–554.
38 Strange, 1996, pp. 18–19.
39 R. Harrison Wagner, “Economic Interdependence, Bargaining Power, and Political Influence,” International Organiza-
tion, Vol. 42, No. 3, Summer 1988, p. 462.
40 Wagner, 1988, p. 473.
constructed identities.” Soft power, she suggests, is more likely “to be present in a relationship
between actors who broadly see themselves as part of the same socially constructed reality.”
She concludes, “We can expect that the weight of state A’s soft power will be greatest when
its collective identity narrative is accepted, to one extent or another, in all major identity dis-
courses in state B.”41
Concepts and Definitions: Influence
Although the aforementioned definitions of power and related concepts helped frame the anal-
ysis in this report, the true subject of our analysis is not power but rather the even more abstract
concept of influence. In searching for existing definitions and interpretations of influence, we
found that the term is undertheorized, ill-defined, and often employed in vague and imprecise
ways. Thus, developing a precise understanding of the concept is essential to assess the status
of the competition in this area. Zimmerling argues, “Although the unproblematic use of the
term influence in ordinary language suggests that there must be some shared understanding of
its meaning, this common core is hard to pin down with any degree of precision.”42
Basic dictionary definitions offer an essential idea that influence is about having some
effect on others. As Lexico puts it, influence is the “capacity to have an effect on the character,
development, or behavior of someone or something, or the effect itself.”43 The Cambridge Dic-
tionary similarly states that influence is “the power to have an effect on people or things, or a
person or thing that is able to do this.”44 Many definitions very explicitly note that influence
involves achieving effects without force and often indirectly. For example, Merriam-Webster
refers to the concept as “the power or capacity of causing an effect in indirect or intangible
ways” and as “the act or power of producing an effect without apparent exertion of force or
direct exercise of command.”45
In addition to exploring these basic definitions, we sought definitions that distinguish
influence from power. As noted earlier, many scholars simply treat the two terms as effectively
equivalent. Some other scholars look at one as a subset of the other.46 In such approaches, influ-
ence is typically viewed as the broader concept and power as a more direct, coercive subset
of influence. That is, power is influence using the threat of sanction, some contend. Other
approaches treat the terms as related but distinct elements of a causal chain. For example, some
41 Feklyunina, 2016, pp. 777, 780.

42 Zimmerling, 2005, p. 4. For a nonscholarly treatment on influence, see Robert B. Cialdini, Influence: The Psychology of
Persuasion, New York: HarperCollins, 1984.
43 Lexico, “Influence,” webpage, undated.
44 Cambridge Dictionary, “Influence,” webpage, undated. Dictionary.com similarly suggests that influence is “the capac-
ity or power of persons or things to be a compelling force on or produce effects on the actions, behavior, opinions, etc., of
others” (Dictionary.com, “Influence,” webpage, undated).
45 Merriam-Webster, “Influence,” webpage, undated.
46 Wrong, 1995, pp. ix–xi, notes that power is often used “as a near-synonym for influence, control, rule, and domination,”
which are, in fact, very different concepts; later, he refers to influence as a “weaker, blander” term than power is. Wrong
suggests that influence is a “more all-embracing concept” and contends that the employment of power is distinguished by
“intentionality.”
scholars argue that influence is the practical result of power being exercised. In this sense,
influence is the actualization of power.47
One of the interesting questions in this definitional dialogue is whether influence can
exist without power. As Zimmerling rightly explains, arguments that “there can . . . be no
influence without power” seem to miss cases in which an actor can have extraordinary influ-
ence without any traditional form of power. Thought leaders, for example, have no direct
ability to make others do anything, yet their ideas can have tremendous influence all over the
world. Thus, if we are interested in behavioral outcomes, we have to take seriously sources of
influence well beyond the sorts of actors that traditionally wield power.
Earlier, we discussed the nonmilitary or nonmaterial factors of power, and nonmate-
rial aspects are even more important for influence. As Simon Reich and Richard Ned Lebow
argue, one “conceptual confusion of realism stems from its tendency to conflate power and
influence in order to reduce both, as far as possible, to material capabilities. . . . This orienta-
tion attempts to reduce politics to a technical problem, in keeping with a long-standing and
broader American tradition.” The authors further contend that power is demonstrably distinct
from influence, in part, because “the translation of power into influence is far from automatic.”
Such efforts can be very expensive, they note, and often fail. Israel, for example, “continually
flouts the U.S. administration’s wishes.”48
Reich and Lebow particularly emphasize the significance of persuasion—that is, “efforts
to convince others that it is in their interest to do what you want them to do”—as the most
important and effective form of influence. Persuaded people or groups are willing to support
goals and actions without the degree of backlash common to coercion. The authors describe
particular aspects of successful persuasive strategies as follows:
Material capabilities can be critical, but so is the wise choice of goals and political skill
in the form of coalition building and maintenance. Persuasion is greatly assisted by past
successes in cooperation and leadership, which create a degree of trust and propensity to
cooperate again. Of equal importance, cooperation helps to build shared, if not common,
identities that make cooperation and persuasion more likely in the future.49
Persuasion, they conclude, “ultimately rests on the notion of legitimacy,” which underpins the
perceived authority of persuasion.50
Zimmerling attempts to resolve this definitional confusion between power and influ-
ence by offering the following: She defines social power as “the ability to get desired outcomes
by making others do what one wants, i.e., by somehow (no matter how) imposing one’s own
preferences on them.” And she defines social influence as “the ‘ability’ to affect others’ beliefs,
that is, their knowledge or opinions either about what is or about what ought to be the case,
about what is (empirically) true or false or what is (normatively) right or wrong, good or bad,
desirable or undesirable.”51
47 Zimmerling, 2005, pp. 105–109, 122–123, 127–128.

48 Reich and Lebow, 2014, pp. 31, 34–35.
49 Reich and Lebow, 2014, p. 35.
50 Reich and Lebow, 2014, p. 36.
51 Zimmerling, 2005, p. 141.
One of the helpful aspects of these definitions, an aspect that Zimmerling investigates in
some detail, is that they emphasize the critical importance of the relationship among beliefs,
preferences, and behavior. As much social science theory has shown, the relationships among
these factors are complex and contingent. But in trying to exercise power and influence, a state
must develop a theory of how beliefs, preferences, and behavior relate to one another and how
the state is trying to use each component to affect the others to achieve a desired outcome. For
example, as China seeks to exercise influence in Asia, how does it balance emphasis between
beliefs and simple incentive-based behavior? Do senior Chinese officials believe that they must
shape beliefs, or is their theory of power and influence based largely on shaping other coun-
tries’ incentives in a case-specific, short-term, and transactional manner?
As suggested earlier, this is one of the fundamental questions that the United States must
consider when thinking about the strategic competition for influence today. In recent decades,
the United States’ dominant competitive advantage in influence-seeking has been its complete
hegemony over most of the longer-term, normative influences on preferences and therefore on
behavior. It is possible that China could gain much more-significant influence in short-term
transactional ways without significantly undermining this fundamental paradigmatic advan-
tage for the United States. But the evidence on this score is highly incomplete, and it is not
clear whether there is a tipping point at which the accumulation of merely incentive-based
transactional influence can fundamentally disrupt an existing normative order that is exercis-
ing longer-term influence over preferences and behavior.
Existing Literature on Influence

Foreign Bilateral Influence Capacity Index
One of the most well-developed existing indexes of influence is the FBIC Index developed by
Jonathan D. Moyer and colleagues in 2018. They sought to develop a foreign influence index
partly because of the absence of an agreed concept. As they explain in their report,
Conspicuously absent in popular and scholarly debates is an understanding of what inter-

national influence is. Beyond anecdotal evidence or broad-brushed descriptions of the util-
ity of ‘soft,’ ‘smart’ or ‘civilian’ power, there is simply neither a clear concept nor a system-
atic measurement of international influence derived from relational dependence.52
The Moyer study differs from our approach in an important respect. The FBIC Index is
designed to produce an annual measurement of potential international influence wielded by
each state. It is not an explicit assessment of dyadic influence relationships but rather a gen-
eralized study on the shares of global influence held by important countries. However, the
indicators used are bilateral and dyadic and thus can contribute to analysis of those types of
relationships.
An important aspect of the Moyer study’s treatment of influence is the focus on what the
authors term potential influence. As they conclude, “the concept of influence is best expressed
in terms of state A’s potential capacity to influence state B rather than through the analysis of
52 Moyer et al., 2018, p. 4.

actual outcomes.”53 That is to say, that study is concerned with uncovering sources of potential
influence rather than describing a process by which influence produces specific results. In this
sense, it represents a very helpful but self-consciously limited study of the inputs to influence
rather than a more comprehensive model of the process of influence development in specific
countries. In part, the authors take this approach because, as they argue, outcomes can be
the result of many factors, and sometimes efforts to achieve influence can produce unantici-
pated and even undesired change. Thus, they recognize that the causal process of influence is
extremely difficult to fully delineate and even more difficult to forecast.54
Moyer and colleagues proposed a specific relationship between power and influence,
partly based on this focus on potential influence. The study “conceptualizes influence as a
force that transforms into power when actor A actively (and successfully) utilizes it to modify
the behavior of actor B.”55
Based on this understanding, the FBIC Index employees two broad categories of indica-
tors to generate its overall measures. One category is bandwidth—the total size of an economic
or political relationship between two countries. The other is dependence—the degree to which
one side or the other depends on economic or military relationships for its well-being. Table 2.1
lists the variables that the FBIC Index uses to produce its overall numbers, as well as the
weights for those variables. The index applies the relative level of importance to each variable,
which then shapes the final numbers in the index. For example, among the bandwidth com-
ponents, the index gives the largest weight to total trade between the countries, at 35 percent,
compared with total arms transfers, weighted at 8 percent. The values for these weights can be
argued—for example, giving shared intergovernmental membership more value than military
alliances seems to us an odd choice—but the weights provide transparency into how the final
index measures are developed.
Table 2.1
Variables Used in the Foreign Bilateral Influence Capacity Index
Bandwidth Dependence
Variable Weight (%) Variable Weight (%)
Total trade 35 Total trade as % of GDP 28
Intergovernmental membership 19 Aid as a % of GDP 21
Trade agreements 14 Total trade as % of trade with state B 16
Military alliances 13 Arms imports as % of arms imports with state B 13
Level of political representation 11 Aid as % of aid with state B 12
Total arms transfers 8 Arms imports as a % of military stock with state B 10
SOURCE: Moyer et al., 2018, pp. 9–10.
53 Moyer et al., 2018, p. 7.

54 This fact does raise concerns with the overall results of that study. If the true sources of influence are unknown, there is
no basis to understand which indicators to include in the index—and, even more so, no basis to assign relative weights of
importance. In other words, the relative importance of a military alliance versus total trade may be dramatically different
between two countries—yet the FBIC Index assigns these variables the same weights for all of its focus countries.
55 Moyer et al., 2018, p. 6.
Using the variables and weights identified in Table 2.1, the authors applied the influ-
ence index, which produced interesting findings about the distribution of global influence
over time. In the FBIC calculations, the United States was the most influential country in
the world, but its proportion of global influence had shrunk, from more than 25 percent in
1963 to just more than 11 percent in 2016. Meanwhile, China, which was not even in the top
ten global influencers through 2000, jumped to fourth place in 2016. Another interesting
trend was the dispersion of influence: In 1963, the top three influencers held more than half
of global influence. By 2016, that proportion had fallen by half. And, following the United
States’ 11-percent share in 2016, there were seven other countries with shares of between 4 and
8.6 percent of global influence. Furthermore, the FBIC Index indicated that Russia’s influence
has declined significantly since 2000.
As mentioned, Moyer and colleagues recognize that the causal process of influence is
extremely difficult to predict, so they did not attempt to create a comprehensive model of the
process of influence development in specific countries. Their concerns are valid, but under-
standing the potential inputs to influence gets a decisionmaker only so far. In trying to under-
stand the competition with China for influence across the world, the United States needs to
know a good deal about potential inputs, but it must also have a more comprehensive sense
of the causal processes involved. We know that, when it comes to influence, the relationship
between inputs and outputs is anything but linear. In many cases, if influence were measured
solely by inputs, the United States ought to have had very significant influence in states where,
in practice, its ability to shape outcomes has been strictly limited. Therefore, we have tried to
assemble a framework that ties together inputs and outputs, as well as the intervening factors
that help determine the relationship between the two. That causal dynamic is entirely con-
tingent on the circumstances in specific countries. No generalized theory of the relationship
between particular inputs and particular outputs is likely to be valid, but, with the analysis
in this report, decisionmakers can have a better understanding of the landscape of variables
involved and some historically informed insights about how some of those variables tend to
interact.
Theory of Change
Another approach to understanding the generation of influence is the effort by Samantha
Custer and colleagues at the College of William and Mary’s AidData research lab to build a
“theory of change” to capture the effects of Chinese public diplomacy activities. The authors’
theory suggests that, by developing influence over specific behaviors and policy outcomes via
public diplomacy, China aims to create what the authors term a good-neighbor effect, which is a
combination of (1) favorable public opinion about China and (2) the alignment of leaders and
elites with China’s foreign policy goals. The authors begin with a hypothesis of a linear rela-
tionship: Intensified public diplomacy activities ought to boost good-neighbor scores.56
What we find interesting about Custer and colleagues’ general approach to influence
is the theory of change that they lay out. The theory begins with inputs—that is, resources
applied (in the public diplomacy sphere) to people, communication channels, networks,
and other tools. These investments then create activities—exchange programs, information
56 Samantha Custer, Brooke Russell, Matthew DiLorenzo, Mengfan Cheng, Siddhartha Ghose, Jacob Sims, Jennifer
Turner, and Harsh Desai, Ties That Bind: Quantifying China’s Public Diplomacy and Its “Good Neighbor” Effect, Williams-
burg, Va.: AidData at William and Mary, 2018, pp. 1–2.
channels—designed to produce “short-term, direct results.” Those results include awareness (of
China’s positions), interactions, greater understanding, attraction (interest in the people and
culture of China), and value-based enticement (targeted countries get value from the interac-
tions). From there, those outputs produce outcomes—support for Chinese positions, adoption
of Chinese values and beliefs, co-optation of elites, and collaboration on specific issues. Finally,
the outcomes result in impacts that China desires—for example, the targeted country’s inter-
ests better aligning with China’s interests, behavior that matches Chinese objectives.57
The resulting analysis from Custer and colleagues provides a very useful way of conceptu-
alizing how investments in influence eventually make their way into states’ behavioral changes.
However, it is important to stress that this causal chain remains a hypothesis or theory. There
is no empirical data suggesting this specific causal relationship, and, in many cases, it appears
that the route from inputs to outcomes and eventually impact can involve jumping around
among many different factors rather than building in a linear way from A to B. Nonetheless,
this approach is enormously helpful in providing a set of potential variables to consider when
building a theory of influence.
Theoretical Review: Lessons and Implications
Our review of the theoretical and empirical literature on power and influence offers several
lessons:
• Influence can be both direct, open, and coercive or indirect, ideational, and implicit. It is
not yet clear which form carries more weight in the long term.
• Direct coercion tends to generate resentment and backlash and appears to have limits as
an ongoing strategy for influence.
• The input variables affecting influence, and their relative importance, are likely to differ
greatly from one case to another.
• Interdependence, or even a largely one-way relationship of dependence, can have complex
and sometimes counterintuitive implications for the degree of influence held by the stron-
ger state in the dyad. Sometimes, profound dependence can produce resentment and lead
to rejectionist behavior by the focus country.
These lessons add up to one profound overarching conclusion: Having high levels of
inputs for potential influence (e.g., alliance memberships, ownership of debt, military aid, lan-
guage prevalence) does not necessarily provide the influencer state with unquestioned control
over targeted countries. The route from potential to actual influence is complex, rocky, strewn
with land mines, and anything but straight or linear. In assessing the degree of emerging Chi-
nese influence in many countries, it is critical not to draw simplistic linear conclusions from
the levels of particular inputs.
57 Custer et al., 2018, p. 5.

CHAPTER THREE
Framework for Assessing Chinese Influence
In this chapter, we discuss the framework we developed to summarize and explain Chinese
influence efforts. The framework is based on our review of the related literature (outlined in
the previous chapter), our discussions with U.S. State Department officials who have closely
observed Chinese influence campaigns, our review of China’s official statements regarding its
own influence campaigns, and an earlier analysis of overlapping U.S. and Chinese interests
and goals.
Framework Components and Variables
The framework has three essential parts: inputs, intervening factors, and outputs. Inputs are
the raw material of power and influence, including the steps and actions that China takes
to attempt to increase its influence over other countries. Intervening factors then determine
whether and when those inputs have the desired effect on outputs—the ultimate policies, posi-
tions, or actions that China is seeking to affect or achieve in a targeted state.
The separation of inputs, intervening factors, and outputs in our framework is crucial.
As described in Chapter Two, some influence analyses simply measure Chinese inputs, such as
trade flows and investments. But after analysis of all three parts of the framework, our research
strongly suggests that it is the intervening factors—typically connected to political, economic,
social, cultural, and informational dynamics in the focus country—that play a decisive role in
determining the degree of influence that an outside actor will have.1
In some cases, intervening factors—such as the number of elites or government officials
the outside power can persuade, coerce, or tempt into supporting its interests—can acceler-
ate the influence-seeking process. In other cases, such as in strong national or local regulatory
regimes, intervening factors can impede that process. One of the dominant findings of our
analysis is that any effort to understand Chinese influence-seeking must consider the role of
intervening factors. The character of the outcomes sought also plays a role in the likelihood
that they will be achieved. For instance, asking a country to end its diplomatic recognition of
Taiwan is an entirely different prospect from demanding that a country end an alliance rela-
tionship with the United States. Thus, some combinations of inputs and intervening factors
will be enough to achieve some policy outputs but not others.
1 As Michael Barnett and Raymond Duvall put it, a framework to understand power in international relations must take
account of “the kinds of social relations through which power works; and the specificity of social relations through which
effects on actors’ capacities are produced” (Barnett and Duvall, 2005, p. 42).
19
Our framework for conceptualizing influence is shown in Figure 3.1, where, beneath
each of the three components of the framework, we also provide the initial set of variables on
which we gathered data for this analysis.
As shown in Figure 3.1, we divided Chinese inputs into categories, such as economic,
security, diplomatic, and informational. When developing this framework, we identified
another way to categorize the inputs by dividing them based on the degree of directness of
Figure 3.1
Framework for Conceptualizing Influence
Inputs: activities that might be influential Intervening factors: conditions Outputs: goals the
governing the degree of influence influencer is attempting
Economic
to achieve in the
• Trade: Total, % of targeted state GDP, trade Shared values and cultural experiences
• Trade agreements and treaties
targeted state
• Regime type
• Economic aid and % of GDP and of total • Bilateral history of relationship (discord or • Policy or strategy change
• FDI and % of GDP and of total friendship) demanded
• Short-term capital flows • National policies related to shared values • Political cost imposed on
• Ownership of debt (e.g., human rights) the targeted government
• Role in strategic sectors and industries • Public opinion in the targeted country • Economic cost imposed on
• % of tourists in targeted state toward the influencer country the targeted state
• Threats of cuts to trade: boycotts, investment • Overlapping political culture • Shift in public opinion
cuts, sanctions; limits to market access • Popular culture ties toward China
• Language ties
Security
• Shared threats and interests Common interests, purposes,
• Military alliance with targeted state or perceived threats
• Military threats against targeted state • History of alignment or contestation
• Arms transfers and % of total • Identity narratives
• Security aid and % of total • Active territorial disputes
• Security cooperation programs • Views on major security issues
• Economic interests
Diplomatic
• Attitudes (popular and official) on whether
• Diplomatic representation
China’s power is a threat or benefit to the
• Membership in shared international
targeted state
organizations
Implicit societal influence, or soft power
Informational
• Credibility of the influencer’s promises
• Media and propaganda
or threats
• Cyber tools for attack or manipulation
Mastery of the local context in the
Intelligence and Clandestine Activity
targeted state
• Covert or clandestine operations: funding
• Degree of the influencer’s effective
political parties, bribery, extortion, direct
collective mobilization (e.g., diplomatic
action
• Intelligence-gathering on or around target
representation, United Front Work
Department activities)
Cultural
Vulnerability of the targeted state
• Historical and cultural ties, language
prevalence to outside influence
• Music, film, and literature prevalence in • Degree of corruption in the political system
targeted state • Role of elites in supporting Chinese
influence
People-to-People • Measures undertaken to protect the
• Exchanges of personnel political system from foreign influence
• Student exchanges
Domestic and international context
Normative Factors • Current global economic and political
• Inherent attractiveness of the national model context
• Legitimation strategies • Political and economic condition of the
• Value alignment targeted country (stable or unstable, in
crisis or a period of strength)
• Internal ethnic and societal stresses
NOTE: The variables in this figure were derived from the literature on power and influence, studies of current
Chinese influence-seeking, and case studies of Chinese influence in specific countries, as described in this report.
FDI = foreign direct investment.
Framework for Assessing Chinese Influence 21
the Chinese action involved (not shown in the figure). This distinction may be important for
analysts and policymakers because it may shape the options available to the United States when
trying to counter China’s efforts.
In this alternative categorization of inputs, or Chinese activities, we distinguish three
types. The first type, public power, is direct coercive activity designed to achieve a specific
result. Such activities can range from efforts to force a rival claimant out of contested territory to
punishments designed to deter unwanted behavior in the future.2 Activities in this category are
close to traditional definitions of the first face of power—direct coercion or reward to change
behavior. We examine many of these Chinese efforts in brief case studies later in this report.
The second type of input, private power, involves more-personal, long-term campaigns to
influence outcomes by gaining leverage with specific individuals and interest groups in the tar-
geted society. These activities still represent a form of power as traditionally understood—the
direct, intentional effort to change the behavior of another.
The third, wider category of inputs, which we term generalized influence, involves China’s
efforts to build more-abstract forms of credibility, legitimacy, and thus influence by construct-
ing economic networks, investing in rival international institutions, providing aid and invest-
ment, and conducting elaborate cultural and ideological outreach. With activities in this third
category, China still aims to underwrite influence in the targeted country. For example, if
most of that country’s elites can be recruited to believe that China’s development model offers
their country the best path forward, that will have important effects on the competition for
influence even though China is not necessarily exercising direct actions to produce specific
outcomes. These categories are summarized in Table 3.1.
These three categories of inputs reflect the importance of the direct versus indirect types
of power and influence described in the literature review in Chapter Two. Each category must
be assessed to gain a comprehensive view of any influence competition, and U.S. efforts to
counter these activities are likely to vary by category. As noted earlier, both public and private
power involve the direct and intentional use of threats or promises to affect behavior and poli-
cies. But public power represents the classic form of state-to-state power plays—threatening
consequences or offering benefits to other governments, often very publicly, to share policies.
Private power activities are direct but involve the clandestine manipulation of levers of influ-
ence within the targeted country.3 Generalized influence activities are indirect. Our examina-
tion of the current contest for influence therefore focuses on assessing Chinese progress, as well
as the state of the overall influence competition, in these three categories of inputs.
2 These distinctions also have much in common with Wrong’s tripartite approach to power—force, manipulation, and
persuasion (see Wrong, 1995, pp. 21–34.
3 In this sense, it has much in common with Dennis Wrong’s category of “manipulation,” which he defines as trying to
shape another’s “field” by “acting on information, rewards, and deprivations” (Wrong, 1995, p. 28).
Table 3.1
Forms of Chinese Inputs for Influence
Input Type Definition General Examples Recent Chinese Casesa
Public power The direct, intentional, and • Threats of military force • Salmon boycott targeted
open employment of tools of to deter conflict or force at Norway
statecraft directed at other a rival to back down • Closure of borders with
states to affect specific policies • Offers of economic aid Mongolia
or decisions through coercion or in exchange for policy • Economic penalties
reward changes imposed on South Korea
• Threats of economic
sanctions to change
policies
Private The direct, intentional, but • Bribes of senior officials • Cambodia election
power private or clandestine use • Interventions in foreign interference
of threats or rewards to election processes • Sri Lanka bribery and
manipulate the views or actions • Payments to election issues
of specific individuals to shape researchers, scholars, • Engagement of
policies or decisions of other and nongovernmental Indonesian economic
states organizations interests
• Engagements with • Investments in Africa
specific interest groups in aimed to create individual
the targeted country leverage
Generalized The indirect shaping of beliefs, • Investments in exchange • Confucius Institutesb

influence views, or preferences of others programs or cultural • Expanded media presence
through one’s own general centers • Investment in major
policies, outreach, or other • The success and motion pictures
actions unrelated to a specific attractiveness of one’s • Training of foreign
desired output system economic officials
• Efforts to build a global
economic order that
generates support for
one’s values
a See Chapter Seven for details.
b Confucius Institutes are educational outposts found at colleges and universities around the world. They are
funded by the Chinese government and promote pro-Beijing positions and research while offering classes on
Chinese language and culture.
Going back to Figure 3.1, the variables for the second component of the framework,
intervening factors, reflect the conditions governing the degree of influence over the targeted
state. These variables are as follows:
• Shared values and cultural experiences, which create a predisposition to agree in the absence
of countervailing factors. For the United States, examples of this variable include shared
democratic values with key allies and a shared historical experience of war with Europe,
South Korea, and Australia.
• Common interests, purposes, or perceived threats, both general and specific, which estab-
lish a basis to persuade the target of influence that a course of action is in its interests.
Examples include common interests in a stable economic order and shared perceptions,
especially with many Asian countries, of a threat perception from China.
• Implicit societal influence, or soft power. In Nye’s classic understanding, a country’s soft
power rests on the attractiveness of its sociopolitical model and cultural values.
• Mastery of the local context in the targeted state, including detailed understanding of the
sinews of power and influence.
Framework for Assessing Chinese Influence 23
• Vulnerability of the targeted state to outside influence, including measures of corruption and
the role of foreign communities and political influence.
• The domestic and international context, which can provide factors either supportive or
destructive of influence. An economic crisis, for example, could increase leverage in
resolving international financial issues because it highlights common interests in a stable
outcome.
These types of intervening factors show the complex nature of determining how Chinese
efforts to achieve influence (or inputs) may or may not be translated into changes in the tar-
geted state’s behavior (or outputs). The targeted state’s willingness to go along with Chinese
pressure, or to resist it, will be determined not only by the nature of the current and prior rela-
tionship between the targeted state and China but also how skillfully China is able to apply
its pressure to key actors and stakeholders in the targeted country, as well as the attitudes of
third parties and other trends or events taking place in the international system at the time.
Although the intervening factors described in Figure 3.1 are not exhaustive, they are illustrative
of the complexity involved in translating influence inputs to outputs, and they show how and
why it is inadequate to measure only inputs when attempting to quantify Chinese influence.
Methodological Challenges to Measuring Influence
Notwithstanding the complexities of our proposed framework and the acknowledged difficul-
ties we have in providing a simple answer to the question of how much influence China has in
particular countries, we believe that the approach we have laid out, or one similar to it, is the
most accurate and realistic way to approach this effort. More-simplistic or more-quantitative
efforts would suffer from substantial methodological shortcomings. For example, it would
be too simplistic to think of this competition as a zero-sum contest for a singular measurable
good. In fact, influence is a complex, multifaceted phenomenon that cannot be reduced to one
or even a few factors. Any such study would risk producing misleading findings: What can
be counted is not always what is most important, and some index approaches can hide many
assumptions in a model of how several measurements sum to an overall number. Any effort to
measure Chinese influence requires dealing with multiple methodological challenges:
• The main variables at stake—power, influence, coercion, and others—remain disputed

and, in some cases, poorly conceptualized.
• Reliable, comprehensive data are difficult to obtain in many categories.
• Some of the best-counted things, such as United Nations (UN) votes, are least indicative
of true alignment.
• Variables chosen as proxies for qualitative factors are often highly imperfect representa-
tions of the factor we are trying to assess.
• Some apparently important Chinese goals (e.g., getting focus countries to rescind recog-
nition of Taiwan as a sovereign entity) are not good indicators of overall degrees of influ-
ence, because they represent low-cost actions for the focus countries.
• The U.S. geopolitical experience is that theoretical inputs to influence often exagger-
ate real power. Dependency, for example, does not necessarily equal influence (and can
become reverse leverage).
• China’s relative rise in economic heft means that its influence will be growing, so the key
is to distinguish the expected from the threatening.
• Most countries are determined to hedge in the U.S.-China competition, so decisive pat-
terns often will be hard to see.
• Distinguishing systemic and permanent positions from personality-dependent, regime-
dependent, temporary trends (such as opinion toward a specific country at a certain
moment in time) can be difficult or even impossible.
• The true causal process from input to output is hugely complex and dependent on many
variables internal to the targeted country; in other words, influence is very context-
dependent.
Because of these methodological challenges, a purely quantitative analysis using measur-

able inputs can go only so far in conveying the true scale and degree of influence that China
or any other state may be acquiring.
To address these concerns, we made several conscious choices in our approach to assess-
ing influence. For instance, this analysis is not designed to produce single-point, summative
assessments of the competition for influence. As Nye argues, “Any attempt to develop a single
index of power is doomed to fail because power depends upon human relationships that vary
in different contexts.”4 Thus, different factors will be decisive in different contexts and at dif-
ferent moments. Specific indicators can be combined, but adding various factors together to
suggest where the United States and China stand—either in a specific country or globally—on
some measurable spectrum of influence is not something the analysis can support. In some
cases, we developed an index, such as the compatibility index or the alignment index, to give
an imperfect but useful sense of a specific sub-variable, but these cannot be rolled up into one
universal measurement or model.
Instead, we used an approach common to many RAND studies that assess large qualita-
tive questions with analysis grounded in many indicators; the approach is diverse and gains
traction on the larger issue through many discrete lenses. In this study, our goal is to shed
useful light on the competition for influence and offer findings that can shape policy responses.
We do this by examining many factors relevant to the influence competition—through the
three framework components of inputs, intervening factors, and outputs—and comparing
their various messages. In the following chapters, we describe our assessments of each of these
components.
4 Nye, 2011, p. 5.
CHAPTER FOUR
Measuring Chinese Influence: Inputs
As noted in our discussion of the framework in Chapter Three, we divided the variables that
affect Chinese influence into inputs, intervening factors, and outputs. In some cases, a given
variable could conceivably belong in more than one of these categories. For example, China’s
activities to affect public opinion, such as its significant investments to engage the elites in all
20 of our focus countries, must be counted as inputs. But the resulting views of those elites
can be both an intervening factor and an output variable.1 In addition, public opinion on the
degree of the Chinese threat shapes how susceptible the focus country’s political system is to
Chinese influence and is thus an intervening factor, but improving public opinion of China is
also an output that Beijing seeks.
Notwithstanding these complexities, in this chapter, we review the status of several Chi-
nese inputs across many economic, diplomatic, informational, cultural, and other categories
in our 20 focus countries. In Chapter Five, we review intervening factors, and in Chapter Six,
we review outputs.
Economic Variables: Trade and Foreign Direct Investment
To assess potential Chinese economic influence in the focus countries, we examined dozens of
independent economic variables, including trade, FDI, overseas development assistance, tour-
ism, and official loans. The mechanisms of such economic influence are as follows:
• attractive economic measures, such as overseas development assistance and trade agree-
ments
• hybrid economic measures, such as politically conditioned loans and investments
• coercive economic measures, such as trade and investment restrictions, sanctions, popular
boycotts, reductions in tourism, and business restrictions.2
We do not include here the full range of research that we found on China’s economic
input variables; rather, we include only the findings that emerged as most significant in assess-
ing China’s influence. When the data highlighted countries that were not among our 20 focus
1 That is to say, elite views function as an intervening factor that determines how well China can translate its influence
activities into results (inputs to outputs), but China also conceives of the degree of elite support as an intended outcome, or
output, of its efforts.
2 The mechanisms of influence are derived, in part, from Peter Harrell, Elizabeth Rosenberg, and Edoardo Saravelle,
China’s Use of Coercive Economic Measures, Washington, D.C.: Center for a New American Security, June 2018.
25
countries (see Chapter One), we include those other countries for comparative purposes. The
discussion and figures in this section offer the most important highlights of this analysis.
A few countries are deeply dependent on China for trade; many are somewhat dependent.
Figures 4.1 through 4.3 show data on Chinese trade relationships with the focus countries,
including the relative dependence of those countries on Chinese trade. From this analysis, sev-
eral highly dependent countries stand out: Myanmar, Laos, Vietnam, South Korea, Australia,
Cambodia, Malaysia, and Japan.3 Brazil is also surprisingly—and increasingly—dependent on
Chinese trade. Broadly speaking, these results are not surprising; the countries deeply depen-
dent on trade with China are well known.
Figure 4.1 shows the percentage of each focus country’s total trade that is with China,
and it offers a comprehensive summary of the countries’ trade dependency. The figure gener-
ates a complex picture with many countries represented, but a broad pattern of the focus coun-
tries’ degree of dependence begins to emerge. In Figure 4.2, for each country whose percentage
of trade with China is more than 30 percent of its total trade, we show the percentage of the
country’s total exports that go to China.
Figure 4.1
Total Trade with China, Each Focus Country, 2013–2017
Australia Brazil Cambodia Ethiopia Germany India Indonesia

Italy Japan Kenya Laos Malaysia Mexico Nigeria
Philippines Singapore South Korea Sri Lanka Thailand Vietnam
60
Percentage of total trade that is with China
50
40
30
20
10
0
2013 2014 2015 2016 2017
SOURCE: United Nations International Trade Statistics Database (UN Comtrade), web tool, undated.
NOTE: We did not have 2017 data for Cambodia, Ethiopia, Laos, Thailand, or Vietnam.
3 Many of these countries—including South Korea, Vietnam, and Cambodia—are also highly trade-dependent in gen-
eral: Their total trade is more than 100 percent of their GDP. A combination of overall trade dependence and a dependence
on China for that trade creates the highest potential influence in economic terms.
Measuring Chinese Influence: Inputs 27
Figure 4.2
Dependence on China for Trade Exports, Select Focus Countries, 2013–2017
70
Percentage of total exports that go to China
60
50
40
30
20
Australia Laos Malaysia Philippines South Korea

10
0
2013 2014 2015 2016 2017
SOURCE: UN Comtrade, undated.

NOTE: We did not have 2017 data for Laos.
Among countries not represented in our 20 focus countries, the states in the Pacific Island
Forum (e.g., Fiji, Samoa, the Solomon Islands, and Tonga) are becoming heavily dependent
on China for trade. For instance, China is now the nations’ leading trade partner, and its trade
with the island nations has grown 400 percent over the past decade. China’s FDI in the region
was $2.8 billion in 2016, up 173 percent since 2014. Its relations with the island nations are
not equal, however: Nearly 70 percent of China’s FDI in 2016 went to Papua New Guinea,
and 72 percent of its total trade with Pacific Island Forum nations is with Papua New Guinea
and the Marshall Islands.4
Overall levels of global dependence on China for trade are no longer rising across the board.
Given China’s economic rise, it is to be expected that many countries’ level of economic engage-
ment with China would have grown significantly over the past three decades. However, look-
ing at roughly the past decade, trade and FDI dependence on China has mostly plateaued and
in, some cases, even fallen back. This trend can be seen in Figure 4.3, which shows the per-
centage of total trade that is with China, averaged across all 20 focus countries for each year.
China’s investments through the Belt and Road Initiative and other mechanisms have been
enormous but still represent a modest proportion of many countries’ FDI inflows. Figure 4.4 dis-
plays Chinese FDI as a percentage of recipient countries’ total FDI inflows—that is, the per-
centage of each country’s incoming FDI that comes from China. As the figure suggests, in
most cases, those percentages remain relatively small. Even by 2018, most countries received
the lion’s share of their FDI from non-Chinese sources.
4 Ethan Meick, Michelle Ker, and Han May Chan, China’s Engagement in the Pacific Islands: Implications for the United
States, Washington, D.C.: U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, June 14, 2018, pp. 7–10.
Figure 4.3
Total Trade with China, Average Across All Focus Countries, 2013–2017
26
Percentage of total trade that is with China
25
24
23
22
21
20
19
2013 2014 2015 2016 2017
SOURCE: UN Comtrade, undated.
Figure 4.4
Incoming Foreign Direct Investment from China, Each Focus Country, 2013–2018
Australia Brazil Cambodia Ethiopia Germany India Indonesia

Italy Japan Kenya Laos Malaysia Mexico Myanmar
Nigeria Philippines Singapore South Korea Sri Lanka Thailand Vietnam
140
Percentage of FDI inflows coming from China
120
100
80
60
40
20
–20
2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018
SOURCE: World Bank, “World Development Indicators,” data set, last updated September 2019a.
The figure may underestimate the significance of Chinese FDI, including Belt and
Road investments, for at least three reasons. First, China’s overall investment totals have been
immense, and despite the relatively small percentage of inflows those investments represent,
they are still important. Second, for a select group of developing nations, especially in Africa,
large Chinese investments are a critical source of project funding even if most FDI is still
coming from other investors. Third, Chinese investments have focused to a significant degree
on infrastructure projects, which are both critical to many developing countries’ growth plans
and generally ignored by other FDI providers. The promise of Chinese investments is therefore
a more significant source of influence than the percentage of inflows might suggest.
China’s economic relationship with Latin America is an important emerging variable. Chi-
na’s merchandise trade with Latin America has grown by more than 18 times since 2000.
China is now Latin America’s second-leading trade partner behind the United States, repre-
senting 9 percent of Latin America’s exports and almost 20 percent of its imports. In terms of
FDI, between 2005 and 2016, China invested more than $90 billion in the region (although
that cumulative amount represented only 5 percent of total inbound FDI). That investment
has focused on three countries—Brazil, Argentina, and Peru, which together received more
than 80 percent of China’s FDI in Latin America. Beijing has entered into trade agreements
with more than a dozen regional countries and directed more than $150 billion in development
finance to Latin America.5 However, after reaching a new peak of about $250 billion in 2012,
Chinese trade with the region has leveled off: It was largely the same in 2013, 2014, and 2017
and was significantly less in 2015 and 2016. But specific countries have become significantly
dependent on China for imports, exports, or investment. These countries include Panama and
Paraguay (which receive more than 30 percent of total imports from China); Brazil, Argentina,
and Peru (which receive large amounts of FDI); and Brazil, Chile, Peru (which export more
goods to China than to anywhere else).6
China plays a much larger role in global lending than was previously understood. In an impor-
tant 2020 study by the National Bureau for Economic Research, Sebastian Horn, Carmen M.
Reinhart, and Christoph Trebesch surveyed many intersecting sources of data. They con-
cluded that, between 1998 and 2018, China’s largely official foreign lending—mostly to low-
and middle-income countries—grew from almost nothing to $1.6 trillion, which equates to “a
quarter of total bank lending to emerging markets” (see Figure 4.5).7 China’s lending eclipses
that of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
The authors found that, although Chinese lending now reaches eight out of ten countries
in the world, some 50 countries constitute the primary recipients of Chinese lending. Col-
lectively, those countries’ indebtedness to China “has increased from less than 1% of GDP
in 2005 to more than 15% of debtor country GDP in 2017. . . . For these countries, debt to
China now accounts to close to 40% of total reported external debt, on average.”8 By 2018,
5 Anabel González, Latin America–China Trade and Investment Amid Global Tensions: A Need to Upgrade and Diversify,
Washington, D.C.: Atlantic Council, 2018, pp. 1, 6–9; and Katherine Koleski and Alec Blivas, China’s Engagement with
Latin America and the Caribbean, Washington, D.C.: U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, October 17,
2018.
6 Koleski and Blivas, 2018, p. 8.
7 Sebastian Horn, Carmen M. Reinhart, and Christoph Trebesch, “China’s Overseas Lending,” Cambridge, Mass.:
National Bureau of Economic Research, Working Paper No. 26050, May 2020, p. 5.
8 Horn, Reinhart, and Trebesch, 2020, pp. 4–5.
Figure 4.5
China’s Overseas Lending Boom, 1998–2019
2.0
FDI debt
Trade credit
1.5 Direct loans
Percentage of world GDP
1.0
0.5
0
1998 2000 2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2012 2014 2016 2018
SOURCE: Horn, Reinhardt, and Trebesch, 2020, p. 6. Used with permission.
China held more than $5 trillion in foreign debt.9 As a result of these trends, the authors con-
clude, “Developing and emerging countries are now much more indebted to China than to all
other major creditor governments combined”—a total of $370 billion to China as opposed to
$246 billion owed to the 22 Paris Club member governments.10
These numbers might raise concerns about China engaging in debt-trap diplomacy—that
is, efforts to acquire influence by creating debtors that are forced to surrender major public
goods, such as ports, land, resources, and state-run companies, to pay off their debt. Yet closer
examinations have suggested that this mechanism is both less intentional on China’s part and
probably less effective than the concerns suggest. Holding foreign debt does not automatically
lead to influence. Moreover, holding significant amounts of debt from developing countries
carries significant risks. As some analysts have noted, Beijing is hardly rooting for its debtors
to default so that it can seize assets; such defaults impose significant costs on China at a time
of rising domestic debt and declining foreign asset availability.11 Furthermore, moving to take
control of local assets can prompt angry nationalist reactions and undermine China’s long-
term search for good relations and broad-based influence. These risks have now emerged pow-
9 Emre Tiftik, Paul Della Guardia, Jadranka Poljak, and Katherine Standbridge, “Surging Global Debt: What’s Owed
to China?” Institute of International Finance, May 14, 2020. The 25 countries most in debt to China (by debt owed to
China as a percentage of the borrowing country’s GDP) are, in order, Djibouti (by far the lead debt-holder, with more
than 100 percent of GDP owed to China); Tonga, Maldives, Congo, Kirgizstan, Cambodia, Niger, Laos, Zambia, Samoa,
Vanuatu, Mongolia, Dominica, Ethiopia, Ecuador, Zimbabwe, Venezuela, Angola, Montenegro, Tajikistan, Mozambique,
South Sudan, Turkmenistan, Belarus, and Kenya. Other significant nations in the top 50 include Bolivia, Pakistan, Bosnia,
Uganda, Sri Lanka, and Tanzania. Those countries are drawn from Horn, Reinhart, and Trebesch, 2020.
10 Horn, Reinhart, and Trebesch, 2020, p. 14. The Paris Club is a group of officials from various countries who seek solu-
tions to the payment problems of indebted countries.
11
See, for example, Matt Ferchen, “China, Venezuela, and the Illusion of Debt-Trap Diplomacy,” Carnegie-Tsinghua
Center for Global Policy, August 16, 2018.
erfully in the context of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic: With dozens of
nations indebted to China now facing severe economic crises, Beijing faces a bitter choice of
absorbing tens of billions of dollars in losses or enforcing what would be seen as cruel demands
for continued loan payments (for more on China’s COVID-19 dilemma, see Chapter Nine).
In sum, holding large amounts of debt can be a source of partial or limited influence but has
major downsides.
Although China’s overseas development assistance totals are not publicly disclosed, such assis-
tance appears to be very significant and a potent potential source of influence. Most of our 20 focus
countries are no longer significantly dependent on overseas development assistance, so its role
in sustaining Chinese influence in most of these countries is negligible. In Cambodia, Ethio-
pia, Kenya, Laos, Myanmar, and Nigeria, however, overseas development assistance accounts
for more than 5 percent of gross capital formation.
One database of Chinese official foreign aid and other official concessionary foreign
transfers lists more than 4,300 projects between 2000 and 2014, involving $351 billion in total
spending or commitments, for an annual average of more than $23 billion (including com-
mitments, not just delivered assistance).12 Another estimate that used different categories—
“official finance with diplomatic intent”—and focused strictly on the Asia-Pacific region from
2000 to 2016 found more than $48 billion in Chinese finance for the region over the period.13
Tourism is one of the most easily weaponized economic relationships, and the rise of Chinese
tourists is a major factor for many countries. For example, Chinese tourism grew an average of
27 percent per year in the Pacific Island states between 2009 and 2014, although the total
number of Chinese visitors by 2017 was less than 10 percent of the region’s total number of
tourists.14 In many other countries in the region, Chinese tourists have come to reflect one-
fourth or more of the annual total, representing billions of dollars in value to the local economy.
To help evaluate the focus countries’ overall economic dependence on China, we summed
evidence from several of these categories, as shown in Table 4.1. The table shows the eight
countries with the highest values in five categories: percentage of total trade that is with China;
percentage of GDP that comes from trade with China; percentage of incoming FDI that comes
from China; percentage of GDP that comes from any foreign investment (not just China’s);
and percentage of foreign tourists who come from China.
Table 4.1 offers several lessons. First, the same countries are not necessarily highlighted
in the different categories; large economic relationships span many countries with different
emphasis, whether trade, FDI, or debt. Second, smaller countries closest to China—Laos,
Cambodia, Myanmar—have the most consistent dependency across the board. Third, because
China’s lending is focused on emerging market and lower-income countries, the list of major
debtors (described in an earlier footnote) is significantly different from the other categories of
economic dependence.
Fourth, for most of Asia, the economic dependency on China is significant in at least
two—and, in many cases, three or four—of the five categories. This fact, combined with
China’s demonstrated willingness to use these dependencies for economic influence, creates
12 Axel Dreher, Andreas Fuchs, Bradley Parks, Austin M. Strange, and Michael J. Tierney, “Aid, China, and Growth:
Evidence from a New Global Development Finance Dataset,” Williamsburg, Va.: AidData at William and Mary, Working
Paper No. 46, October 10, 2017, pp. 6–7.
13 Custer et al., 2018, p. 15.
14 Meick, Ker, and Chan, 2018, pp. 13–14.
Table 4.1
Economic Dependence on China, Focus Countries and Selected Others
Top 8 Countries (%)
Dependence on China Dependence on China

(Trade): % of Total Dependence on (FDI): % of Incoming Dependence on Role of Tourism: % of
Trade That Is with Trade: Trade with FDI That Comes from Foreign Investment: Foreign Tourists Who
China China as % of GDP China FDI as a % of GDP Come from China
Laos (42) Singapore (335) Laos (78.47) Singapore (23) South Korea (31)
Philippines (41) Vietnam (180) Kenya (33.72) Cambodia (12) Myanmar (29)
Vietnam (33) Malaysia (136) Cambodia (24.75) Laos (7) Thailand (28)
Australia (32) Cambodia (128) Thailand (14) Vietnam (6) Japan (26)
South Korea (30) Thailand (127) Myanmar (13) Myanmar (5) Cambodia (22)
Cambodia (29) South Korea (88) Indonesia (12) Ethiopia (4) Singapore (19)
Malaysia (28) Laos (87) South Korea (11) Brazil (4) Australia (15)
Japan (25) Germany (85) Malaysia (9) Australia (4) Philippines (15)
SOURCE: Data compiled from UN Comtrade, undated; World Bank, 2019a; World Tourism Organization,
“Statistical Data,” web tool, undated, Yearbook of Tourism Statistics. Data are from 2018, except tourism data,
which are from 2017.
significant constraints on the behavior of these countries. Fifth, however, these measures of
dependency have plateaued in most cases; that is, the trend lines have become flatter. China’s
demand for domestic capital to prime its economy has caused a drop in some foreign invest-
ment and assistance accounts. And partly because China has made clear its willingness to
punish others, partner countries are looking for ways to mitigate this power.
The Reputational Effects of Economic Interdependence

Economic relationships can create direct sources of influence by providing the influencer state
with the ability to coerce the targeted country. But economic interactions also have effects on
short-term attitudes and long-term relationships in ways that help shape influence outcomes.
Many statistical analyses have attempted to evaluate the relationship between economic inputs
(such as trade and FDI) and influence-related outputs (such as attitudes toward the influencer
state). The results have generally been mixed, and the literature suggests that there is no gener-
alizable relationship between economic inputs and political or reputational outcomes.
Various studies have examined the causal nexus between economic relationships and
positive influence. For example, there is empirical support for the idea that popular affinity
between countries tends to drive higher trade levels.15 Other research finds that a country’s
image abroad is associated with higher exports to those countries;16 a positive reputation
15 Anne-Célia Disdier and Thierry Mayer, “Je t’aime, Moi Non Plus: Bilateral Opinions and International Trade,” Euro-
pean Journal of Political Economy, Vol. 23, No. 4, December 2007.
16
Andrew K. Rose, “Like Me, Buy Me: The Effect of Soft Power on Exports,” Cambridge, Mass.: National Bureau of Eco-
nomic Research, Working Paper No. 21537, September 2015.
of a country’s leader is also associated with higher trade.17 More specifically to this report,
some studies appear to demonstrate a positive tie between Chinese investments and attitudes
toward China, at least among certain segments of the population.18 Other studies, and much
recent anecdotal evidence, suggest that the opposite may be true—that Chinese trade and
investment tend to worsen views of China over time.19 In a 2019 study, Damian Raess found
that managers in developed countries tended to oppose and resent Chinese FDI and favor
U.S. and European investment (although he did not find the same negative attitudes among
labor leaders).20
Field work conducted for multiple RAND studies also points to the following ways in
which trade dependence can have complex and sometimes negative effects on relations and the
influence of the trading state:
• Imports in specific sectors, such as agriculture and textiles, can negatively affect local
industries and spark a political backlash. This has occurred in some Southeast Asian
countries as Chinese imports have displaced national industries.
• Larger trade volumes can alienate the business elite of the targeted country and increase
resentment of Chinese influence.
• Chinese investment practices are improving but have generally been far below Western
standards for labor, environmental protections, and respect for the rule of law. These
conditions have caused significant public backlash in many countries—including Cam-
bodia, one of the countries that is most dependent on Chinese economic ties. And resent-
ment of such practices is very strong, for example, in Vietnam, where concerns about
Chinese bribery and illicit practices run very high.
The literature on the relationship between influence and economic ties is therefore com-
plex, and it offers no clear conclusions about the ability of economic interactions to generate
positive reputational outcomes. In terms of direct forms of influence, economic ties certainly
provide the influencer state with the potential for coercion or attraction, although these strat-
egies carry significant costs when employed. It would be wrong to presume that large-scale
Chinese investments, when employed in longer-term, more-indirect ways, will automatically
produce enhanced influence across social, political, and cultural domains.
17
Andrew K. Rose, “Agent Orange: Trump, Soft Power, and Exports,” Cambridge, Mass.: National Bureau of Economic
Research, Working Paper No. 25439, January 2019.
18 Vera Z. Eichenauer, Andreas Fuchs, and Lutz Brückner, “The Effects of Trade, Aid, and Investment on China’s Image
in Developing Countries,” Williamsburg, Va.: AidData at William and Mary, Working Paper No. 54, June 26, 2018. The
authors of this report find a modest positive correlation in attitudes among the young, well educated, and economically
privileged.
19 Katja B. Kleinberg and Benjamin O. Fordham, “Trade and Foreign Policy Attitudes,” Journal of Conflict Resolution,
Vol. 54, No. 5, 2010; and Marek Hanusch, “African Perspectives on China-Africa: Modeling Popular Perceptions and Their
Economic and Political Determinants,” Oxford Development Studies, Vol. 40, No. 4, 2012.
20 Damian Raess, “The Demand-Side Politics of China’s Global Buying Spree: Individual Attitudes Toward Chinese
Inward FDI Flows in Comparative Perspective,” Bern, Switzerland: World Trade Institute, Working Paper No. 02/2019,
March 2019.
The Appeal of the China Model and the Rise of a Beijing Consensus
A related reputational issue is the degree to which the Chinese development model (the so-
called “China Model”) is or will continue to be viewed as a leading option for the developing
world. The appeal of the model is a major presumed source of Chinese influence, and, in some
countries—notably, in Africa—opinion polling indeed suggests that the model outpaces the
U.S. model in appeal. Some analysts have gone beyond the appeal of the model itself to posit
the potential rise of a Beijing Consensus counterpoised to the Washington Consensus backing
a neoliberal model.21
Our research suggests multiple reasons to doubt the degree to which either of these nar-
ratives will have growing influence. First, the China model has always been more theoretical
than practical: It is a grab-bag of state-led development tactics that has evolved significantly
over time. It is not a clear, coherent set of policies that another state could simply adopt.22
Second, China’s economic performance is likely to hit roadblocks in the coming years. Com-
bined with growing concerns about China’s human rights practices, an economic decline will
have the effect of weakening the appeal of the proposed model.23 Third, the idea of a coherent
Beijing Consensus counterpoised to the dominant liberal model of economic governance has
been largely discredited.24 Fourth, because of these shifting attitudes, many countries are now
taking measures to guard themselves against the more-malign effects of economic relation-
ships with China, from controls on Chinese investment (especially in such areas as high tech-
nology) to limits on sharing of technology by Western firms.
Security Variables: Security Cooperation and Military Posture
In addition to examining economic input variables, we analyzed security input variables, which
can include arms sales and coproduction agreements, direct military assistance, institutional
capacity-building programs, military training and education, military exercises, humanitar-
ian assistance and disaster relief activities, and military facilities and access agreements. To
assess the status of influence in the security category, we reviewed available evidence on U.S.,
Chinese, Russian, and European security cooperation activities. The overarching lesson of
this review is clear: Although China is increasing its security cooperation activities at the mar-
gins, the United States continues to enjoy an immense advantage in this sphere and remains
the security partner of choice for most countries. In the remainder of this section, we discuss
related findings from this analysis.
The security cooperation activities of the United States and its allies remain vastly larger and
more significant than those of China (or Russia). This is true for arms transfers, as shown in Fig-
ures 4.6 and 4.7. But it is even more true for direct military aid: The United States provided
$13.7 billion in aid in 2018 alone, and the leading security providers in the European Union
21
Weitseng Chen, ed., The Beijing Consensus? How China Has Changed Western Ideas of Law and Economic Development,
Cambridge, United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press, 2017.
22 Barry Naughton, “China’s Distinctive System: Can It Be a Model for Others?” Journal of Contemporary China, Vol. 19,
No. 65, 2010; and Shaun Breslin, “The ‘China Model’ and the Global Crisis: From Friedrich List to a Chinese Mode of
Governance?” International Affairs, Vol. 87, No. 6, 2011.
23 Elizabeth Economy, “The Problem with Xi’s China Model,” Foreign Affairs, March 6, 2019.
24 Scott Kennedy, “The Myth of the Beijing Consensus,” Journal of Contemporary China, Vol. 19, No. 65, 2010.
Figure 4.6
Total Arms Transfers, 2017
14
12
Arms transfers ($U.S. billions)
10
0
United States China Russia
SOURCE: Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), undated.
Figure 4.7
Chinese Arms Exports, by Region, 2013–2017
1,400 Southeast Asia

South Asia
Africa
1,200 Central Asia
Arms exports from China ($U.S. billions)
Eastern Europe
Latin America
1,000
800
600
400
200
0
2013 2014 2015 2016 2017
SOURCE: SIPRI, undated.

(EU) (Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Spain, and Italy) provided another $7 billion.25
Hard and fast numbers for Chinese (and indeed Russian) military aid are much tougher to come
by, partly because Beijing considers such figures to be a state secret. Our best estimate from
Chinese-language and international open-source reporting suggests that China provides some-
what less than $100 million of military aid annually; we found a similar number for Russia, in
a range between $90 and $145 million annually.26 Thus, U.S. arms transfers are a multiple of
China’s arms transfers, but U.S. military aid is orders of magnitude larger than China’s.
Even in categories in which raw numbers suggest that China is beginning to approach
U.S. levels of security cooperation—for example, in military exercises—the numbers tend to
conceal a continuing difference in scope and quality of cooperation activities. For instance,
RAND field work in Asian countries between 2017 and 2019 strongly suggests that U.S. exer-
cises remain generally far larger, more sophisticated, and more valued than China’s exercises are.
Formal U.S. allies are by far the second most important security cooperation actors in the
world (behind the United States), vastly outstripping China and Russia. The leading security
cooperators in the EU provide billions in military aid (see Figure 4.8). They conduct a signifi-
cant proportion of global arms transfers, have security aid missions in dozens of countries, con-
duct dozens of major military exercises (both multilaterally among themselves and bilaterally
and multilaterally with non-EU countries), and host thousands of foreign students in profes-
sional military education venues every year.
This fact increases the relative U.S. advantage in this sphere: In many cases—in such
areas as North Africa, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia—the United States is seeking goals
that align with those of important allies whose own security cooperation activities outstrip
those of China even before U.S. figures are counted. Multilateral coordination could enhance
the efficiency of U.S. and allied security cooperation activities and sustain an indefinite advan-
tage over China.
Another emerging reality benefits the United States: Several countries that have not tra-
ditionally had a large security cooperation profile—including Japan, Australia, and India—are
bolstering their efforts specifically to contest Chinese influence. As their security cooperation
activities continue to grow, they will provide additional opportunities for coordination with
U.S. activities.
Chinese security cooperation relationships remain centered on a handful of traditional and
regional partners and client states. As shown in Table 4.2, China has an emerging set of modest
25 U.S. security assistance statistics are derived from Security Assistance Monitor, web tool, undated. EU numbers come
from a review of government publications and open-source documents from EU member states, including United Kingdom
Ministry of Defence, UK Defence in Numbers, London, October 2018; North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Allied
Command Transformation, “Partnership Training and Education Centres,” webpage, undated; France Ministry of Europe
and Foreign Affairs, “Les Écoles Nationales à Vocation Régionale,” webpage, undated; and Germany Federal Ministry of
Defence, White Paper 2016: On German Security Policy and the Future of the Bundeswehr, Berlin, 2016.
26 These estimates are derived from Chinese government reporting on specific aid cases, Department of Defense reports,
Defense Intelligence Agency reports, and think tank sources. See, for example, Office of the Secretary of Defense, Annual
Report Congress: Military and Security Developments Involving the People’s Republic of China, Washington, D.C.: U.S. Depart-
ment of Defense, various years; Defense Intelligence Agency, Assessment on U.S. Defense Implications of China’s Expanding
Global Access, Washington, D.C., December 2018; Defense Intelligence Agency, China Military Power: Modernizing a Force
to Fight and Win, Washington, D.C., January 2019; Kenneth Allen, Phillip C. Saunders, and John Chen, Chinese Military
Diplomacy, 2003–2016: Trends and Implications, Washington, D.C.: National Defense University Press, China Strategic
Perspectives No. 11, July 17, 2017; SIPRI, “Arms Transfers Database,” web tool, undated; and Helena Legarda, China Global
Security Tracker, Berlin: Mercator Institute for China Studies, various years.
Figure 4.8
Top European Providers of Foreign Military Aid, 2013–2017
12
10
Foreign military aid (€ billions)
0
France Germany Spain United Kingdom Netherlands Sweden
SOURCE: Pieter D. Wezeman, Aude Fleurant, Alexandra Kuimova, Nan Tian, and Siemon T. Wezeman, Trends in
International Arms Transfers, 2018, Stockholm: Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, March 2019.
NOTE: This figure shows the cumulative amount of aid over the period for each country.
security relationships with a variety of countries around the world. The lion’s share of China’s
aid, military exercises, and arms sales, however, remain with a relatively small set of countries
that represent traditional friends, clients, or targets of regional influence, including Russia,
Pakistan, the Philippines, Cambodia, and Laos.
Chinese security cooperation activities are not growing in a linear fashion—and, in some cat-
egories, are not growing at all. China’s regional and global security profile is not matching the
growth of its economy in anything like a linear sense. One example is the number of major
exercises China conducts internationally: The number of exercises has grown since 2013 but
largely leveled off.27 According to our research, similar patterns appear in such areas as military
aid and the number of students hosted in professional military education programs.
U.S. security cooperation activities remain far more respected, in-depth, comprehensive, and
sought after than China’s are. Chinese exercises, military education, and training and advising
missions remain significantly behind the United States in quality. Even U.S. humanitarian
assistance and disaster relief activities are seen as significantly more professional and effective
than their Chinese counterparts are.
In sum, security cooperation remains an area of profound U.S. competitive advantage
and is likely to remain so for some time. This finding becomes even more valid when account-
ing for the activities of U.S. friends and allies. China is working to expand and improve the
quality of its security cooperation efforts in several areas but must overcome significant suspi-
cions in some countries and established U.S. relationships in others.
27 For data from 2013 to 2016, see, for example, Allen, Saunders, and Chen, 2017; and International Institute for Strategic
Studies, The Military Balance 2020, London, February 2020.
Table 4.2
Total Chinese Military Aid, 2013–2018
Total Military Aid

Country or Group ($U.S. millions)
Cambodia 115.0
African Union 100.0
Afghanistan 70.0
Tanzania 30.0
Nepal 22.0
Philippines 21.0
Sri Lanka 18.0
Peru 17.5
Kyrgyzstan 16.0
Mali 14.0
Cape Verde 10.0
Liberia 10.0
Namibia 10.0
Nigeria 10.0
Seychelles 10.0
SOURCE: Estimates are derived from open-source and Chinese government
reporting on specific aid cases; Department of Defense reports; Defense
Intelligence Agency reports; and think tank sources, as described earlier.
See, for example, Office of the Secretary of Defense, various years; Defense
Intelligence Agency, 2018; Defense Intelligence Agency, 2019; Allen, Saunders,
and Chen, 2017; SIPRI, undated; Legarda, various years; and Tom Bayes, China’s
Growing Security Role in Africa: Views from West Africa, Implications for
Europe, Berlin: Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung, July 15, 2020.
NOTE: Recipients that received less than $10 million in Chinese military aid
include (in $U.S. millions) Bolivia (8.5); Fiji and Ghana (7.5 each); Cameroon,
Guinea, and Sierra Leone (7.0 each); Ecuador and Uruguay (5.0 each); Ivory
Coast (4.5); Armenia (4.0); Barbados and Dominica (3.0 each); Belarus, Grenada,
Papua New Guinea, and Somalia (2.0 each); and the Bahamas, Central African
Republic, Argentina, Serbia, and Madagascar (less than 2.0 each).
Diplomatic Variables: Programs and Activities
In addition to reviewing economic input variables, we considered Chinese activities in public

diplomacy and their possible influence effects. We did so in two ways: First, we referred to the
extensive work by the AidData lab at the College of William and Mary, which has gathered
tremendous data on Chinese public diplomacy activities in Asia over the previous decade.28
Second, we reviewed surveys of Chinese influence that included public diplomacy activities in
specific countries or regions.29 (Importantly, we included activities of the United Front Work
Department, a critical arm of Chinese propaganda and social influence. We consider these as
part of the intervening factor of mastering the local context and achieving societal-level influ-
ence. See Chapter Five.)
Custer and colleagues at AidData have examined indicators in the public diplomacy
realms of informational and cultural diplomacy, human exchanges, financial diplomacy, and
28 See Custer et al., 2018.

29 For example, Meick, Ker, and Chan, 2018, pp. 14–16.
elite-to-elite diplomacy. They traced available data on activities in these realms between 2000
and 2016. These measures include
• the number of Confucius Institutes, which has grown from a handful in 2004 to more
than 80 in 2016, and other forms of Chinese cultural centers
• festivals and other Chinese cultural activities hosted in the targeted country
• the establishment of Chinese sister cities in the targeted country
• foreign exchange programs, including educational scholarships
• FDI, especially in infrastructure, and the public diplomacy activities surrounding those
investments
• elite-to-elite diplomacy in various forms, especially official visits.30
The authors’ analysis produces several interesting conclusions. For instance, China has
directed the greatest amount of its public diplomacy at the Asia-Pacific region’s developed
states—Japan, South Korea, and Australia. This could be for various reasons, but one implica-
tion is that Chinese investments do not correlate with clear results in terms of a good-neighbor
effect in these countries. For example, although Japanese public opinion toward China has
recovered recently to some degree, it declined precipitously between 2017 and 2020. Public
opinion of China in Australia collapsed in 2019 and 2020, suggesting that a decade’s worth
of investments in public diplomacy can be undone very quickly and that these activities alone
cannot necessarily build lasting influence.31
Among the region’s developing nations, Indonesia, Cambodia, Malaysia, and Thailand
are the priorities for Chinese public diplomacy. Of these, there is evidence that Cambodia and,
to some degree, Thailand have aligned somewhat more with China during this period. Here,
too, investments are not correlated with linear results, at least in terms of public opinion.
When looking at the general country patterns, however, Custer and colleagues did find
that China’s public diplomacy activities had some success on a person-to-person basis. Overall,
“financial, cultural, and elite-to-elite diplomacy are generally associated with more favorable
views of China,” they conclude. Specifically, “Respondents in countries exposed to a higher
volume of Beijing’s financial diplomacy and official visits were more likely to view China as
having the best development model and as a positive force for their countries.”32
The AidData researchers also conducted interviews with 76 officials, academics, and
businesspeople in several countries targeted by Chinese influence efforts. A consistent theme
of the interviews was that, even after a decade and a half of public diplomacy investments by
China, many elites in the region remained extremely skeptical of Beijing’s intentions.
The only way that Custer and colleagues tried to assess how well China converts “its
public diplomacy overtures into foreign policy returns” was to look at UN General Assembly
voting patterns, which is a problematic indicator. The authors did find a positive correlation
between Chinese activities and UN voting, but this could be explained by various intervening
factors.33
30 Custer et al., 2018, pp. 3–4.

31 Custer et al., 2018, pp. xx, 19; and Laura Silver, Kat Devlin, and Christine Huang, Unfavorable Views of China Reach
Historic Highs in Many Countries, Pew Research Center, October 6, 2020.
32 Custer et al., 2018, p. 45.
33 Custer et al., 2018, p. 49.
Other studies have examined the incidence of similar activities in other countries. For
instance, China has boosted its exchange programs, scholarships, and official visits in Latin
America and the Caribbean and now refers to its partnerships with seven countries in the
region as “comprehensive strategic partnerships.” There are 39 Confucius Institutes in the
region, and China announced an intent to offer more than 12,000 scholarships and training
programs between 2015 and 2019.34
In addition to these studies, we considered other sources of data on Chinese civilian and
military diplomacy activities. The top destinations for military diplomacy and visits are famil-
iar: Australia (55 visits between 2010 and 2016), Thailand (51), Indonesia (42), Singapore and
Vietnam (39), Malaysia (36), India (32), and Myanmar (28).35
Finally, we gathered information from the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs website
regarding all notifications of bilateral high-level meetings with foreign ministers, party leaders,
and so forth. A meeting was counted as high-level if at least one head of state was in attendance
(see Figure 4.9).
Figure 4.9
Number of High-Level Meetings Between China and Select Focus Countries, 2008–2018
2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018
30
25
20
High-level meetings
15
10
0
ia
sia
ly
ia
ia
ka
nd
m
re
i
ne
an
az
di
di
ny
re
ic
Ita
al
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er
na
o
an
ne
ila
ex
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In
Ko
pi
Br
tr
Ke
ap
a
ig
et
al
iL
a
do
M
us
lip
er
m
ng
Th
Vi
h
M
Sr
A
G
Ca
In
ut
Ph
Si
So
SOURCE: Author analysis of diplomatic activity data from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Peoples’ Republic
of China. See, for instance, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Peoples’ Republic of China, “Indonesia: Activities,”
webpage, undated-b.
34 Koleski and Blivas, 2018, pp. 15–16.

35 Allen, Saunders, and Chen, 2017.
Using the same data, we also examined the average number of high-level meetings between
China and all focus countries over time to determine whether we saw a trend. As Figure 4.10
indicates, there is not a consistent, significant rise in the incidence of such exchanges between
the beginning and the end of the period examined.
Informational Variables: State-Supported Broadcasting and Social Media

Activities
We considered China’s information-based influence operations, which are growing and under-
way throughout the Asia-Pacific region. For this effort, we gathered data first on traditional
state media (news broadcasts from radio, television, and newspapers) and then on social media.
Specifically, we gathered information about station providers that offered a Chinese television
station through the China Global Television Network, the international branch of China’s
state media (China Central Television). These channels were counted even if multiple provid-
ers offered the same channel (see Figure 4.11). Additionally, we gathered any extra scattershot
information available on China-based news and the perception of such news in the focus
country. For instance, we recorded whether access to radio programming was full or partial.
Although most focus countries had full radio programs available in English, others had only a
ten-minute to one-hour daily summary in the local language.36
Figure 4.10
Average Number of High-Level Meetings Between China and Select Focus Countries, 2008–2018
10
8
High-level meetings
3
2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018
SOURCE: Author analysis of diplomatic activity data from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Peoples’ Republic
of China. See, for instance, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Peoples’ Republic of China, undated-b.
36 China Radio International, homepage, undated; and Koh Gui Qing and John Shiffman, “Beijing’s Covert Radio Net-
work Airs China-Friendly News Across Washington, and the World,” Reuters, November 2, 2015.
Figure 4.11
42
Number of National Providers That Host a China Global Television Network Channel, Select Focus Countries
Understanding Influence in the Strategic Competition with China

0
1
2
3
4
SOURCE: Authors’ analysis of data from China Global Television Network, homepage, undated, and its affiliated sites in various languages.
In recent years, the Chinese government has invested around $1.3 billion annually to
increase the international presence of Chinese media, yet the focus of state media seems largely
regional.37 As shown in Figure 4.11, Indo-Pacific countries host the bulk of Chinese news sta-
tions. Despite China’s push for news representation internationally, its efforts abroad seem
hampered by the perception that Chinese news is highly biased. For example, in Kenya, where
both radio and television stations are either directly run by Chinese companies or are owned
by China’s state media, there have been reports that local reporters were either self-censoring
to retain their positions or were actively warned by supervisors to stick to the Chinese narrative
of international events.38 Furthermore, leaders in Germany, Malaysia, and Mexico have stated
that Chinese media outlets promote national propaganda, sowing distrust in their validity.39
RAND field research suggests a significant skepticism of Chinese broadcasting entities
(such as the China Global Television Network) throughout much of Asia.40 Elites and citizens
of most countries appear to understand that Chinese state media provide only the Chinese
government’s view on an issue and cannot be relied on for objective information. Moreover,
some regional governments exercise tight control of the media, which limits China’s ability to
broadcast unfettered messages.41
Recent U.S. experience confirms the idea that state-sponsored media can struggle to
affect public attitudes or other sources of influence. In the wake of the terrorist attacks on
September 11, 2001, the United States set up multiple Arabic-language broadcasting stations,
including Radio Sawa and the Al-Hurra television network, aimed at influencing countries in
the Middle East. According to opinion polls, neither network appears to have had a significant
measurable impact on beliefs in general or attitudes toward the United States—especially rela-
tive to other effects on opinion in these countries, such as U.S. policy. Given the large-scale
skepticism toward the Chinese government, there is little reason to expect Chinese state media
to have a better experience.
Next, we performed a qualitative assessment of the top social media platforms in China.
For this analysis, we examined in depth the two platforms with the largest international pres-
ence: Weibo (roughly equivalent to Twitter) and WeChat (a catch-all platform with compo-
nents for Facebook, ride-share services, doctors’ appointments, and contactless payments).
Overall, Chinese social media receives mixed success in the focus countries. For example,
although Kenyan and Nigerian netizens firmly prefer non-Chinese social media platforms,
Australian politicians are joining the platforms to connect with Chinese-speaking users in
Australia about domestic politics. The Australian commercial sector has not picked up Chi-
37 Amy Gunia, “China’s Media Interference Is Going Global, Report Says,” Time, March 25, 2019.
38 Bartholomäus Grill, “China’s Expanding Media Dominance in Africa,” Der Spiegel, June 14, 2019; Sheng Ding, “To
Build a ‘Harmonious World’: China’s Soft Power Wielding in the Global South,” Journal of Chinese Political Science, Vol. 13,
No. 2, 2008; Najum Mushtaq, “Africa Tunes In to China,” Horn of Africa Bulletin, June 4, 2019; and “China Is Broadening
Its Efforts to Win Over African Audiences,” The Economist, October 20, 2018.
39 Arne Delfs, “Germany Probes China Reporters for Snooping Around Military,” Bloomberg, May 25, 2019; Syed Arabi
Idid and Chang Peng Kee, “The Media and Public Agenda Among the Malay and Chinese Communities During the 2008
Malaysian General Elections,” Asian Social Science, Vol. 8, No. 5, April 2012; and Pablo Sebastian Morales, “Could Chinese
News Channels Have a Future in Latin America?” Westminster Papers in Communication and Culture, Vol. 13, No. 1, 2018.
40 As we indicated in Chapter One, this field research had not yet been published at the time of this report.
41
See, for example, Russell Hsiao, “A Preliminary Survey of CCP Influence Operations in Singapore,” China Brief, Vol. 19,
No. 13, July 16, 2019.
nese social media, but German, Mexican, and South Korean tourist boards advertise on Weibo.
Going further, some Brazilian and Italian businesses have opened Weibo accounts to attract
Chinese consumers without leaving China. However, the Italian efforts have fallen flat after
several culturally insensitive posts by luxury brands and Italian celebrities.42
The role of Chinese social media in the focus countries seems to be focused largely on
luring Chinese customers to specific brands or influencing local politics. Indeed, various social
media campaigns regarding pro-Chinese politics may be partially to blame for the lack of for-
eign users on the sites. For instance, in 2016, an international tribunal ruled in favor of the
Philippines in a territorial dispute with China. Following the verdict, Chinese social media
platforms were flooded with anti-Filipino rhetoric.43 Environments like these are unlikely to
be welcoming for non-Chinese netizens. But, at this point, our research does not suggest that
China is engaged in large-scale manipulation of social media users or in politically oriented
social media activities outside of Taiwan, Hong Kong, or other issues considered relevant to
Chinese sovereignty.
Cultural Variables: Language Prevalence and Entertainment

Language Prevalence
An important source of U.S. global influence has been the prevalence of the English language,
not only as the global second language of choice but also as the semi-official language of many
professional fields. One indicator of relative influence would therefore be whether the Chinese
language (specifically, the Mandarin dialect) is beginning to overtake English in any impor-
tant ways. Language prevalence could be especially important in such fields such as finance, air
transport, shipping, and engineering.44 Data on this question are difficult to come by. There
is no reliable database of people studying various languages around the world. The informa-
tion that is available, however, suggests that the economic rise of China has indeed prompted
a growing effort to learn its language. However, there is little evidence that Chinese will sup-
plant English, and the growth of English around the world continues to be a major trend.
We gathered data from a variety of census sources for as many focus countries as pos-
sible to determine the extent of language ties. The countries for which we found census data
included Australia, India, Indonesia, Italy, Malaysia, Mexico, the Philippines, Singapore,
South Korea, Sri Lanka, Thailand, and Vietnam.45 However, because of the scattered years of
42 Yuhan Xu, “Dolce & Gabbana Ad (with Chopsticks) Provokes Public Outrage in China,” NPR, December 1, 2018; and
Miranda Barnes and Manya Koetse, “‘No Place Like Italy Innit’—Young Beckham’s Instagram Post Sparks Controversy on
Weibo,” What’s on Weibo, October 5, 2018.
43 “South China Sea: Chinese Social Media Urges Mango Boycott,” BBC News, July 13, 2016. For example,
44 David Singh Grewal discusses the English language as a form of network power and describes many areas in which it
constitutes the default language (David Singh Grewal, Network Power: The Social Dynamics of Globalization, New Haven,
Conn.: Yale University Press, 2008, pp. 71–81).
45 Australian Bureau of Statistics, “Cultural Diversity in Australia, 2016,” webpage, June 28, 2017; Census of India, Lan-
guage: India, States and Union Territories, New Delhi: Office of the Registrar General, 2011; Central Intelligence Agency,
“East Asia/Southeast Asia: Singapore,” in The World Factbook, Washington, D.C., 2019; Ethnologue, “Chinese, Man-
darin,” web tool, undated; Istituto Nazionale di Statistica, “Linguistic Diversity Among Foreign Citizens in Italy,” press
release, July 25, 2014; and Sistemas Nacionales Estadístico y de Información, “Población Hablante de Lengua Indígena de
5 y Más Años por Principales Lenguas, 1970 a 2005,” webpage, July 3, 2006.
available information and overall lack of consistent data, it is not possible to provide compre-
hensive representations over time. Therefore, we also conducted a qualitative analysis, in which
we gathered any information on Chinese-speaking in classrooms and on job opportunities
incentivizing Chinese-speaking. (For this analysis, Chinese includes Mandarin, Cantonese,
and any other dialects of the language.)
We found that Singapore, Vietnam, and Malaysia had the largest recorded number of
Chinese speakers. India, Mexico, and Sri Lanka did not include any Chinese dialects on their
census lists of locally spoken languages. The percentage of students studying Chinese in Aus-
tralia has hovered around 20 percent since 2006, although there is anecdotal evidence that
relatively few nonethnic Chinese are studying the language there. It has been documented that
China has donated books and Chinese-language programs to such countries as Cambodia and
Kenya,46 but we could not find the number of speakers or even of people learning the language
in those countries.
In many of the focus countries, English is still prioritized over all other foreign languages.
This is true in Malaysia, Singapore, and Vietnam, which all rank the importance of English
studies above Mandarin in the classroom. Interestingly, students in Mexico who study Chinese
are using English as an intermediary; that is, Chinese translations are given in English. Only
South Korea shows a noticeably large increase in Chinese-language students directly studying
from Korean to Chinese.
Overall, although we found news articles about how the rise of Chinese trade in many
countries is making it advantageous to learn the language, few countries, including China’s
bigger trade partners (e.g., Australia), seem to prioritize the Chinese language in classrooms.47
Much of the Chinese proficiency in the focus countries remains among those of Chinese
descent, particularly migrants and international students. Some anecdotal evidence suggests
modifications to this picture: For instance, Indonesian sources have told RAND researchers
that there are more Indonesians studying in China than in the United States and that large
numbers of Indonesians are learning Mandarin.48
One important indicator of language prevalence is the number of university and graduate
courses or programs offered in various languages. English has become the default second lan-
guage of global education, and, according to one study, this process accelerated significantly in
all regions of Europe between 2007 and 2014, during which the number of English-language
courses tripled.49 A global survey of English-language courses found them to be concentrated
46 “China Donates 9,130 Chinese Books to Schools in Cambodia,” China Daily, November 18, 2017; and Overseas Chi-
nese Language and Culture Education Online, “肯尼亚中国学校,” webpage, undated.
47 Ji Ye, “Mandarin Prospers in Brazil,” China Daily, September 29, 2014; Chen Lixiong, “It Pays to Learn Chinese, in
Cambodia,” World Crunch, January 24, 2015; Grace Tan-Johannes, “Why More Chinese Indonesians Are Learning Man-
darin, and Nurturing Their Children’s Sense of Belonging to Chinese Culture,” South China Morning Post, August 23,
2018; Abdi Latif Dahir, “Kenya Will Start Teaching Chinese to Elementary School Students from 2020,” Quartz, Janu-
ary 8, 2019; Michelle FlorCruz, “Chinese Language in Nigeria Is Increasingly Popular as China-Africa Economic Relations
Deepen,” International Business Times, June 29, 2015; Peter Teo, “Mandarinising Singapore: A Critical Analysis of Slogans
in Singapore’s ‘Speak Mandarin’ Campaign,” Critical Discourse Studies, Vol. 2, No. 2, 2005; and Fergus Hunter, “Interna-
tional Education Boom Predicted, Despite Decline in Chinese Students,” Sydney Morning Herald, January 30, 2019.
48 RAND researchers, interview with the authors during field work for this project, Jakarta, September 2019.
49 Carmen Neghina, “New Study Reveals: English-Taught Education in Europe Tripled Since 2007,” Studyportals.com,
2014.
mainly in the United States, Europe, Japan, South Korea, and Australia, with handfuls of
courses and programs available in Africa and Southeast Asia.50
Another important submeasure of language-based influence is the number of fields or
industries around the world in which English has become the language of professional activity.
For example, global air traffic control is conducted in English, some international engineering
firms conduct daily business in English to attract employees from all over the world, and most
top international economics programs are taught in English. Our research did not indicate any
particular shift toward using Chinese in major industries.
Entertainment: Film and Television

To measure China’s popular culture influence in the focus countries, we compiled an aggre-
gated list of Chinese films—in which we included Chinese-produced films and Western-
produced films in which a Chinese production studio played a major role—released in each
country from 2014 to 2018 and calculated the amount that Chinese films grossed in Australia,
Brazil, Germany, Italy, Malaysia, Mexico, the Philippines, Singapore, and South Korea (the
countries for which we found data). In other focus countries where data were less available, we
conducted a qualitative search for people who watched Chinese-produced films and Chinese
collaborations in Western-produced films. To collect information on the popularity of Chinese
television, we counted all channels that showed non-news programs (including soap operas,
game shows, and movies) in the focus countries. Where we could not find numerical data, we
conducted a qualitative assessment of Chinese programming.
The results from our analysis show that China’s role in global media is steadily increas-
ing, although it still lags well behind the United States and other leading cultural influenc-
ers. The pattern is inconsistent among a representative set of our focus countries: As shown in
Figure 4.12, Mexico saw a sudden increase in Chinese films debuting in domestic theaters in
2016, and Singapore and Malaysia saw a decreasing number of Chinese films released over the
period. Figure 4.13 offers data on the amount that Chinese films grossed in the nine countries
noted earlier. As shown, Mexico’s surge of Chinese films led to the second-highest gross, after
South Korea.
Other statistics seem to demonstrate that Chinese films are not taking other markets
by storm. Indeed, one survey of the data referred to the “waning appeal” of Chinese movies
abroad, especially when compared with the success of films from India and South Korea,
whose media have significant foreign penetration.51 Moreover, China’s relationship with West-
ern film studios has been increasingly clouded by Beijing’s efforts to censor the content of for-
eign films as a condition of access to China’s market.
Outside of films, some Chinese television programming has been released in Sri Lanka,
Thailand, and Vietnam, although viewership levels are unknown. In Africa, the Chinese firm
StarTimes and its local energy partners in Kenya and Nigeria have advertised low prices for
installation and cable packages.52 These incentives might be leading to more consumption of
Chinese media in African nations, but no viewership data were available. However, some of
the success of Chinese television in foreign countries has resulted in backlash: In 2017, con-
50 Carmen Neghina, “Mapping English-Taught Programmes,” Studyportals.com, 2015.

51 China Power Team, “Do Chinese Films Hold Global Appeal?” Center for Strategic and International Studies, 2019.
52 Jenni Marsh, “How China Is Slowly Expanding Its Power in Africa, One TV Set at a Time,” CNN, July 24, 2019.
Figure 4.12
Number of Chinese Films Released in Select Focus Countries, 2014–2018
20
18 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018
16
14
Number of films released
12
10
0
ia
il
ly
sia
es
a
e
an
az
re
ic
or
Ita
al
in
ay
ex
Ko
Br
tr
ap
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al
M
us
er
ng
ili
h
M
A
ut
Ph
Si
So
SOURCE: Box Office Mojo, “2019 Worldwide Box Office,” webpage, 2019.
Figure 4.13
Total Gross Income for Chinese Films in Select Focus
Countries, Normalized by Number of Film Releases, 2014–2018
($U.S. millions)
South Korea Australia
Singapore $1.20 $0.57
Philippines $0.44 Brazil

$2.36
$0.36
Mexico $2.93
$4.05 Germany
$1.15
Malaysia
$2.24
Italy
SOURCE: Box Office Mojo, 2019.

cerns that Chinese celebrities were using their international fame to promote Chinese pro-
paganda led to many Vietnamese channels announcing that they would cease showing and
promoting Chinese programming—including one show that depicted the Chinese claimed
nine-dash line.53
A related trend in China’s entertainment-based influence activities is China’s purchase of
Western media companies. For many years, state-controlled Chinese firms have been purchas-
ing film production companies, theater chains, and distribution houses in the United States
and Europe. Some reports suggest that China has used these connections to influence the por-
trayal of China in Western films—although, as noted earlier, Beijing has also sought a positive
portrayal of China as a condition of access to China’s market.54 Beyond a general ability to dis-
courage negative portrayals of China, however, it is not clear how ownership stakes in Western
media companies have influenced societal outcomes.
People-to-People Variables: Education
In the people-to-people category of inputs, we examined international education exchanges—in

this case, Chinese students studying abroad and China hosting foreign students. Our research
suggests that some available data must be treated with caution: International study involves
many different periods of stay, levels of integration with the local community, degree programs,
quality, and follow-up. Simply referring to the total number of students studying abroad or to
the number of foreign students studying in a country may not reflect the whole picture.
As of 2011, more than 25 percent (723,000) of the 2.7 million students who trav-
eled abroad for higher education came to the United States. Chinese students constituted
the fastest-growing segment of that number. Other top destinations for international study
were the United Kingdom (455,600), France (283,621), Australia (258,827) and Germany
(252,032). China ranked fourth on the list at that time, with 265,090 foreign students, most
of them from Asia.55
We looked at similar data for tertiary (post–high school) education programs in 2012 to
2018. For information on the number of Chinese students studying in our focus countries,
we used data from the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization
(UNESCO); when such data were not available for a specific country, we sought other inde-
pendent sources. For information on the number of students studying in China, we relied on
“inbound student” data from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of China.
As shown in Figure 4.14, the most popular destinations for Chinese students enrolled in
tertiary education programs were Australia and South Korea, and a significant percentage of
students chose to study in Germany, Italy, and Malaysia. Some values, such as the 2016 statis-
tics of the 61 students in Sri Lanka and the 336 students in Brazil, were very small. (Singapore’s
53 “Vietnam Pulls Abominable Film over South China Sea Map,” BBC News, October 14, 2019.
54 Edward Wong, “Chinese Purchases of U.S. Companies Have Some in Congress Raising Eyebrows,” New York Times,
September 30, 2016a; Darren E. Tromblay, “No More Fun and Games: How China’s Acquisition of U.S. Media Entities
Threatens America’s National Security,” Small Wars Journal, May 22, 2017; and Scott Rodie and Andrew Viner, “What
Chinese Companies See When Buying Up European Media,” BDO Global, February 26, 2018.
55 Institute of International Exchange, Open Doors 2011: Report on International Educational Exchange, New York, Novem-
ber 2011, p. 4.
Figure 4.14
Percentage of Chinese Exchange Students Enrolled in a Tertiary Education Program in Select Focus
Countries, Normalized by Total Outbound Chinese Students, 2012–2016
25
Percentage of Chinese exchange students enrolled in each country
2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017
20
15
10
0
ia
sia
ka
y
m
il
ly
nd
re
an
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di
pa
Ita
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an
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Ko
tr
la
In
m
Br
Ja
et
al
iL
us
ai
er
Vi
M
Th
Sr
A
ut
So
SOURCE: Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of China, “Inbound International Students to China,
2011–2016,” spreadsheet, 2017; UNESCO Institute for Statistics, “Education: Outbound Internationally Mobile
Students by Host Region,” web tool, United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, undated,
accessed September 2019; Wang Hongyi, “Growth in Numbers Studying Abroad Slows,” China Daily, March 13,
2014; “Number of Chinese Outbound Students Up by 11% in 2014,” ICEF Monitor, March 31, 2015; “459,800
Chinese Left for Study Abroad Last Year,” Ecns.cn, March 5, 2015; “Did Growth in Outbound Chinese Mobility
Really Slow in 2013?” ICEF Monitor, November 26, 2014.
NOTE: Singapore’s data were excluded from the chart because estimated numbers varied widely, from 13,000 to
36,000, and all reported data were significantly older than the data available for the other focus countries. Data
for other focus countries were not available.
data were excluded from the graph because estimated numbers varied widely, from 13,000
to 36,000, and all reported data were significantly older than the data available for the other
focus countries. Nonetheless, it is clear that a significant number of Chinese students were
studying there.)
Data on exchange students studying in China are depicted in Table 4.3. When we nor-
malized the data against all inbound students from focus countries to China between 2012 and
2017, the number of students from Australia, Germany, Italy, and Malaysia steadily increased.
Conversely, the number of students from the South Korea, Thailand, and Vietnam showed a
steady decline.
Table 4.3
Number of Chinese Students Enrolled in Select Focus Countries’ Tertiary Education Programs,
2012–2017
Country 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017
Australia 87,497 87,980 90,245 97,387 112,329 128,498
Brazil 314 270 332 336
Germany 19,441 21,886 23,616
India 682 694 444 294 191 177
Indonesia 431
Italy 7,645 9,788 11,318 12,581 13,768
Malaysia 6,033 9,031 9,560 10,889 10,880
South Korea 43,698 38,109 34,145 34,513 38,568
Sri Lanka 66 63 84 61 73
Thailand 8,444 4,544 5,305
Vietnam 440 388 274 281 131 34
SOURCE: UNESCO Institute for Statistics, undated.

NOTE: The UNESCO Institute for Statistics splits mainland China, Hong Kong, and Macau. The table
shows data for mainland China only.
CHAPTER FIVE
Measuring Chinese Influence: Intervening Factors
Now that we have examined the input variables for Chinese influence, we turn to assessing
the intervening factors from the framework for influence described in Chapter Three. Our
research into case studies of influence-seeking suggests that intervening factors can be the most
important component in determining the degree of influence that an outside actor can gain
in a targeted nation. Measuring inputs alone, as explained in Chapter Four, can be misleading
because the causal relationship between the input and the output is not linear. The intervening
factors help determine how, and how much, the inputs affect the outputs.
As noted in Chapter Three, we identified six essential categories of intervening factors
that shape an influencer state’s degree of influence:
• shared values and cultural experiences, which create a predisposition to agree in the absence
of countervailing factors
• common interests, purposes, or perceived threats, both general and specific, which establish a
basis to persuade the target of influence that a course of action is in its interests
• implicit societal influence, or soft power, which rests on the attractiveness of the influencer
state’s sociopolitical model and cultural values
• mastery of the local context in the targeted state, including detailed understanding of the
sinews of power and influence
• vulnerability of the targeted state to outside influence, including measures of corruption and
the role of foreign communities and political influence
• the domestic and international context, which can provide factors either supportive or
destructive of influence.
In this chapter, we examine variables in these categories to gain insight on the degree to which
China is acquiring influence in our 20 focus countries.
One important constraint on any effort to better understand intervening factors is that
they are complex, obscure, and almost impossible to measure in truly meaningful ways. Many
variables in these six broad categories have to do with highly subjective and qualitative percep-
tions that can dampen or boost the influence of an outside actor but that are very difficult to
capture in quantifiable terms. In some cases, a seemingly clear variable, such as regime type, is
not reliably associated with high or low levels of Chinese influence in a country. In other cases,
variables that can be more readily measured, such as public opinion, can change rapidly and
provide only a snapshot indication of intervening conditions. Finally, as we explain in Chap-
ter Six, it is very difficult to measure the outputs of influence campaigns in any objective way,
making it even more challenging to assess the effect of intervening factors.
51
Therefore, in this chapter, we offer evidence that is more qualitative and incomplete
than the evidence presented in Chapter Four is. As a result, rather than constituting a final or
comprehensive assessment of intervening factors, this analysis leads us to conclude that more
research is needed to better understand these variables.
Shared Values and Cultural Experiences
One category of intervening factors has to do with the degree to which a targeted country
(in this analysis, one of our focus countries) shares values and cultural experiences with the
influencer state (in this analysis, China, whose influence we compare with that of the United
States). The theory of this intervening factor is that nations are more likely to be influenced by
countries that share their values and experiences, partly because those countries are also more
likely to be politically friendly with one another or to share common strategic perspectives.
Seva Gunitsky, for example, contends that global power transitions tend to result in domestic
governance changes in countries throughout the system; that is, more countries tend to mirror
the domestic structure of a hegemon, and when an existing hegemon declines, so does the
prevalence of its domestic model.1 This theory suggests that rising Chinese power might natu-
rally encourage more autocratic regimes and present a growing challenge to liberal values in the
international system, even before Beijing makes conscious efforts at influence.
One obvious way to measure shared values is to compare regime types. For example, the
Economist Intelligence Unit ranks all but seven of the 20 focus countries to be complete or
incomplete democracies.2 Freedom House is similar in its ranking of countries as free, partly
free, or not free: Only four of the 20 focus countries rate as not free.3 Therefore, most of
these focus countries, including most of the economically significant countries on our list, are
democracies. Because shared regime type can indicate a significant value alignment with the
influencer state, most of the focus countries are more likely to align with the United States
than with China.
Another way to measure shared values is by assessing public opinion on national admira-
tion and affinity. (Chapter Six deals with public opinion as an output variable and offers more-
detailed statistics on these points.) For example, when residents of 36 African countries were
surveyed in 2016 and asked about the most popular model for national development, the U.S.
model came in first place (cited by 30 percent of respondents), but China’s was close behind
(at 24 percent).4 In several countries, China’s model was most popular.5 Interestingly, in this
survey, younger people tended to favor the U.S. model more heavily than the average respon-
dent did, and more-educated cohorts showed a somewhat more-equal distribution between
the U.S. and China models. According to RAND field research, including dialogues with
1 Seva Gunitsky, Aftershocks: Great Powers and Domestic Reforms in the Twentieth Century, Princeton, N.J.: Princeton Uni-
versity Press, 2017.
2 Economist Intelligence Unit, Democracy Index 2019: A Year of Democratic Setbacks and Popular Protest, London, 2020.
3 Freedom House, “Countries and Territories,” webpage, undated.
4 Mogopodi Lekorwe, Anyway Chingwete, Mina Okuru, and Romaric Samson, “China’s Growing Presence in Africa
Wins Largely Positive Popular Reviews,” Afrobarometer, Dispatch No. 122, October 24, 2016, p. 2.
5 Among the countries where the U.S. model enjoyed the top spot in this indicator were Kenya, Morocco, Nigeria, and
Uganda; China’s model held the top spot in Egypt, Mozambique, Niger, and Zambia, among others.
Measuring Chinese Influence: Intervening Factors 53
U.S. embassies and host-nation officials and scholars, even in Thailand—one of the Southeast
Asian countries more amenable to Chinese influence than most—few saw the Chinese system
as an appropriate model for Thailand’s own development.6 And despite the apparent similarity
between Vietnam’s state-led development program and China’s, most Vietnamese officials and
elites did not see China as their model.
Other surveys explicitly ask questions about national affinity. One spring 2019 survey in
Japan and South Korea, for example, found that more than 60 percent of respondents reported
more affinity toward the United States than toward China. Respondents unwilling to make a
choice were the next-largest group; those expressing more affinity toward China than toward
the United States accounted for just 6.3 percent in South Korea and 3.3 percent in Japan.7
We reviewed many polls and dozens of questions that dealt with popular views in the
focus countries on key value issues—for instance, do respondents support democracy and free
speech, and do they believe in tolerance as a political value?8 Perhaps surprisingly, these poll-
ing results were complex and did not align completely with regime type. Residents from some
strong democracies showed less support for specific democratic values than residents of incom-
plete democracies did. Our review of this subset of the data suggested that public attitudes on
key shared values are not a strong and reliable indicator of value-sharing.
In addition to shared values, cultural ties and a history of alignment or contestation can
affect how those in a targeted state perceive an influencer state. In the full intervening factor
category of shared values and cultural experiences, we evaluated seven variables—regime type,
bilateral history of relationship (discord or friendship), national policies relating to shared values
(such as human rights), public opinion, overlapping political culture, popular culture ties, and
language ties. We assigned each variable a value on a scale of 1 to 3, weighting two of the
variables—regime type and bilateral history—slightly more than the others (indicated by darker
shading of that row in the list of variables). We then simply added those values to create a total
for each country, and those countries are plotted on a spectrum. Figure 5.1 displays the results of
this exercise as an affinity index. We found that most of our focus countries have greater affinity
for the United States, significantly (but not exclusively) because of shared values.
This analysis suggests that Chinese influence-seeking will be constrained, to an impor-
tant degree, by the fact that many of the targets of its influence share more values with the
United States than they do with China. Indeed, the authors of one 2018 study make exactly
such an argument, adding the concept of national identity to the equation: After evaluating
public opinion and analyzing official statements and public discourse, Bentley B. Allan, Srdjan
Vucetic, and Ted Hopf conclude that values of democracy and liberal economics are well
entrenched in global great powers (such as India, Brazil, and Germany) and that this creates a
significant barrier to China’s effort to dominate global norms.9 This reality is already emerg-
6 As described earlier in the report, this field research was conducted between 2017 and 2019 for studies related to this
project, and those researchers shared their data and findings with us. The reports describing the field research were not yet
published as of the writing of this report.
7 Genron NPO and East Asia Institute, The 7th Japan-South Korea Joint Public Opinion Poll 2019: Analysis Report on Com-
parative Data, Tokyo, June 2019.
8 We relied mostly on two sources of polling data—Pew Research Center and Gallup—for assessing these and other
issues. See Pew Research Center, “Democracy,” web tool, undated; and Gallup, “World Poll,” web tool, undated.
9 Bentley B. Allan, Srdjan Vucetic, and Ted Hopf, “The Distribution of Identity and the Future of International Order:
China’s Hegemonic Prospects,” International Organization, Vol. 72, No. 4, Fall 2018.
Figure 5.1
Affinity Index
10 5 5 10
Dominant political, social, Significant political,

and cultural affinity with social, and cultural
the U.S.: affinity with China:
Australia Indonesia Malaysia Cambodia
Brazil Italy Nigeria Laos
Ethiopia Japan Philippines Sri Lanka
Germany Kenya Singapore Thailand
India Mexico South Korea Vietnam
Variables in Index Essential Findings

(by degree of weighting) • Most countries are full democracies (the leading
indicator of affinity).
• Regime type (Freedom House rating) • Several have histories of war or conflict with China
• Bilateral history (positive/negative) and strong historical ties with the United States.
• Public opinion on affinity favors the United States
• National policies on shared values
and is growing.
• Public opinion
• U.S. popular culture and the English language still
• Political culture ties dominate Chinese alternatives
• Popular culture ties • Some Asian countries have overlapping elements of
• Language ties, trends political culture with China.
SOURCE: Authors’ analysis of data from Freedom House, undated; public opinion polling (as cited in the main
text); unpublished RAND field research; and other sources on cultural and language ties cited elsewhere in this
report.
ing in Europe, where a reaction to Chinese human rights violations, cyber intrusions, and
intellectual property theft has been growing. It is impossible to quantify this effect precisely,
however. And the effect of shared values is itself constrained by a competing factor: China’s
dominant source of influence—the immense attraction of its economic market and foreign aid
and investment programs. This powerful tool continues to mute the reactions generated from
clashing values and to lead U.S. value-sharing allies and partners (such as Germany, South
Korea, and Indonesia) to overlook differences with China in service of economic gain. Under-
standing the intervening factors shaping China’s influence therefore demands considering a
larger set of intervening issues, such as common interests, which we turn to next.
Common Interests, Purposes, or Perceived Threats
When the influencer and the targeted state have perfectly overlapping interests and purposes,
the relationship is not one of influence so much as of joint action. Any arising arguments are
about means, not ends, and the influencer does not have to coerce or entice the targeted coun-
try to share goals but rather merely work out collective courses of action. This can be challeng-
ing, but the degree of that challenge is very different from that of influencing a state whose
interests strongly conflict with those of the influencer.
For this study, we evaluated the intervening factor category of common interests, pur-
poses, and perceived threats using six variables: history of alignment or contestation, identity
narratives, active territorial disputes, views on major security issues, economic interests, and
attitudes (popular and official) on whether China’s power is a threat or benefit to the targeted
state.10 Table 5.1 summarizes the results, indicating whether each focus country has a nega-
tive or positive interest alignment with China. Red indicates a negative assessment for China
(interests with the focus country diverge), and green indicates a positive interest alignment
with China. Darker shades indicate a stronger degree of negative or positive alignment. Empty
cells indicate that the factor was not a notable concern for that country.
As seen in the table, very few variables are on the positive side of the ledger. The only
variable showing positive alignment is for economic interests, and we judged all focus coun-
tries to be positively aligned with China on that variable. This was a complicated decision
because some countries (including some African and Latin American nations) have shared
economic interests (because of Chinese economic trade, investment, and lending) but only in
a purely transactional manner. These targeted countries do not really share security interests
with China—they do not endorse China’s claim to the South China Sea, for example—but
the overlapping economic interest of a strong trade tie is a significant influence. In such cases,
we represented the variable as somewhat positive. In other cases, the simple desire for trade and
investment with and from China has the potential to cancel out many areas of interest clashes;
in those cases, we represented the variable as strongly positive. This assessment thus reinforces
a general theme of this report: China’s burgeoning economic power is the foundation for its
influence, above and beyond any other considerations.
In the remainder of this section, we dig deeper into each of the six variables assessed in
Table 5.1.
History of Alignment or Contestation

The first variable we examined in this category indicates whether each focus country has a
history of war, rivalry, contestation, friendship, or alliance with the influencer (in this case,
China). For example, we included cases of outright war with China, as well as cases of strong
negative historical memories from Chinese interference in the country’s domestic affairs, such
as support for violent revolutionary movements.
As seen in Table 5.1, many countries in Asia have significant negative historical experi-
ences, including wars with China (Cambodia, India, and Vietnam), recent coercive Chinese
activities (Japan, the Philippines, and South Korea), and domestic crises or civil wars involving
a local Chinese population (Indonesia). Some countries (such as Singapore and Thailand) have
10
The lines between intervening factor categories can be blurry, and some variables can belong in multiple categories.
Public opinion and a history of alignment or contestation are two examples.
Table 5.1
Interest Alignment Between China and the Focus Countries
Attitudes
on Whether
History of Active China’s Power
Alignment or Identity Territorial Views on Major Economic Is a Threat or
Contestation Narratives Disputes Security Issues Interests Benefit
Australia
Brazil
Cambodia
Ethiopia
Germany
India
Indonesia
Italy
Japan
Kenya
Laos
Malaysia
Mexico
Nigeria
Philippines
Singapore
South Korea
Sri Lanka
Thailand
Vietnam
SOURCE: Authors’ judgments based on subject-matter expertise. For some more-specific sources, see, for
instance, the sources cited in this section; Pew Research Center, undated; Gallup, undated; and Bryan A.
Frederick, Paul R. Hensel, and Christopher Macaulay, “The Issue Correlates of War Territorial Claims Data, 1816–
2001,” Journal of Peace Research, Vol. 54, No. 1, 2017.
histories that are less conflictual. Outside of Asia, none of the focus countries has a deep histor-
ical rivalry or alliance with China that is big enough to significantly constrain relations today.
In some countries, such as Thailand, the rise of Chinese influence is partly attributable
to the fact that China has respected the targeted country’s autonomy; Thailand in particular
has moved toward a more authoritarian political system. Such behavior may be a precondition
for lasting, sustainable influence. On the flip side, states that perceived strong Chinese inter-
ference have tended to take stricter measures to limit the influence that Beijing wields and to
resist the application of that influence when it occurs. This fact reinforces the dilemma that
Beijing confronts: As it becomes stronger and more willing to forcibly exercise its influence, it
risks creating the conditions under which that influence weakens.
In addition to considering common interests and purposes in this category, we consider

common perceived threats, which can contribute to whether countries are aligned. Even coun-
tries with significant differences can find common ground in a shared threat. In the case of
the focus countries, most in Asia harbor a perception that China poses at least some threat,
which creates a natural alignment—if muted and incomplete—with the United States. This
emerges in various ways and to various degrees in different countries and among different
interest groups in those countries. For example, in the Philippines, President Rodrigo Duterte
and some key cabinet members are more skeptical of the U.S. relationship, while those in the
military and security services continue to view China as a significant threat and value the U.S.
alliance.11 Broadly speaking, notable fear of the Chinese threat exists in at least eight of the 20
focus countries, and very few, if any, perceive a threat from the United States.
Identity Narratives
A second variable in this category considers identity narratives, particularly the degree to which
a targeted country’s self-conception or identity clashes in some way with China’s. This could
be true, for example, if a country believes it has a natural right to regional leadership in a way
that collides with China’s presumption of eventual regional hegemony.
We found four cases in which national self-conceptions created clearly divergent inter-
ests with China: India, Indonesia, Japan, and Vietnam. All four countries view themselves as
having rightful degrees of regional influence that would appear to clash with China’s concep-
tion. There are other cases in which smaller countries may have well-developed identities of
independence and autonomy that conflict with China’s presumed degree of control. Examples
are Cambodia, Malaysia, and Singapore.
Active Territorial Disputes

Third, we identified countries that have an active and ongoing territorial dispute with China,
and these are listed in Table 5.1. The disputed claims are in the South and East China Seas and
along China’s border with India.
Views on Major Security Issues

For the views on major security issues variable, we considered a variety of global and regional
issues, including UN votes on major security issues; global security threats, such as terrorism and
nuclear proliferation; and regional security issues, relating mostly to competing territorial claims.
The data suggest that neither China nor the United States aligns with or strongly diverges
from most focus countries, except in one area: regional territorial disputes. Table 5.1 indicates
the countries that have taken public positions at odds with China’s claims and interpretation
of maritime law, especially as they relate to the 2016 Permanent Court of Arbitration ruling
that concluded that China has “no legal basis to claim historic rights to the bulk of the South
China Sea.”12
11 Richard Heydarian, “How Tighter Philippines-US Defence Ties Contradict Rodrigo Duterte’s Beijing-Friendly Foreign
Policy,” South China Morning Post, October 20, 2019.
12 Katie Hunt, “South China Sea: Court Rules in Favor of Philippines over China,” CNN, July 12, 2016. For more on the
positions of the 20 focus countries, see Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative, “Arbitration Support Tracker,” webpage,
June 16, 2016a. On UN voting patterns, see U.S. Department of State, Voting Practices in the United Nations, Washington,
D.C., various years.
Economic Interests
The complex variable of economic interests has at least two major components for this analysis:
a targeted country’s interest in preserving good economic relations with China and the coun-
try’s overall economic strategy and stance relative to competing U.S. and Chinese economic
institutions, norms, and standards.
For the second category—the relative economic ties of the focus countries—the evidence
is mixed, as suggested in Table 5.2. Most leading countries are heavily engaged with both the
United States and China. They remain tied to the post–World War II economic institutions
and rules established by the United States. But they also accept engagement with Chinese-led
trade regimes and economic institutions when such engagement does not constitute a zero-
sum choice with the established institutions. Some focus countries have trade disputes with the
United States that mirror those of China in some way. Moreover, China remains aligned with
many aspects of the post-war order, so the overall U.S.-China contest does not demand other
countries to make a fundamental choice. In short, the general economic alignment of focus
countries does not indicate dominant influence for either the United States or China.
In Chapter Four, we reviewed evidence for the first category of economic influence
alignment—dependence on Chinese economic trade, aid, loans and investment. As noted
there, such dependence is growing and provides the single most powerful source of Chinese
influence. In many recent cases in which states or nonstate actors (such as corporations and
sports teams) declined to confront China more vigorously, the leading reason was almost
always economic.
Attitudes (Popular and Official) on Whether China’s Power Is a Threat or a Benefit

We present most public opinion data in Chapter Six, partly because views on China represent
both intervening factors and outputs in our framework for assessing influence. Positive views
of Chinese power are an output sought by Beijing, but general attitudes toward China also
constitute an intervening factor that affects the success of Chinese influence campaigns.
Broadly speaking, the evidence on attitudes toward China suggests significant constraints
on its influence. In Asia, there is substantial suspicion of Chinese motives and very clear con-
cern about Chinese military power. In countries outside Asia, extended economic interaction
with China tends to produce more concerns over time, a trend seen even in Latin America and
Africa (although support for engagement with China remains high). In sum, the public opin-
ion data that we review in detail in Chapter Six point to potential limits on Chinese influence.
Some countries reflect conflicted and hedging positions on this issue. Malaysia is a good
example: Recognizing the economic opportunities of good relations with China, both popular
opinion and official statements appear to distinguish between the actual degree of Chinese
threat and the degree Malaysians are willing to publicly acknowledge.13 This essential pragma-
tism, which is apparent in many Asian and especially Southeast Asian countries, constrains the
degree of overt pushback against Chinese influence, even where the risks of growing Chinese
power are tacitly recognized.
13
See, for example, Cheng-Chwee Kuik, “Making Sense of Malaysia’s China Policy: Asymmetry, Proximity, and Elite’s
Domestic Authority,” Chinese Journal of International Politics, Vol. 6, No. 4, Winter 2013.
Table 5.2
Economic Alignment of the Focus Countries
Asian
Free Trade World Trade World Bank Trade Infrastructure Free Trade
Agreement Organization and IMF Trade Disputes Disputes Investment Agreement
Country with the U.S. Member Member with the U.S. with China Bank Member with China
Australia P P P 6 P P
Brazil P P P
Cambodia P P P P
Ethiopia P P
Germany P P 52 (via EU) 13 (via EU) P
India P P 17 P
Indonesia P P P P
Italy P P 52 (via EU) 13 (via EU) P
+1
Japan P P 14 2
Kenya P P P
Laos P P P P
Malaysia P P P
Mexico P P P 4
Nigeria P P
Philippines P P 5 P P
Singapore P P P P P
South Korea P P P 18 P P
Sri Lanka P P P
Thailand P P P P
Vietnam P P P P
SOURCE: Information on membership was gathered from each organization’s website (World Trade Organization,
“Members and Observers,” webpage, undated; World Bank, “Member Countries,” webpage, undated-b;
IMF, “List of Members,” webpage, April 15, 2020; and Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, “Members and
Prospective Members of the Bank,” webpage, August 27, 2020). Information on trade disputes reflects formal
disputes filed with the World Trade Organization as of July 2018 (John McKenna, “Who the US and China Have
Trade Disputes With,” World Economic Forum, July 6, 2018). Information on free trade agreements is from Office
of the U.S. Trade Representative, “Free Trade Agreements,” webpage, undated; and Ministry of Commerce of the
People’s Republic of China, “China FTA Network,” webpage, undated.
NOTE: Blue text indicates alignment with the United States; red indicates alignment with China.
Conclusion: Interest-Based Intervening Factors

The six variables in this category offer several lessons. First, the area of most-common interest
alignment is in economics—but this could be changing somewhat as more countries become
attuned to the economic risks of engagement with China. Indeed, even absent concerns over
intellectual property, technology transfer, state-led espionage through 5G systems, and other
rising worries, Chinese trade relations were already creating some negative reaction from
domestic industries in many countries. Second, there is a significant divergence between coun-
tries inside and outside Asia: Within the region, mixed histories, active territorial disputes, and
clashing regional identities create natural barriers to shared interests with China. But outside
the region, these barriers do not exist to remotely the same degree, so China influence-seeking
occurs on a more neutral playing field. Third, the barriers to shared interests are, in most cases,
deeply structural rather than transient: They are grounded in perceptions of Chinese power
and intentions and in historical experience, and China will not easily be able to alter them.
Fourth, although we did not include a table depicting the focus countries’ interest alignment
with the United States (similar to Table 5.1), a counterpart table would depict almost no areas
of strongly clashing interests outside Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea, and it would show
significant areas of shared interest.
Implicit Societal Influence, or Soft Power
The next category of intervening factors is an influencer country’s soft-power assets in the
targeted country. As noted earlier, soft power refers to the ability to attract and co-opt others
to one’s goals rather than coerce them. Nye identified three forms of soft power: culture,
political values, and foreign policies.14 The concept of soft power has clear limits as a tool to
assess national influence. Nye stresses that it is difficult, and maybe impossible, for countries
to intentionally wield soft power; it is a quality that emanates from a country’s character and
system. Moreover, it is notoriously difficult to assess how soft power affects outcomes or to
gauge how a large amount of soft power might help a country get what it wants?
China has certainly made dramatic investments in soft-power resources, from state broad-
casting to education scholarships. Scholar David Shambaugh estimates that China may spend
$10 billion per year on foreign propaganda and soft-power endeavors—for example, by pro-
moting Chinese cultural performances and exchanges all over the world.15 Yet, as Shambaugh
and others argue, it is not clear what China is getting for these efforts. As we discuss later in
this report, polling data show growing skepticism about China’s role and policies. And both
objective and anecdotal data suggest that China’s soft power is not providing the intervening
boost that Beijing may have hoped.
For example, by far the most comprehensive analysis of global soft power is the Soft
Power 30, a quantitative assessment by the public relations and branding firm Portland Com-
14 Nye, 2011.
15 David Shambaugh, “China’s Soft-Power Push: The Search for Respect,” Foreign Affairs, Vol. 94, No. 4, July–August
2015; and Melik Kaylan, “China Has a Soft-Power Problem,” Wall Street Journal, September 5, 2019. See also David
Shambaugh, China Goes Global: The Partial Power, New York: Oxford University Press, 2013; and “China Is Spending Bil-
lions to Make the World Love It,” The Economist, May 23, 2017. For an argument that China’s soft-power profile is likely to
grow, see Young Nam Cho and Jong Ho Jeong, “China’s Soft Power: Discussions, Resources, and Prospects,” Asian Survey,
Vol. 48, No. 3, May–June 2008.
munications and other partners. It aggregates dozens of variables in seven categories—culture,

digital, education, engagement, enterprise, government, and polling—into an index of soft
power. Example variables include a country’s level of tourism, the popularity of its music
and food, the number of Facebook followers for the head of state, the number of top uni-
versities, and the level of development aid to other countries. By this index, China does not
do very well: It comes in 27th of the 30 and is significantly outstripped in global soft power
by much smaller countries, such as France, Sweden, Switzerland, and Canada. (The United
States comes in fifth.)16
More-anecdotal and case-based research points to the same limits on China’s soft-power
capacities. As noted in Chapter Four, the attractive force of the China model is limited, given
how unique it is to a single context. A detailed analysis of public opinion data and affinity rat-
ings in Asia found that China has a real handicap: Its values generate attractive power only in
the economic arena, but such power can wax and wane with China’s economic fortunes; U.S.
values of freedom and democracy are more timeless.17
Part of the problem for China is that soft power more naturally emerges from free, open,
vibrant, and liberal societies.18 In the Soft Power 30 rankings for 2019, all of the top 26 coun-
tries were open democracies, with the partial exception of Singapore. China, Russia, Hungary,
and Turkey rounded out the top 30, but the correlation between liberal democracy and soft
power seems clear. Because China’s soft-power enterprises, such as broadcasting and social
media, are associated with the state, there is natural suspicion about the messages they pres-
ent. Many of China’s recent activities—such as its crackdown on democracy activists in Hong
Kong, its human rights violations of Muslims in Xinjiang province, and its meddling in free
speech abroad—are hallmarks of an authoritarian state that will surely erode the attractive
power of the China model.
Most importantly, China’s soft-power efforts are aimed in contexts where suspicion of
China is very high for historical and geopolitical reasons. Territorial disputes and historical
enmities limit the effect of Chinese soft power in key states, such as Indonesia.19 In other cases,
such as Vietnam, the level of animosity to Chinese power is very intense; in India, a more
intense phase of concern about a rising China predated the new surge of worry in the United
States. In cases where states have a significant ethnic Chinese population, the arrival of Chi-
nese soft power carries particular risks.
All of these factors appear to be limiting the value for China of soft power as a helpful
intervening factor. As China’s economic growth slows and other economic and social stresses
mount, as many expect them to, the natural appeal of the China model will further dim. And
if China’s trend toward greater authoritarianism and its tendency to meddle in other societies
rises as well, the attractive force of China’s soft power will further erode. China’s massive global
economic weight—and specific soft-power programs, such as development aid—mean that it
will continue to enjoy some soft-power influence. But that form of power is not likely to be
16 Portland Communications, The Soft Power 30: A Global Ranking of Soft Power, London, 2019.
17 Kai-Ping Huang and Bridget Welsh, “Economic Context, Values, and Soft Power Competition in Southeast Asia: An
Individual-Level Analysis,” Asian Barometer, Working Paper No. 134, 2017.
18 Kaylan, 2019.
19 Juniar Laraswanda Umagapi, “The Rise of China-Indonesia Relationship: Soft Power, Resources, and Prospect in the
Future,” Indonesian Perspective, Vol. 2, No. 2, July–December 2017.
any more than an indeterminate intervening factor in China’s search for influence. The United
States and its allies and partners have a tremendous competitive advantage in this area, which
they could further capitalize on with additional investments in key soft-power endeavors.
Mastery of the Local Context in the Targeted State
One intervening factor that can affect how well a state’s inputs achieve influence in a targeted
society is the state’s mastery of the local context. How well does it understand the political and
social levers to pull to get what it wants? Does it enjoy personal relationships with influential
figures? Does it have a strong sense of what has worked and what has not to achieve influence
over time? Does it have powerful programs in place to gain influence in specific countries?
The case studies examined in Chapter Seven suggest that an important factor associated
with successful cases of Chinese influence-seeking is Beijing’s ability to manipulate local politi-
cal, economic, and social events to its benefit. If China’s mammoth economic magnet is the
gravitational center of its influence, then its ability to reach into other countries and effectively
manipulate perceptions and events is the predominant tool. The two go together, of course;
China’s economic power is a chief mechanism for manipulating incentives and behavior in
other countries. Beijing appears to view the United Front Work Department—the agency
responsible for efforts both inside and outside China “to co-opt and neutralize sources of
potential opposition to the policies and authority of its ruling Chinese Communist Party”—as
a leading tool for pursuing these goals.20
Yet it is exceptionally difficult to accurately measure China’s mastery of the local contexts
in countries that it seeks to influence. We examined various sources of evidence to evaluate this
intervening factor. We spoke to U.S. diplomats who had served in countries where China was
active and asked them about the degree of effectiveness they saw on the ground. We consulted
RAND experts on key targeted countries of Chinese influence. And we searched for articles
about Chinese involvement in local contexts and reviewed studies of the United Front Work
Department’s activities.
The primary finding from this research is that no comprehensive and reliable data exist to
assess this factor. The sum of the evidence we reviewed points to a very mixed picture: China
clearly has significant contacts in many societies across a variety of sectors and can use its eco-
nomic relationships to leverage its influence in these groups. But China also often acts in a
heavy-handed or ineffective manner; its interlocutors sometimes behave without sensitivity to
local cultures or traditions; and it appears to take generic, centralized approaches as often as
it develops nuanced, highly specialized strategies tailored to the local context. These are very
broad, qualitative inferences drawn from available information, however, and the single most
important lesson of this analysis is that the U.S. government’s awareness of the issue needs to
be much more detailed.
Diplomatic Representation
As just one example of the data we gathered to inform this judgment, we looked for informa-
tion about China’s diplomatic representation in the focus countries to help us gain insight into
20
Alexander Bowe, China’s Overseas United Front Work: Background and Implications for the United States, Washington,
D.C.: U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, August 24, 2018, p. 3.
the quality and effectiveness of such representation. In the absence of open-source treatments
of the issue, most of the data were gathered from the local Chinese embassy websites.21 This
included information on China’s current (2019) ambassador to the focus country, the number
of high-level positions at the embassy, the number of consulate generals in the country, and
whether the embassy website was available in the local language. Then, we analyzed details on
the current ambassador, which helped us judge the level of importance China places on the role
of ambassador to each focus country. In particular, we noted how long the current ambassador
had held the post compared with the average length for a Chinese ambassador for that country,
and we determined the ambassador’s years of experience in the region.
The embassy websites for each country were an interesting window into the priority of
reaching the local population. Seven of the websites, including those for Cambodia, India, and
the Philippines, lacked information in the local language. Additionally, the length of appoint-
ment for each ambassador had some notable variation: Although the length for most countries
was between 3.1 and 3.6 years, the shortest average appointment was 2.2 years in Singapore,
and the longest average appointment was 4.2 years in Germany (see Table 5.3). Meanwhile, we
found that the amount of experience each ambassador held in the region also varied consider-
ably (Table 5.4). The Chinese ambassador to Brazil held the largest amount of regional experi-
Table 5.3
Average Length of Chinese Ambassador
Appointment, by Select Focus Country
Country Years
Germany 4.2
Indonesia 3.7
Thailand 3.7
Cambodia 3.6
Vietnam 3.6
India 3.5
Italy 3.5
Nigeria 3.4
South Korea 3.3
Australia 3.2
Kenya 3.2
Mexico 3.2
Brazil 3.1
Sri Lanka 3.1
Malaysia 2.8
Philippines 2.8
Singapore 2.2
SOURCE: Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People’s
Republic of China, undated-a.
21
For links to Chinese embassy websites throughout the world, see Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of
China, “Chinese Embassies,” webpage, undated-a.
Table 5.4
Details on the Chinese Ambassador to Each Focus Country, 2019
Year Ambassadorship
Country Ambassador Began Previous Years of Experience in the Region
Brazil Yang Wanming 2018 29
Japan Kong Xuanyou 2018 27
Mexico Zhu Qingqiao 2019 19
Germany Wu Ken 2019 17
Cambodia Wang Wentian 2018 9
India Sun Weidong 2019 7
Malaysia Bai Tian 2017 7
Vietnam Xiong Bo 2018 7
Indonesia Xiao Qian 2017 6
Kenya Wu Peng 2019 3
Thailand Lu Jian 2017 3
Philippines Zhao Jianhua 2016 2
Australia Cheng Jingye 2016 0
Italy Li Junhua 2019 0
Sri Lanka Cheng Xueyuan 2018 0
Ethiopia Tan Jian 2017 0
Singapore Hong Ziaoyong 2018 Number of years was not available, but the
ambassador does have experience in Japan,
Singapore, Hong Kong, and Vietnam
Laos Jiang Zaidong 2018 Number of years was not available, but the
ambassador does have prior experience in
Vietnam and the Asia Department of China’s
Ministry of Foreign Affairs
South Korea Qiu Guohong 2014 Not available
Nigeria Zhou Pingjian 2016 Not available
SOURCE: Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of China, undated-a.
ence (29 years), and the ambassador to Mexico had 19 years of regional experience. Together,
these two ambassadors held 44 percent of the total relevant regional experience held by all
ambassadors in the focus countries.
This one category of data (diplomatic representation) illustrates how challenging it was to
meaningfully assess China’s mastery of local contexts. There is simply not enough open-source
evidence to make a conclusive judgment. The available information implies a mixed picture,
but our primary conclusion is that more research is needed on this issue.
Activities of the United Front Work Department

The United Front Work Department appears to have a prominent place in China’s plans for
influence, particularly in the Indo-Pacific region and in places with large ethnic Chinese pop-
ulations.22 The department’s activities count partly as an input to influence, but their ability to
provide China with a mastery of local contexts is also an intervening factor.
Beijing employs the organization in a variety of ways, such as attempting to exploit
schisms in the Buddhist community in Mongolia, fostering independence movements in Oki-
nawa, and encouraging bloc voting in Australia and New Zealand to increase pro-Beijing
voices in those countries’ parliaments. Generally, United Front activities include, for example,
disseminating propaganda, hosting influencers from targeted countries at conferences, and
intervening in foreign political processes. The department is the Chinese Communist Party’s
single most direct institutional arm of Chinese influence.
Through its United Front activities, China is attempting to make societies on a mass level
more friendly to Beijing and, in some instances, to plug United Front–connected individuals
directly into the political system in democratic states. One of the department’s main goals is to
tie ethnic Chinese populations back to Beijing, particularly in such critical fields as business,
media, and academia. Many of these populations were not particularly pro-Beijing during the
Cold War, but, through the United Front, Beijing is trying to turn them into a useful tool of
influence. The department also supports China’s efforts to conduct surveillance of overseas
Chinese populations and regulate the attitudes that they express.23
Recent years have seen significant new revelations about United Front activities in such
countries as Australia, Canada, and New Zealand. Specific targeted-nation politicians have
been tied to United Front activities, and ethnic Chinese community leaders have been revealed
as having significant roles in United Front organizations.
Beyond these general themes, some evidence about a refurbishment of United Front insti-
tutions and programs in the past several years, and some high-profile reporting on specific
cases of Chinese political meddling—notably, in Australia, New Zealand, and Taiwan—there
is little conclusive basis to assess the effectiveness of the department’s activities. In a 2019
RAND report, we assessed extensive Russian disinformation and political interference activi-
ties in the United States and Europe—activities that partly but not fully parallel those of the
United Front Work Department—and found mixed evidence for impact.24 For the present
analysis, we found nothing more than highly incomplete, anecdotal reporting on the effects
of department activities in various countries. It is also difficult to separate the effects of those
22 Information in this section was derived from Bowe, 2018; Takashi Suzuki, “China’s United Front Work in the Xi Jinping
Era—Institutional Developments and Activities,” Journal of Contemporary East Asia Studies, Vol. 8, No. 1, 2019; Mercy A.
Kuo, “China’s United Front Work: Propaganda as Policy,” The Diplomat, February 14, 2018; David Shullman, ed., Chinese
Malign Influence and the Corrosion of Democracy: An Assessment of Chinese Interference in Thirteen Key Countries, Wash-
ington, D.C.: International Republican Institute, 2019; Anne-Marie Brady, “Magic Weapons: China’s Political Influence
Activities Under Xi Jinping,” paper presented at the Corrosion of Democracy Under China’s Global Influence conference,
Arlington, Va., September 16–17, 2017; and Peter Mattis and Alex Joske, “The Third Magic Weapon: Reforming China’s
United Front,” War on the Rocks, June 24, 2019.
23 Gerry Groot, “The Long Reach of China’s United Front Work,” The Interpreter, November 6, 2017.
24 Michael J. Mazarr, Abigail Casey, Alyssa Demus, Scott W. Harold, Luke J. Matthews, Nathan Beauchamp-Mustafaga,
and James Sladden, Hostile Social Manipulation: Present Realities and Emerging Trends, Santa Monica, Calif.: RAND Cor-
poration, RR-2713-OSD, 2019.
programs from other sources of influence, such as a desire for access to Chinese markets and
foreign investment.
In sum, the United Front Work Department represents a powerful effort by the Chi-
nese government to master local contexts through connections to local politicians, influenc-
ers, Chinese students and ethnic populations, targeted-nation businesses and business leaders,
and others. However, the degree of mastery over local contexts the department provides is not
known and demands further research.
Vulnerability of the Targeted State to Outside Influence
One intervening factor that helps explain the degree to which inputs can lead to outputs of
influence is the degree to which the political system of the targeted country is susceptible to
influence. We assessed this factor using three variables: the degree of corruption in the politi-
cal system, the role of elites in supporting Chinese influence, and the measures undertaken to
protect the political system from foreign influence.
Degree of Corruption in the Political System

Several existing indexes rank levels of transparency, corruption, and rule of law in various
countries. Such characteristics have been a particular concern in regard to avenues of Chinese
investment, such as the Belt and Road Initiative, whose funds are arguably less conditioned on
a recipient country’s good governance (compared with other countries’ development assistance
funds) and could allow China to take advantage of local corruption to achieve influence. We
reviewed dozens of indicators of corruption, including
• multiple indexes compiled by PRS Group, a political risk consulting firm, for its Interna-
tional Country Risk Guide; example measures include civil disorder, civil war, internal
disorder, government stability, and political risk
• Center for Systemic Peace indexes, including on civil violence, civil war, ethnic violence,
and state fragility, built from Polity and other established political science databases
• World Values Survey questions about national legitimacy and corruption from the sixth
wave of the survey
• World Bank Worldwide Governance Indicators, including government effectiveness, reg-
ulatory environment, and rule of law
• World Justice Project rule of law index
• Transparency International’s corruption perceptions index.25
These indicators provided a mixed relationship between a targeted state’s degree of corruption
and the degree of Chinese influence over the state’s behavior.
25 PRS Group, “The International Country Risk Guide (ICRG),” webpage, undated; Center for Systemic Peace, “INSCR
Data Page,” web tool, undated; R. Inglehart, C. Haerpfer, A. Moreno, C. Welzel, K. Kizilova, J. Diez-Medrano, M. Lagos,
P. Norris, E. Ponarin, B. Puranen, et al., eds., World Values Survey: Round Six, Country-Pooled Datafile Version, Madrid:
JD Systems Institute, 2014; World Bank, “Worldwide Governance Indicators,” data set, November 7, 2019b; World Justice
Project, World Justice Project Rule of Law Index 2019, Washington, D.C., February 2019; and Transparency International,
“Corruption Perceptions Index,” web tool, undated. In each case, we used the most recent data available as of late 2019.
Next, we sought to provide a simplified summary of an overarching indicator—the qual-

ity of the rule of law, as assessed by the World Bank.26 We categorized each focus country as
having either strong rule-of-law measures or weaker rule-of-law measures. The countries that
we assessed to have strong measures are Australia, Germany, Italy (although its measures have
some weaknesses), Japan, Singapore, and South Korea. The countries that we assessed to have
weaker rule-of-law measures are Brazil, Cambodia, Ethiopia, India, Indonesia, Kenya, Laos,
Malaysia, Mexico, Nigeria, Philippines, Sri Lanka, Thailand, and Vietnam. These categories
make clear that many targets of Chinese influence have imperfectly developed institutions to
safeguard the rule of law. Other indicators of governance quality—such as government effec-
tiveness and corruption—tend to break down the focus countries into the same two baskets,
with a significant degree of variation in each list.
Public opinion data on the legitimacy of institutions and the degree of corruption show
highly uneven and unclear results. Opinion data in some countries with capable institutions,
such as Australia, show high degrees of public skepticism about those institutions, whereas
data in some countries with less-effective governance, such as Indonesia, nonetheless show
some confidence in the institutions. As just one example, in Pew Research Center polling from
2020, 58 percent of respondents in Indonesia pronounced themselves “satisfied” with their
democracy, whereas only 41 percent of respondents in France and 43 percent of respondents
in Japan did.27 In other cases—such as Canada, the Netherlands, and Sweden—strong-rule-
of-law countries did demonstrate among the highest satisfaction with the operation of democ-
racy, but overall public confidence in institutions is not always well correlated with objective
measures of governance.
Moreover, tying these characteristics to national behavior is challenging. It might appear
obvious that countries with problematic rule-of-law indicators and the potential for corruption
would be highly vulnerable to Chinese influence. But this is not necessarily the case, partly
because other variables (such as clashing interests, a history of conflict, and misaligned values)
can counteract the potential effects of such vulnerabilities. Broadly speaking, the list of coun-
tries with weaker rule-of-law measures does not clearly correlate to countries that have been
weak in pushing back against Chinese influence.
Figure 5.2 provides one example of an effort to connect corruption and other rule-of-law
variables to outputs. The figure, based on an Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative analysis,
shows a correlation between an indicator of governance quality (the Freedom House rating28)
and a country’s degree of public support for the 2016 Hague ruling that denied China’s territo-
rial claims in the South China Sea. This analysis does show a statistical relationship between
these two factors, although it may be colored by regional placement: Many countries with high
governance scores are in Europe, whereas countries that are more likely to equivocate are close
to China and under the direct shadow of Chinese power. That, rather than governance qual-
ity, may be the critical variable.
Generally, in fact, the correlation between governance quality and Chinese influence
is very uneven. Some countries with lower governance scores, such as India and Vietnam,
26 World Bank, “Government Effectiveness,” web tool, undated-a.

27 Aidan Connaughton, Nicholas Kent, and Shannon Schumacher, “How People Around the World See Democracy in
8 Charts,” Pew Research Center, February 27, 2020.
28 Freedom House, undated.
Figure 5.2
Link Between Corruption, Governance, and Support for 2016 Hague Arbitration Ruling
100
Czech Republic
Spain
Cyprus Germany
U.K. Sweden
Finland
Poland Estonia Australia
Slovenia
Canada
Netherlands
Luxembourg
New Zealand
Denmark
Malta Portugal
Lithuania France
Ireland
Japan
Belgium
Italy Slovakia Taiwan U.S.
90 Croatia
Latvia
Romania
Greece South Korea
Bulgaria Hungary
80 Serbia
India
Montenegro
70
Philippines
Indonesia
Freedom House ranking
60 Bosnia & Herzegovina
Singapore
50
Malaysia
Pakistan
40
Algeria
Cambodia Thailand
30 Myanmar
Russia
Vietnam
20
China
Laos
10
Sudan
Syria
0
10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
Corruption Perceptions Index
Stances
Opposing arbitration ruling
Making neutral statements, without addressing ruling
Positively acknowledging ruling, but not calling for compliance
Calling for ruling to be respected
SOURCE: Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative, “Who Is Taking Sides After the South China Sea Ruling?”
August 15, 2016b. Used with permission.
count as China’s most consistent critics and rivals. Others, including Indonesia, Malaysia, and
the Philippines, have pushed back powerfully on Beijing’s South China Sea claims. Mean-
while, some countries with very high governance scores—such as Australia, Canada, New
Zealand, and Taiwan—have been subject to some of the most wide-ranging and effective
Chinese manipulation efforts. David Dollar and other analysts studying influence levers have
pointed out that, over time, China has been improving the conditions and practices required
for a country to receive investments through the Belt and Road Initiative, and investments in
areas of high corruption pose a significant risk for China; poor ratings on governance indica-
tors may be even less correlated with Chinese influence in the future.29
One issue with making such correlations is the analytical problem that bedevils any gen-
eral assessment of Chinese influence—the predominance of hedging strategies, especially in
Asia. When so many countries are determined to avoid taking a positive stance against Chi-
nese influence, it is difficult to assess the impact of influence—or intervening factors, such as
governance quality.
In sum, therefore, the degree of a targeted state’s corruption provides some intervening
filter in determining the effectiveness of Chinese influence. It does not appear to be the deci-
sive variable, however, and outlier cases are readily apparent. This again points to the role of
Chinese economic weight as the most fundamental variable governing countries’ reactions to
Chinese influence-seeking efforts.
The Role of Elites in Supporting Chinese Influence

One intervening factor that helps explain the degree to which various inputs produce influence
is the role of a targeted country’s elites in supporting the expression of Chinese power. Elite
support for Chinese influence can come about in various ways, such as elites harboring genu-
ine sympathy for the China model or for Chinese objectives, receiving material benefits from
Chinese economic involvement (e.g., when elite-owned businesses profit from joint ventures),
receiving open and legal economic benefits offered to elites (e.g., funding for research or lavish
conferences and honoraria), and accepting illegal bribes.
This general phenomenon is present in all the focus countries to some degree. China’s
global economic role creates a natural source of elite connections, especially in business com-
munities but also in governments. China has invested billions of dollars in outreach campaigns
to regional and global elites—for example, bringing them to China for all-expenses-paid con-
ferences, supporting universities and think tanks, and inviting elites to China’s official delega-
tion visits. China can also cultivate ties in countries with large ethnic Chinese populations.
The rise of such an outward-directed economic superpower is bound to generate influence
networks with global elites. (Of course, in many countries—such as Vietnam and, to a lesser
degree, Germany—some elites oppose these ties and influence networks in reaction to perceiv-
ing China as a rising threat.)
Our research also points to significant risks of elite-based diplomacy. In some cases, such
as when Chinese bribery of officials is revealed, there can be very clear and specific blowback.
Cultivating influence through ethnic Chinese populations has generated some local reactions
in countries where such individuals are seen as a conduit of Chinese influence, as has recently
occurred in Australia.30 More generally, though, a variety of recent open-source reporting and
polling suggests some degree of popular resentment at the view that China is gaining transac-
tional assistance from elites who are benefiting from the relationship, sometimes at the expense
29 David Dollar, China and the West Competing over Infrastructure in Southeast Asia, Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institu-
tion, April 2020.
30 Amy Searight, “Countering China’s Influence Operations: Lessons from Australia,” Center for Strategic and Interna-
tional Studies, May 8, 2020.
of the broader population.31 How this plays out can complicate China’s pursuit of influence
through elite connections.
Measures Undertaken to Protect the Political System from Foreign Influence

The degree of corruption and the role of elites do not fully capture all of the variables that
might make a targeted state vulnerable to foreign influence. For instance, Australia and New
Zealand usually rank very highly on measures of rule of law and transparency and low on
corruption. Decisionmaking in those countries is also relatively diffused, with many contend-
ing interest groups, robust judicial systems, and administrative states. When considering only
those measures, we might presume that Australia and New Zealand are not particularly vul-
nerable to foreign influence, but China has made huge efforts to influence each country’s
political system.
We therefore sought a variable that considers the measures that a country takes to pro-
tect its political system from foreign influence. Until 2018, the federal government in Aus-
tralia had no laws whatsoever against foreign money influencing an election.32 New Zealand
has extremely permissive political-financing laws and few independent checks on the political
system’s level of foreign influence, with political parties and governments largely left to police
themselves.33 Both countries have elected people with significant ties to Beijing and the United
Front Work Department. Part of the reason that we know about these conditions is because
the countries are transparent, but they are also vulnerable to influence because of their legal
regime on foreign interference.
One way to assess a targeted state’s susceptibility to outside influence in politics is simply
to look at whether the country has a ban on foreign political contributions. To do this, we used
2020 data compiled by the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance.
The data set revealed that, of our focus countries, Australia, Brazil, Cambodia, Ethiopia,
India, Indonesia, Japan, Kenya, Mexico, Nigeria, the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand
had such bans; for comparison, so did Spain and Taiwan. Of our focus countries, Germany,
Italy, Malaysia, and Sri Lanka did not have such bans; for comparison, Greece, the Nether-
lands, New Zealand, South Africa, and Switzerland did not. (Laos, South Korea, and Vietnam
were not included in the data set.)34
In theory, countries with such bans should be better insulated against influence, but that
is not always the case. For example, the United States has such a law, yet foreign influence in
the 2016 presidential and other elections has been a significant issue. Thus, this measure ide-
ally would include such nuanced qualitative assessments as which countries are enforcing such
laws and their independence from the political process. But reliable data on such qualitative
measures do not yet exist for all focus countries. This reemphasizes a basic theme of the report:
The United States needs much better information on China’s efforts to shape targeted societies
through election interference and other means.
31 See, for example, Christopher Balding, “Why Democracies Are Turning Against Belt and Road,” Foreign Affairs, Octo-
ber 24, 2018. For 2020 polling data that reflect these and related trends, see Silver, Devlin, and Huang, 2020.
32 Kelsey Munro, “Australia’s New Foreign-Influence Laws: Who Is Targeted?” The Interpreter, December 5, 2018.
33 Jamie Smyth, “New Zealand Plans Laws to Curb Foreign Influence in Politics,” Financial Times, March 10, 2019.
34 International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance, “Is There a Ban on Donations from Foreign Interests to
Political Parties?” webpage, Political Finance Database, undated.
In the case studies in Chapter Seven, we discuss many examples of Chinese political
interference. One broad lesson to be drawn from those cases is that political influence is a
somewhat wasting asset: Once it is unveiled—in the form of specific political leaders beholden
to Beijing or campaign interference in the form of cash—the targeted countries tend to take
action to limit such effects in the future. It is too early to tell how this trend will unfold over
time, but it would be wrong to assume a linear growth of Chinese political interference.
A Vulnerability Index
We combined measures on six variables related to a targeted state’s susceptibility to outside
influence and generated a rough vulnerability index. The measures are the corruption percep-
tions index, a rule-of-law rating, the economic dependency index, Chinese engagement in local
affairs, the size of the local ethnic Chinese population, and a history of Chinese capture of—or
overwhelming influence over—the country’s political leadership. All variables were weighted
equally. The results of our index are displayed in Figure 5.3.
Figure 5.3
Vulnerability Index
Most
Essential Findings vulnerable: 15
• Ratings are powerfully influenced by two Cambodia
factors: degree of corruption and the size of Indonesia
the ethnic Chinese population in a targeted Laos
state. Malaysia
– Corruption concern: Cambodia, Kenya, Philippines
Nigeria, the Philippines, Vietnam Sri Lanka
– Diaspora influence: Thailand, Malaysia, Thailand
Singapore, Indonesia, the Philippines, Vietnam
Australia
10
• The most vulnerable states are those
physically close to China with a long history
of conflict with China and a large ethnic Somewhat
Chinese population. vulnerable:
• All major Asian countries are significantly Australia
vulnerable across at least three factors of Brazil
the index. Ethiopia
India
• Vulnerability correlates imperfectly with
Italy
influence outcomes. Influence is more 5
Japan
correlated with a mix of (1) basic economic
Kenya
need and opportunity and (2) the absence
Mexico
of powerful security disputes.
Nigeria
Singapore
South Korea
Variables in Index
Germany
• Corruption perceptions index
• World Bank rule-of-law rating
0
• Economic dependency index
• Chinese sociopolitical ties
• Ethnic Chinese population
• History of political leader capture
SOURCE: Author analysis of World Bank, 2019b; Transparency International, undated; the economic dependency
and sociopolitical ties statistics cited in previous chapters; Academy for Cultural Diplomacy, “Chinese Diaspora
Across the World: A General Overview,” undated; and Daniel Goodkind, The Chinese Diaspora: Historical Legacies
and Contemporary Trends, Washington, D.C.: U.S. Census Bureau, August 2019.
The variables in this index are not weighted; the vulnerability ratings would differ if, for
example, economic dependency or the size of the ethnic Chinese population was more heav-
ily weighted. One notable lesson from the results of this index is that vulnerability measures
alone do not equate to influence: Some highly vulnerable countries are also highly resistant
to Chinese coercion. Instead, economic need, clashing interests, and vulnerability to outside
influence combine to affect influence outcomes.
Domestic and International Context
The sixth category of intervening factors is the domestic and international context for influence-
seeking. Trends and realities in the domestic life of the targeted state, as well as international
trends, can either magnify or suppress the effectiveness of Chinese influence efforts.
In Chapter Seven, we examine the domestic context of several targets of Chinese influ-
ence. Whether those influence efforts succeed or fail can depend on several factors, such as
whether the targeted state is politically and economically stable, its ethnic and societal stresses,
and the size of the Chinese diaspora there. There are no generic trends or relationships in the
domestic and international context variable. Rather, it merely emphasizes that any assessment
of potential Chinese influence must be case-specific and consider the context in the targeted
country.
Our analysis points to the following international trends since roughly 2003 that have
created an uncharacteristically helpful context for Chinese influence efforts:
• significant harm to the United States’ image globally in the wake of the Iraq War and
revelations about U.S. torture and drone programs
• the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis, which both sowed new doubt about neoliberal
economic models and created very specific economic distress
• strong, if slowing, economic growth in China and a significant, though perhaps tempo-
rary, persistence of the attractive effect of China’s economic model
• rising polarization in the United States and Europe and the growth of right-wing popu-
list movements, which dimmed the attractiveness of liberal democratic models, produced
skepticism of traditional mechanisms of international engagement, and created vulner-
abilities for outside actors to play on
• the rise of populism elsewhere, such as in the Philippines and Hungary, which brought
to power leaders willing to break with established alliance patterns and work more closely
with Beijing
• political gridlock in the United States, which has obstructed more-vigorous bipartisan
responses to China-related economic and diplomatic challenges.
Globally, therefore, Beijing could hardly have wished for a period more amenable to the
appeal of its influence in many countries. Some of these supportive trends (such as polariza-
tion in the West) appear somewhat structural and are unlikely to disappear in the next several
years. Others are more subject to rapid shifts. These facts reemphasize an overall lesson of
the analysis: Success in the competition for influence is as much about how the United States
responds to current challenges as it is about anything China does or does not do.
Conclusions
This analysis of intervening factors offers several broad lessons. First, and most importantly,
we do not have a very good empirical basis for making judgments about the role or current effect
of intervening factors across countries. The open-source basis for understanding the degree to
which these factors are accelerating or constraining Chinese influence—and, in particular,
the degree to which China is expert or poor at manipulating them—remains very weak. As
opposed to the input variables, for which there is ample basis for measurement, the intervening
factors are poorly studied and offer little basis for accurate measurement.
Second, as a result, the U.S. government should make more-elaborate efforts to gather on-
the-ground information to assess the effect of intervening factors on Chinese influence-seeking, par-
ticularly in regard to China’s mastery of local contexts and the effectiveness of China’s influ-
ence campaigns. These will ultimately be qualitative assessments—no simple indexes will be
possible in such complex factors—but they can potentially provide much more elaborate and
telling data than are currently available.
Third, to the degree that available information does offer lessons, they tend to emphasize con-
straints on Chinese influence. In our assessment of many of the intervening factors outlined in
this chapter, we found potential barriers to Chinese influence. These begin with shared (or
divergent) values and interests, especially in Asia, but also include such issues as the domestic
contexts of targeted countries and existing territorial or other disputes. China is operating in
a rich and often complicated historical context, especially in Asia, that creates natural buffers
to how influential it can be.
In the emerging strategic competition between the United States and China, the United
States can do much to take advantage of these realities. For example, it can emphasize shared
values in explicit ways, publicize China’s attacks on or threats to the interests of targeted coun-
tries, and gather far more-nuanced information on local Chinese influence activities. Through
these and other strategies for competition, the United States can take seriously the importance
of these intervening factors and use them to advance U.S. goals and interests.
CHAPTER SIX
Measuring Chinese Influence: Outputs
Directly measuring the outputs of Chinese influence efforts is generally expected to be diffi-
cult. Many outputs that China seeks—such as a policy or strategy change in the targeted state,
a political or economic cost imposed, or a shift in public opinion that favors China over the
West—may be hidden, difficult to interpret, or determined by a wide variety of factors beyond
China’s efforts. This is, of course, why Chapters Four and Five provide data on Chinese inputs
and intervening factors. Nonetheless, some outputs of China’s influence efforts may be mea-
surable, in part or in full. In this chapter, we survey several categories of output variables. In
Chapter Seven, we evaluate outcomes in a different way, through brief case studies.
Public Opinion Variables
As noted in Chapter Four, public opinion has a role in all three elements of our framework:
inputs, intervening factors, and outputs. Because one of China’s end goals is to improve how it
is viewed around the world, in this section, we examine measures of public opinion as output
variables. To assess the status of public opinion toward China in the 20 focus countries, we
reviewed all publicly available polling data that we could identify (dating back to various years,
depending on the topic). To improve the depth of our data, we also purchased access to coun-
try data from the Gallup World Poll, which is not publicly accessible.1 In addition to collect-
ing the raw opinion data, we reviewed available studies dealing with public opinion on China.
One challenge is that data on how each focus country’s population views China are very
uneven. For some countries, the annual Pew Research Center polling offers consistent, long-
term trends on specific questions (Table 6.1). In other cases, regional focus polls, such as the
Eurobarometer or Afrobarometer, ask some consistent and some differing questions across dif-
ferent years.2 Some countries, such as Indonesia, have relatively poor opinion polling. Others,
such as Australia (through the Lowy Institute Poll), benefit from extensive and in-depth annual
surveys that provide a nuanced time series of data on views toward China.3
As we would expect, public views on China in the diverse set of focus countries were very
mixed. If anything, the most general global trend was negative: Many notable countries, includ-
ing most on our focus list, saw a decline in favorability toward China since 2015. In addition,
our review of the opinion data and related studies produced the following general findings.
1 Gallup, undated.
2 European Parliament, “Eurobarometer,” web tool, undated; and Afrobarometer, homepage, undated.
3 Lowy Institute, “China—Lowy Institute Poll 2020,” web tool, 2020.
75
Table 6.1
Public Favorability Ratings on China, by Select Focus Country, 2014–2018
Percentage of Population with an Percentage of Population with a

Unfavorable View of China Favorable View of China
Country 2014 2015 2017 2018 2014 2015 2017 2018
Australia 33 32 47 57 64 48
Brazil 44 36 25 33 44 55 52 49
Germany 64 60 53 54 28 34 34 39
India 39 32 41 37 31 41 26 12
Indonesia 25 22 36 32 66 63 55 53
Italy 70 57 59 60 26 40 31 29
Kenya 16 22 21 17 74 70 54 67
Malaysia 17 17 74 78
Mexico 38 34 23 27 43 47 43 45
Nigeria 14 14 13 17 70 70 72 61
Philippines 58 43 40 43 38 54 55 53
South Korea 42 37 61 60 56 61 34 38
Vietnam 78 74 16 19 10
SOURCE: Pew Research Center, “Global Indicators Database,” web tool, 2019.
NOTE: We do not include data for 2016 because those data were less comprehensive than the data in the other
years. Empty cells indicate that data for those years were not available.
China’s growing bellicosity has had negative effects on opinion in many key countries, espe-
cially in Asia. Opinion toward China is broadly mixed in historical terms (see Table 6.1). Favor-
ability ratings across many Indo-Pacific countries have been in the 40-percent range for some
time. But there is clear evidence that China’s recent aggressive behavior in political, economic,
and military terms is harming its global reputation.
In Japan, for example, favorable opinion toward China was above 50 percent as recently
as 2002, as measured by Pew Research Center. Even by 2010, the favorability rating held in the
range of 30 percent, but subsequent Chinese actions drove it down to a floor of just 5 percent
in 2013. It recovered somewhat by 2018 but only into the mid-teens, so it remains far below
its previous peak.4
Perhaps the most dramatic case of harm to China’s reputation has been in Australia.
Partly because of China’s efforts to manipulate Australian politics and educational institutions,
favorability ratings toward China have plummeted. The 2019 Lowy Institute poll suggested
that the percentage of Australians who trust China to “act responsibly in the world” plum-
meted to 32 percent, a 20-point drop in just a single year.5 (Strangely, 44 percent also affirmed
that Australia should seek better relations with China, “even if this might harm our relations
4 See Pew Research Center, 2019; and China Power Team, “How Are Global Views on China Trending?” Center for Stra-
tegic and International Studies, March 20, 2020.
5 Nathasha Kassam, “Lowy Institute Poll 2019,” Lowy Institute, June 26, 2019.
Measuring Chinese Influence: Outputs 77
with the United States.”) Three-fourths of Australians believed that the country had become
overly dependent on China in economic terms; 68 percent believed that their government was
allowing too much Chinese investment. Three-fourths agreed with the statement that “Austra-
lia should do more to resist China’s military activities in our region.”
However, these concerns are not anywhere close to sufficient enough to cause most countries to
make a serious break from China, especially in the economic realm. The dominant pattern is that
the focus countries are trying to maintain good relations, keep options open for significant
economic ties, and push back selectively and carefully on areas of concern.
The most pronounced concern is Chinese military power. As shown in Table 6.2, which is
based on a 2019 Pew Research Center poll asking whether China’s growing military power is
a good or bad thing, there are profound regional and global concerns about growing Chinese
Table 6.2
Views of Chinese Military Power
Bad Thing Good Thing

Country (%) (%)
United States 81 11
Canada 82 11
Indonesia 44 28
Philippines 71 24
India 73 12
Australia 84 11
South Korea 90 7
Japan 90 5
Median 79 12
Lebanon 43 39
Tunisia 40 32
Israel 49 29
Turkey 66 15
Nigeria 27 57
Kenya 39 53
South Africa 57 35
Mexico 46 36
Brazil 49 24
Argentina 59 19
18-country median 58 24
SOURCE: Laura Silver, Kat Devlin, and Christine Huang, China’s Economic Growth
Mostly Welcomed in Emerging Markets, but Neighbors Wary of Its Influence, Pew
Research Center, December 5, 2019, p. 35.
NOTE: Respondents were asked whether China’s growing military is a good
or bad thing for their country. The percentages do not include “don’t know”
responses, so numbers do not sum to 100.
military strength. Respondents in Asia-Pacific nations were especially concerned. Furthermore,

a 2019 poll from Genron NPO and the East Asia Institute found that almost half of Japanese
and South Korean residents viewed China as a potential military threat.6
In regional terms, opinion toward China is, by far, most positive in Africa.7 One of the most
recent comprehensive surveys on views of China in Africa is an October 2016 Afrobarometer
effort. The authors concluded that, overall, “the public holds generally favorable views of eco-
nomic and assistance activities by China,” and China “matches or surpasses the United States
in popularity as a development model” in many African subregions. Across all 36 countries
surveyed, some 63 percent of Africans said that China’s influence was very or somewhat posi-
tive, and only 15 percent answered that it was somewhat or very negative. The highest positive
ratings for China (all above 80 percent) were in Mali, Niger, Cameroon, and Liberia; the most-
critical views of China were in Algeria, Ghana, Morocco, Tunisia, and Egypt.8
Opinion is not correlated reliably with economic investment. In some countries that have
received significant Chinese investment, such as Egypt and Algeria, favorable opinion of China
remains at 40 percent or less. Scandals over corruption associated with China’s investments
have affected favorability: The favorability rating in Ghana, for example, dropped from 80 per-
cent in 2015 to 49 percent in 2017. In other countries, such as Kenya, increased investment
over the past several years is correlated with a modest decline in favorability.9
European countries have witnessed a notable decline in favorability toward China in the past
few years. This shift in opinion is a product of growing dissatisfaction with China’s trade poli-
cies, a perception of Chinese predatory technology programs, human rights abuses in China,
and coercive Chinese behavior in the South China Sea.
In sum, public attitudes toward China have generally worsened over the past several years
in tandem with growing Chinese belligerence.
Output Analysis
One way of assessing the effectiveness of Chinese influence campaigns is to consider countries’
responses to major Chinese goals, especially in Asia. Table 6.3 highlights several leading goals
associated with Chinese strategy both globally and in the Indo-Pacific region and reviews
whether and the degree to which each focus country took China’s preferred position. Red indi-
cates a negative outcome for China (the focus country took an opposing position), and green
indicates a positive outcome for China (the focus country took a favorable position). Darker
shades indicate a more decisive stance. Empty cells indicate that the factor was not a notable
concern for that country.
As the table suggests, once again, China’s leading areas of success are economic. China
has succeeded in gaining extensive economic relations with multiple countries and avoiding
decisive blowback from unfair trade practices. Across the full set of Chinese goals, however, the
picture becomes far more complex. The table suggests mixed success for Chinese influence-
6 Genron NPO and East Asia Institute, 2019.

7 China Power Team, 2020.
8 Lekorwe et al., 2016.
9 China Power Team, 2020.
Measuring Chinese Influence: Outputs 79
Table 6.3
Output Analysis: Each Focus Country’s Position on China’s Leading Strategic Goals
Did the Focus Country:

Decline to Join the Belt Allow 5G Stop or Allow
Establish Support Abandon and Road Investments Downgrade Chinese
Economic the 2016 Contested Initiative and from Chinese Security Military
Ties with Hague Territorial Allow Chinese Company Cooperation Bases or
Taiwana Rulingb Claims Investmentc Huaweid with the U.S.e Accessf
Australia
Brazil
Cambodia
Ethiopia
Germany
India
Indonesia
Italy
Japan
Kenya
Laos
Malaysia
Mexico
Nigeria
Philippines
Singapore
South Korea
Sri Lanka
Thailand
Vietnam
NOTE: Green represents a position favorable to China; red represents a position opposed to China’s; darker
shades represent more-decisive stances.
a This column considers whether a country increased trade or investment flows with Taiwan under Taiwan’s
New Southbound Policy introduced in 2016. See Daniel Workman, “Taiwan’s Top Trading Partners,” World’s Top
Exports, March 24, 2020.
b The source for this column is Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative, 2016a. No focus countries opposed the
ruling; light green here reflects only that the country was silent. Dark red reflects that the country supported the
ruling and called for compliance with it; light red means that the country publicly welcomed the ruling but did
not demand compliance.
c These are countries that had joined the Belt and Road Initiative as of 2018 or 2019. See, for example,
Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, OECD Business and Finance Outlook 2018, Paris, 2018,
Chapter 2; and Green Belt and Road Initiative Center, “Countries of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI),” webpage,
undated.
d The data come from a variety of unclassified reporting. See, for example, Michael Goodier, “The Definitive List
of Where Every Country Stands on Huawei,” New Statesman, July 29, 2020.
e These findings are drawn from unpublished RAND research on Chinese-language defense strategic statements
and from U.S. government and open-source reporting, including Office of the Secretary of Defense, various
years; Defense Intelligence Agency, 2018, 2019; Allen, Saunders, and Chen, 2017; SIPRI, undated; Legarda, various
years.
f Cambodia is rumored to have granted China military access to Ream naval base (see Jeremy Page, Gordon
Lubold, and Rob Taylor, “Deal for Naval Outpost in Cambodia Furthers China’s Quest for Military Network,” Wall
Street Journal, July 22, 2019). Sri Lanka provided a long-term lease to Hambantota port (see Maria Abi-Habib,
“How China Got Sri Lanka to Cough Up a Port,” New York Times, June 25, 2018).
seeking so far, at least relative to its most desired goals. Yet it is undeniable that China has
influenced many policy outcomes in specific states (see Chapter Seven). There also appears to
be significant anecdotal support for growing Chinese influence, even if it has not yet achieved
the more ambitious components of the agenda represented in Table 6.3. In the next chapter, we
briefly review case studies of Chinese influence-seeking and identify the outcomes that China
has been able to achieve.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Case Studies of Chinese Influence-Seeking
In addition to the reviewing the quantitative metrics for input, intervening factor, and output
variables (see Chapters Four, Five, and Six), we wanted to take a more holistic look at the
process of Chinese influence-seeking in particular contexts. The case studies provided in this
chapter were selected to cover the most-significant cases since 2010 (at least that we could iden-
tify) of large-scale Chinese influence efforts aimed at achieving specific, targeted goals.1 These
13 case studies include seven from our focus countries and six from countries not on our list.
Table 7.1 summarizes the cases and the outcomes. Critically, these are outcomes of specific
influence campaigns and not wider judgments of Chinese influence in these countries. In the
following sections of this chapter, we provide the details of each case.
These cases do not provide definitive causal explanations of how Chinese influence efforts
operated, but they do help illustrate the broad contours of how Chinese efforts have played
out in practice across a variety of contexts. As a result, they are helpful in showing how impor-
tant different aspects of Chinese efforts or the intervening context have been in determining
whether China was able to achieve its goals.
The upshot of these cases is complex. In several of them, China’s exercise of power and
influence unquestionably shaped policy outcomes. In most of those cases, however, China
did not get all that it was asking for: In some, its demands were largely rebuffed; in others,
even the successful exercise of influence produced a significant backlash in the targeted state.
The case-specific story of Chinese influence-seeking cannot be reduced to simple, unquali-
fied conclusions.
1 Chinese influence activities have been documented in other countries, such as Canada, France, Germany, the Pacific
Islands, Singapore, and the United Kingdom. We feel that the 13 cases that we selected represent the most-significant and
best-known examples of the past decade.
81
Table 7.1
Chinese Influence-Seeking: Case Study Details and Outcomes, 2010–2019
Degree of
Chinese
Country Input Purpose Influence Output
Australia • Bribe legislators to sup- • Sway political Moderate • Public backlash over
port preferred policies outcomes, especially China’s efforts
• Detain an Australian related to the South • New laws passed to
national as leverage China Sea restrict foreign influence
in iron ore price • Discourage Chinese in politics
negotiations diaspora in Australia • Australian government
• Purchase media from participating remains hesitant to
companies and publish in anti-China curtail Chinese influence
pro-China information demonstrations or express positions
contrary to Chinese
preferences
Greece • Investments in Greek • Make Greece China’s Moderate • Greece loathe to

port infrastructure and economic entryway to challenge China
other foreign direct the rest of Europe • Greece blocked and
investment • Allow economic watered down EU
• Engagement with success to sway measures against China
the government and political decisions
nongovernmental
organizations
Japan • Initiated a fishing vessel • Test territorial Minimal • Japan defended the
conflict in disputed integrity and seek to Senkaku Islands with
waters benefit from South force
• Suspended export of China Sea resources • Japan did not give in to
rare earth minerals • Pressure Tokyo into economic pressures
important to Japanese preferred policies • Tech companies
tech companies diversified sources
• Other economic • Japan began an
sanctions (tourism) economic program to
compete with the Belt
and Road Initiative
• Public backlash
Maldives • Promote a pro-Beijing • Shift political Minimal • Pro-Beijing president

political party alignment toward and party voted out of
• Invest in infrastructure Beijing office
through the Belt and • Build an economic • Significant backlash over
Road Initiative relationship beneficial China’s actions
• Pursue a free trade to China
agreement
Mongolia • Close the border and • Discourage Minimal • Public backlash

cancel flights between acceptance of the • Mongolia promised
the countries in response Dalai Lama, who not to host the Dalai
to Mongolia hosting the promotes autonomy Lama anymore, but
Dalai Lama for Tibet the new government is
• Invest in infrastructure not beholden to that
through the Belt and promise
Road Initiative • New laws passed to limit
foreign influence
• Government diversified
the source of its loans
New • Bribe public officials • Sway political Moderate • Public backlash but the
Zealand • Intimidate academics outcomes in China’s government response
• Sign a free trade favor has been weak
agreement and build an • Sway public opinion • Self-censored speech
economic relationship at universities to avoid
• Foster Confucius reprisals or loss of
Institutes funding from Beijing
Case Studies of Chinese Influence-Seeking 83
Table 7.1—Continued
Degree of
Chinese
Norway • Suspend diplomatic • Get Norway to Minimal/ • Norway helped admit

relations and impose promise to never moderate China as an observer to
sanctions as punishment again award the prize the Arctic Council
for awarding the Nobel to a Chinese dissident • Norway refused to meet
Peace Prize to a Chinese with the Dalai Lama in
dissident 2014
• Chairman of the Nobel
committee was ousted
from his position,
but Norway did not
apologize for its choice
• Diplomatic relations
were restored in
2016 after Norway
compromised little
relative to China’s initial
demands
Philippines • Support Chinese fishing • Test territorial Minimal • Philippines initiated

vessels operating in integrity and seek to international arbitration
disputed waters benefit from South of the issue, which
• Impose economic China Sea resources resulted in the 2016
sanctions Permanent Court of
Arbitration ruling in the
Philippines’ favor
South • Release official • Persuade South Korea Minimal • THAAD briefly

Korea statements opposing the to reverse or suspend suspended but
THAAD deployment the deployment eventually fully
• Impose multiple forms of • Discourage further deployed
economic punishment military advancements • South Korea made
assurances to China that
it would not deploy any
further U.S. defense
systems or join a military
alliance with the United
States and Japan, but
those promises could be
reversed
• Public backlash
Sri Lanka • Shield Sri Lanka from UN • Coerce debt Moderate • Preferred candidate
sanctions dependency was defeated in 2015,
• Provide military • Compel but another preferred
equipment to help end intelligence-sharing candidate was elected
the civil war • Sway political in 2019
• Invest in infrastructure decisions • New port leased to a
• Intervene in politics to Chinese company for
support a preferred 99 years
candidate • Sri Lanka’s massive debt
continues to give China
influence
Taiwan • Impose economic • Isolate Taiwan from Moderate • Public backlash

punishment for the Tsai the international • Influence efforts
administration’s stance community backfired, and the
on independence • Prevent independence preferred candidate was
• Use economic leverage for Taiwan and defeated in a landslide
and promises to get maintain the One • Taiwan’s isolation
countries to switch China status quo pushed it closer to the
allegiances from Taipei • Ultimately unify United States rather
to Beijing Taiwan and the than China
• Pursue United Front People’s Republic of
activities and general China
information operations
Table 7.1—Continued
Degree of
Chinese
Thailand • Issue a safety warning • Demonstrate to Moderate • Thailand waived visa

to Chinese citizens to Thailand the value of fees for Chinese and
discourage travel to its relationship with other tourists
Taiwan following two China • Economic and security
incidents cooperation increased
• Hold military exercises • Thailand hedges
with Taiwan between the United
• Invest in infrastructure States and China
through the Belt and
Road Initiative
Australia
Public attention to Chinese influence in Australia was galvanized in 2017 when Senator Sam
Dastyari of the Australian Labor Party adopted China’s stance on the South China Sea imme-
diately after Chinese donors threatened to withdraw campaign funds.2 At nearly the same
time, Duncan Lewis, the Director-General of the Australian Security Intelligence Organiza-
tion, warned that foreign influence efforts were occurring on “an unprecedented scale.”3
Following the scandal, the Australian government passed a series of anti–foreign influ-
ence laws that limit foreign involvement in the political process, mostly by banning political
contributions from foreigners.4 China responded by canceling visas for Australian business
leaders and engaging in a propaganda campaign in Australia suggesting that the new laws were
motivated by racism. Because of pronounced historical examples of racism toward the Chi-
nese in Australia, the suggestion of racism resonated with some on the left wing of Australian
politics.5 Canberra pushed the laws through anyway with only minor changes from the initial
proposal.6
The laws’ passage suggests that China suffered blowback for its efforts to directly influ-
ence politics in Australia. However, to measure the effectiveness of China’s influence there, it
is important to examine not only whether the Chinese received their intended outputs in the
2017 case but also how those outputs compared with previous episodes in which China sought
to commodify its influence and how those outputs have changed over time, even after the new
laws took effect. Beneath the surface, Chinese influence in Australian society continues to
grow and filter through the political system.
In 2010, after billions of dollars in Chinese investment flowed into the Australian
resources sector and helped it avoid the global recession of 2008, the Chinese took a hard
2 Larry Diamond and Orville Schell, eds., Chinese Influence and American Interests: Promoting Constructive Vigilance, Stan-
ford, Calif.: Hoover Institution Press, 2019, pp. 146–151.
3 John Pomfret, “China’s Meddling in Australia—and What the U.S. Should Learn About It,” Washington Post, June 14,
2017a.
4 Yee-Fui Ng, “The Foreign Donations Bill Will Soon Be Law—What Will It Do, and Why Is It Needed?” The Conversa-
tion, November 27, 2018.
5 Joseph Lee, “Anti-Chinese Legislation in Australasia,” Quarterly Journal of Economics, Vol. 3, No. 2, January 1889.
6 Damien Cave and Jacqueline Williams, “Australian Law Targets Foreign Interference. China Is Not Pleased,” New York
Times, June 28, 2018.
stance several issues. For instance, China demanded a lower negotiated price of iron ore, but
the Australians did not agree to it. The price of iron ore almost doubled in the ensuing year,
enraging the Chinese. In response, China detained an Australian executive, prompting a nega-
tive public reaction to Beijing’s tactics throughout Australia; the tactic failed to change Austra-
lia’s stance in the price negotiations.
That same year, China demanded that the Melbourne International Film Festival with-
draw a film that China perceived as anti-Beijing. Not only did the film still make its premiere
at the festival, but the Chinese objections increased public awareness of the film, and the public
flocked to the viewing. Additionally, the defense minister resigned after public outcry over
unreported trips to China paid for by a woman with ties to the Communist Party. Each of
these instances shows that, although China was engaging in influence efforts to use its power
to receive tangible benefits, its influence in 2010 was rather limited, and the Australian public
consistently rejected Beijing’s attempts.7
By 2017, Chinese efforts had only increased on both the mass and elite levels. Beijing pres-
sured its large number of students studying in Australia to refrain from joining demonstrations
against Chinese activities and to report those who did participate; the pressure often came in
the form of threatening the students’ families at home in China.8 State-owned or state-friendly
companies in China bought most of the Chinese-language media outlets in Australia, and they
increasingly toed the Communist Party’s line. Some scholars studying China have had severe
difficulty finding outlets for their materials, as publishers are fearful of offending Beijing and
imperiling their business relationships there.9 The weight of Chinese economic power looms
large over even local affairs; government officials in one town painted over Taiwanese flags
for fear of losing Chinese investment.10 Australian businesspeople with interests in China are
increasingly pressuring the government to take a more neutral stance between Washington and
Beijing, and China is aggressively using the threat of lawsuits to dissuade media outlets from
reporting negative stories on China’s activities.11
The anti–foreign interference laws passed in 2018 seemed to indicate that China’s efforts
to influence Australian politics had reached their limit, but events since their passage indicate
that Beijing’s influence continues to grow in many ways. For instance, the activities of Con-
fucius Institutes at Australian universities continue largely unabated, given that the institutes
are embedded in the academic structure. They often act as part of the Chinese government’s
propaganda apparatus, and, by intimidating anti-Beijing researchers and funding pro-Beijing
research, they can have significant influence over the degree to which criticism of Beijing is
allowed in higher education.12 Confucius Institutes took a leading role in countering pro–
Hong Kong protests on campuses in 2019, and the University of Queensland, where violence
7 John Pomfret, “Australia Welcomes China’s Investment, If Not Its Influence,” Washington Post, February 14, 2010.
8 John Pomfret, “In Australia, China is the Meddler,” Washington Post, June 15, 2017b.
9 Rob Schmitz, “Australia and New Zealand Are Ground Zero for Chinese Influence,” NPR, October 2, 2018; and John
Garnaut, “How China Interferes in Australia,” Foreign Affairs, March 9, 2018.
10 Damien Cave, “Australia’s China Challenge,” New York Times, May 20, 2019.
11 Jamie Tarabay, “As China Looms, Australia’s Military Refocuses on Pacific Neighbors,” New York Times, June 11, 2019.
12 Munro, 2018.
targeting pro–Hong Kong protesters occurred, named the Chinese consul general a visiting
professor after he praised the “patriotic behavior” of the pro-Beijing students.13
The United Front Work Department—an organization that is at the center of many
influence efforts and whose main goal is to assimilate Chinese populations living in China and
abroad into the Chinese Communist Party and gain support for its policy positions (see Chap-
ter Five)—has been a major Chinese focus in Australia. This organization has an enormous
pool of potential recruits in the country, with almost 1 million Australian residents of Chinese
origin.14 The United Front Work Department’s aim is to target these individuals and “to make
the foreign serve China.”15 In Australia’s 2019 elections, which took place after the anti–foreign
interference laws took effect, the first Chinese-Australian was elected to Parliament. She was
soon found to have connections to the United Front Work Department.16 This episode reflects
the pervasiveness of United Front activities in Australia and their continued ability to reach
into the political system.
China has generally not been successful in instances of applying acute pressure on Austra-
lia. Canberra took a hard line in the 2010 iron ore price negotiations, passed the anti–foreign
influence laws in 2018 over Chinese objections, and began an ambitious program of ship-
building to counter Chinese military power in the Indo-Pacific.17 However, the fundamental
dynamics appear to be shifting over time, and hints of changing outputs can be seen. China
is using many of the fundamental attributes of liberal democracy to gain an advantage. For
example, it is using the courts to sue critical media outlets for libel and using Australia’s sen-
sitivity to racism to counter laws aimed at China. It is taking advantage of free enterprise by
buying Chinese-language outlets and of freedom of assembly to coordinate pro-Beijing pro-
tests that often intimidate anti-Beijing protesters. It is exploiting the Australian population’s
preference for prosperity, which can force politicians to court approval from China, because
of its economic power. Many Australians have grown more cautious in expressing criticism of
Beijing, even while they express no affection for China itself.18
Even after the anti–foreign interference laws were instituted, many of the sources of Chi-
nese influence in politics can be maintained simply by using Australian go-betweens and
capitalizing on the natural predilection of business elites to maintain profitable relationships
with China.19 With the sources of those inputs largely intact at both the elite and mass levels,
and with continued Australian dependence on Chinese investment, many policy outputs may
continue to slowly drift China’s way through subtle changes in the way Australian society
relates to China and issues sensitive to Beijing. Australia can arrest this process if it is willing
to imperil some of its trade with Beijing to take a stronger stance against Chinese interference
in Australia’s political process.
13
A. Odysseus Patrick and Emanuel Stoakes, “China’s Sway Chills Campus Speech in 2 Pacific Nations,” Washington Post,
August 12, 2019.
14 Pomfret, 2017a.
15 Clive Hamilton, “Australia’s Fight Against Chinese Political Interference,” Foreign Affairs, July 26, 2018.
16
Gerry Groot, “Inside China’s Vast Influence Network—How It Works, and the Extent of Its Reach in Australia,”
The Conversation, August 13, 2019.
17 A. Odysseus Patrick, “Australia to Beef Up Military Spending,” Washington Post, March 21, 2016.
18 Tarabay, 2019.
19 Munro, 2018.
Greece
In the wake of the global financial crisis in 2008 and during financial difficulties in Greece,
China began investing heavily in newly cheap assets in Greece. In 2009, Chinese company
COSCO (China Ocean Shipping Company) signed a 35-year lease to docks 2 and 3 at the
Port of Piraeus. This deal sends roughly €100 million per year to the Greek government, and
it includes plans to build a new €280 million logistics center and to conduct a multi-billion
Euro expansion of the cargo capacity for the COSCO terminals.20 China also gave Greek ship-
builders access to $4.5 billion in credit, although the credit line was to be used for buying ships
made in China.21
In addition to these investments, China committed to doubling trade with Greece over
five years to more than $8 billion, which was a crucial vote of confidence in the Greek econ-
omy at a time when it was teetering.22 Tassos Vamvakidid, the president of the Piraeus Cham-
ber of Commerce, claimed that COSCO’s investment was a “flagship project” in Greece’s
effort to rebound from its economic crisis.23 China also created a $3 billion investment fund
for Central and Eastern Europe, and it began plans to build a high-speed rail line between
Belgrade, Budapest, Skopje, and Athens, which would terminate at the Port of Piraeus, where
China further planned to build an additional $600 million worth of commercial properties.24
By 2017, China had invested roughly $13.6 billion in Greece, and it intended for Greece to be
Beijing’s economic entrepôt to the rest of Europe.25
By 2019, the Port of Piraeus had grown considerably, handling five times as much cargo
as it did in 2010 on its way to becoming the second-largest container port in Europe. This
growth was expected to continue, making Piraeus the largest port in Europe as soon as 2020.
These investments have also had significant knock-on effects throughout the rest of the Greek
economy, including real estate, retail, and tourism. These industries have responded to the
growth in foreign buyers by pressuring the government in Athens to adopt the “golden visa”
program, which allows foreigners to buy resident status for €250,000 in property investments.
The Greek economy as a whole has become more reliant on Chinese investment after COSCO
took control of the Port of Piraeus, which is primarily responsible for the Greek economy’s
return to health. Other European nations, such as Italy, Belgium, and Spain, have seen the
transformation of Piraeus and responded by lobbying the Chinese for investment there.26
With all this investment, observers began to wonder whether Beijing’s sway over Athens
would grow, particularly with how many sectors of the Greek economy now rely on Chinese
capital infusions. Vamvakidis seemed to indicate that increased influence was part of the
exchange, saying that the port deal was not just about business but also about people-to-
20 Fu Jing, “COSCO Eyeing Further Piraeus Port Investment,” China Daily, June 19, 2012.
21 Liz Alderman, “China Looks to Europe for Deals and Friends,” New York Times, November 2, 2010.
22 Nick Skrekas and Andrew Batson, “Beijing Offers Support to Greece,” Wall Street Journal, October 4, 2010.
23 “China’s Cosco Makes Piraeus 2nd Largest Port in Mediterranean,” National Herald, February 4, 2019.
24
On the investment fund, see Aleksandar Vasovic, “Belgrade-Budapest Railway Part of Chinese ‘Express Lane’ to
Europe,” Reuters, December 17, 2014. On the rail line, see Wade Shepard, “Another Silk Road Fiasco? China’s Belgrade to
Budapest High-Speed Rail Line Is Probed by Brussels,” Forbes, February 25, 2017.
25 David Ignatius, “China Has a Plan to Rule the World,” Washington Post, November 29, 2017.
26 Vivienne Walt, “Boxed In at the Docks: How a Lifeline from China Changed Greece,” Fortune, July 22, 2019.
people exchanges and that Greece should “spare no efforts joining and supporting the Belt
and Road Initiative.”27
By 2017, Greece tried to alter EU actions related to China. First, Greece blocked an EU
measure to condemn China for human rights abuses. A spokesman for the Greek foreign min-
istry stated, “When the stability of a country is at stake, we need to be more constructive in the
way we express our criticism, because if the country collapses, there will be no human rights
to protect.” He further went on to describe the EU measure as “unproductive criticism.”28
Second, Greece and Hungary, two countries at the center of Beijing’s economic efforts in
Europe, acted to water down an EU measure addressing Chinese activities in the South China
Sea.29 Third, prompted largely by Beijing’s increasing investment in Greece, France and Ger-
many demanded a measure to screen foreign investments into the EU zone. Greece initially
opposed the action, but Athens agreed to it once the legislation was watered down to include
only reporting requirements and nonbinding EU investigations if a third-party state objected
to foreign investment. Each state remained responsible for its own screening regulations.30
This drift in Greek foreign policy does not appear to be the result of an overt pressure
campaign on Beijing’s part. Rather, the choices of the Greek government and Greek citizens
have changed as they have increasingly relied on Chinese investment for their prosperity. Chi-
na’s investment in Greece came at a time of acute vulnerability for Athens, which was suffering
the largest peacetime depression in recorded history. The Greek economy shrunk 45 percent
between 2008 and 2016, but it has since returned to growth, largely owing to Chinese invest-
ment that the country does not want to imperil.
Furthermore, the timing of China’s investments has created a psychological sense of
dependence that goes beyond the numbers. Chinese investment is seen as key to the revitaliza-
tion of Greece itself. A better economy will lead to the return of those who left the country for
greater opportunity elsewhere. In 2019, the governor of the Bank of Greece stated that “only
by producing good jobs will young couples produce more children.”31 Such a statement reveals
that many in Greece still feel that the country is in the midst of an existential crisis, and it is
reluctant to imperil its future for what it sees as non-core interests. Chinese investment there-
fore made abundant economic sense, and the perceived success of these investments has drawn
other European states toward courting Chinese investment. In addition, it has undermined the
EU’s ability to present a united front against Beijing’s violation of human rights or its aggres-
sive actions in the South China Sea.
Greece does still appear to be able to resist Chinese influence when a key domestic inter-
est is at stake. In 2019, much of the proposed Chinese construction at the Port of Piraeus was
put on hold when the Greek archaeological authority ruled that large portions of the port
were historical landmarks. Even with more than $600 million in investment on the line, the
archaeological authority called for a halt to construction of a shopping mall and changes to the
27 “China’s Cosco Makes Piraeus 2nd Largest Port in Mediterranean,” 2019.

28 Nick Cumming-Bruce and Somini Sengupta, “In Greece, China Finds a New Ally Against Criticism of Its Human
Rights Record,” New York Times, June 20, 2017.
29
David Barboza, Marc Santora, and Alexandra Stevenson, “A Risky Courtship as China Seeks Sway in Europe,” New York
Times, August 13, 2018.
30 Philip Blenkinsop, “With Eyes on China, EU Lawmakers Back Investment Screening,” Reuters, February 14, 2019.
31 Walt, 2019.
construction of a hotel and two shipyards. Although there is disagreement over the validity of
these archaeological claims, it demonstrates that Chinese influence is not limitless.32
Domestic backlash to Chinese investment has also grown, partially because of the lack
of domestic sourcing for materials used in the construction process at Piraeus and threats to
unionization in the Chinese terminals. Many have warned that any Chinese move to end
unionization could end the harmony between Greece and China altogether, as unions play
a central role in the Greek economy.33 Thus, foreign policy outputs have shifted toward Bei-
jing with increasing Chinese investment, but, on the domestic front, recent experience dem-
onstrates that Athens is still willing to accept economic costs to preserve what it sees as key
interests.
Japan
In 2010, a Chinese fishing trawler rammed a Japanese patrol boat near the disputed Senkaku
Islands, and Japan detained the captain of the Chinese boat for more than two weeks. China
responded by arresting four Japanese fishermen, and the two countries cut off ministerial con-
tact. Thousands of Chinese tourists dropped trips to Japan, and concerts by Japanese artists
were canceled in China.34 Japanese businesses responded in kind by investing 41 percent less
in China in the year following the incident.35 China then suspended the export of rare earth
minerals to Japan in an effort to harm the high-tech Japanese industries that rely on them.36
The price of rare earth minerals skyrocketed after the embargo was put in place, calling into
question whether Japan would be able to withstand Chinese pressure.37
Japan might appear to be highly susceptible to producing outputs favorable to Chi-
nese foreign policy, given the high level of influence inputs coming its way from Beijing. For
instance, in the year prior to the fishing vessel incident, China had surpassed the United States
as Japan’s largest trade partner, accounting for roughly 20 percent of Japanese trade at more
than $300 billion a year.38 In addition, because of their proximity to China and distance from
Japan’s main islands, many of Japan’s southern islands are highly vulnerable to an attack from
China. These circumstances may lower Tokyo’s willingness to confront Chinese assertiveness
in the area.39
Despite economic pressure from China, Japan’s military has responded forcefully to every
new Chinese incursion into the disputed area around the Senkaku Islands, particularly after
elections that swept Shinzo Abe’s right-leaning party into office. China has repeatedly tested
Japanese resolve by sending both civilian and military vessels and aircraft into the vicinity of
32
Nektaria Stamouli, “China’s Biggest Investment in Greece Blocked by Archaeological Authority,” Wall Street Journal,
April 3, 2019.
33 Walt, 2019.
34 “Japan Frees Chinese Boat Captain amid Diplomatic Row,” BBC News, September 24, 2010.
35 Lally Weymouth, “Can Japan and China Make Amends?” Washington Post, November 9, 2014.
36 Howard Schneider, “A Key Chinese Advantage Erodes,” Washington Post, October 27, 2012.
37 Eugene Gholz, Rare Earth Elements and National Security, New York: Council on Foreign Relations, October 2014.
38 Yoichi Funabashi, “Japan Must Ponder the Risks of Closer Ties with China,” Washington Post, October 27, 2018.
39 Eric S. Margolis, “Stopping Short of War,” The Nation, February 11, 2013.
the islands.40 The Japanese military scrambled eight fighter jets in 2012 to intercept a Chinese
surveillance plane that flew over Senkaku airspace, which was the first such incursion in more
than 50 years.41 Shortly thereafter, a Chinese military frigate entered waters near the islands,
and it was met by a Japanese destroyer. Both ships went into battle stations and targeted the
other with their weapons; U.S. airborne early warning and control aircraft were deployed to
the area shortly thereafter. Prime Minister Abe committed to facing down China after each of
the incidents, and his administration met each incursion head on.42 In 2016, Japan scrambled
jets more than 800 times to respond to Chinese incursions, and its defense of the Senkaku
Islands never abated.43
Japan also leaned heavily on its alliances. Tokyo gained reassurances from the United
States in the 2013 National Defense Authorization Act, which stated that the United States
would consider the Senkaku Islands as Japanese territory under the Treaty of Mutual Coopera-
tion and Security and would thus protect the islands in case of an attack.44 The United States
then deployed F-22 fighter jets to Okinawa.45 Japan also began reconstituting “the quad,” an
anti-China alliance of Japan, Australia, India, and the United States, to balance against Chi-
nese influence in the region.46
Rather than buckling to Chinese economic pressure, Japan mustered its array of alliances
to push back on the economic front, as well. Tokyo banded together with the United States
and the EU to file a World Trade Organization grievance on China’s rare earth export suspen-
sion, and the ruling was in Japan’s favor. By that time, much of the Japanese technology indus-
try had adapted to the new state of affairs by adopting new techniques that used fewer rare
earths and by diversifying its sources.47 From 2010 to 2018, China’s share of rare earth produc-
tion dropped from 95 percent to 70 percent as companies entered the market around the world
after the Chinese-induced price shock; oftentimes, the companies’ increased production was
underwritten by Japanese financing.48 Japan has further embarked on an economic program to
counter China’s Belt and Road Initiative in Southeast Asia by funding infrastructure projects
on more-favorable terms without the threat of political strings.49
Japan’s stern responses around the Senkaku Islands and the strengthening of its alliance
networks seem to have had an effect on China’s policy toward Japan. By late 2017, the Chinese
40 “Chinese Ships Near Disputed Islands: Japan,” Hindustan Times, July 11, 2012.
41 “Back to the Future,” The Economist, January 5, 2013.
42 Margolis, 2013.
43 Japan Ministry of Defense, “Statistics on Scrambles Through Fiscal Year 2016,” Joint Staff press release, April 13, 2017.
44 PublicLaw 112-239, National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2013, Section 1251: Sense of the Senate on the
Situation in the Senkaku Islands, January 2, 2013.
45 Richard D. Fisher, Jr., “Japan Will Have a Busy Year Defending Islands Against China,” Aviation Week, February 25,
2013.
46 Max Fisher and Audrey Carlsen, “How the Rise of China Is Challenging Longtime American Dominance in Asia,” New
York Times, March 16, 2018.
47 Schneider, 2012.
48 Cary Huang, “China’s Ban on Rare Earths Didn’t Work on Japan and It Won’t Work in the Trade War with the US,”
South China Morning Post, June 5, 2019.
49 Diamond and Schell, 2019, p. 168.
incursions had temporarily halted,50 although they would surge again and, by 2019, reached
a new annual record.51 For a time, though, China’s restraint coincided with the easing of ten-
sions between the two countries, which began to return to normal in 2017–2018. With this
easing of tensions, Chinese tourism to Japan increased four-fold to more than 8 million visitors
in 2018.52 Japan pursued a dual policy of building up Japan’s own capabilities while simulta-
neously mending fences with China.53 At the same time, efforts to improve ties would “not
be huge,” as Tokyo sought to avoid policies that would make it appear to be undermining the
U.S. stance against China.54
This case indicates that Chinese pressure on Japan in this period proved largely counter-
productive. Tokyo sought to draw closer to the United States, weave a counterbalancing web of
alliances throughout Asia, and bolster its own defense capabilities. Japanese policymakers have
taken steps to prepare for a prolonged period of strategic competition with China, and they
have broadly welcomed strong U.S. policies toward Beijing in recent years.55 All in all, Chinese
economic power has shown little to no ability to be converted into political and cultural influ-
ence in Japan, and when Beijing has made specific demands, Tokyo has shown a propensity to
heavily counterbalance rather than accommodate.
On a societal level as well, Japan has proven to be largely immune to Chinese influ-
ence. In particular, efforts from the United Front Work Department have shown little suc-
cess. Japan’s long history of incorporating China’s useful attributes while rejecting the rest has
assisted in its ability to rebuff Chinese cultural influence, although Beijing’s efforts have been
mildly effective in Okinawa with groups that favor independence from Japan.56 Tokyo also has
decades-long security relationships with the United States and other democratic states that it
can draw upon in its counterbalancing and deterrence efforts in instances of Chinese military
confrontation. During the Senkaku Islands dispute, Japan began long-term efforts in both
the security and economic spheres, indicating that it plans a prolonged period of rivalry with
China. Although the two countries are currently in a period of détente, Japan appears to be
poised for a significant role as a regional counterbalance to Chinese influence.
Maldives
The Maldives has traditionally been heavily influenced by nearby India, and New Delhi repeat-
edly intervened in the country to restore order after a series of coups in the 1980s. In 2008,
the Maldives held its first free democratic elections, but the country has since suffered many
50 Jiji Kyodo, “China Instructs Its Fishermen to Stay Away from Senkaku Islands,” Japan Times, August 15, 2019.
51 “Chinese Incursions Near Japan-Held Islands Top 1,000 to Hit Record, Up 80% on Last Year,” Japan Times, Decem-
ber 6, 2019. For the official 2020 data, see Japan Ministry of Foreign Affairs, “Trends in Chinese Government and Other
Vessels in the Waters Surrounding the Senkaku Islands, and Japan’s Response,” webpage, July 9, 2020.
52 Daniel Hurst, “Amid Thaw, Japan Is Seeing a Boom in Chinese Tourists,” The Diplomat, March 27, 2019.
53 Fisher and Carlsen, 2018.
54 Anna Fifield and Simon Denyer, “Amid Trade Battle with U.S., China Seeks a Friend in Japan,” Washington Post, Octo-
ber 23, 2018.
55 Walter Russell Mead, “China and Trump Are Making Japan Nervous,” Wall Street Journal, September 17, 2019.
problems typical of new democracies. The winner of the 2008 presidential election, Mohamed
Nasheed, resigned in 2012 after a large number of security forces mutinied. Nasheed’s victory
was nullified by the country’s Supreme Court after allegations of fraud, even though most
election observers claimed that the vote was free, fair, inclusive, and transparent.57 After the
nullification, Abdulla Yameen took power and immediately began to alter Maldivian policies.
For instance, contracts with Indian companies to build new bridges and upgrade the
main airport were abruptly canceled in 2012 and given to Chinese firms.58 Chinese President
Xi Jinping traveled to the capital of Malé in 2014 to sign the agreement for $2 billion worth of
infrastructure work as part of the Belt and Road Initiative.59 The two countries also signed a
free trade agreement to open the Chinese market to the Maldivian fishing industry.60 The free
trade agreement was more than 1,000 pages long and passed the parliament with less than one
hour of discussion, amid rumors that China would pursue a naval base in the Maldives.61 Out-
side analysts soon said that the Maldives would have trouble paying for the Chinese projects,
which were financed entirely by high-risk loans taken out with Beijing.62 The opposition capi-
talized on these analyses by claiming that China was seeking to engage in debt-trap diplomacy
in order to gain further control over strategic infrastructure in the country.63 Beyond these elite
dealings, the country saw a massive increase in Chinese tourism, and more than 20 percent of
tourists came from China in 2017.64
In late 2017, rumors of Chinese interest in a naval base in the Maldives were strengthened
by the visit of three Chinese naval vessels, which docked in the capital.65 In February 2018,
President Yameen used these economic infusions and perceived political and military back-
ing from China to attempt a consolidation of his power by arresting and convicting many
of his political opponents. When the Supreme Court overturned these convictions, Yameen
had two of the five members of the court arrested. The opposition began publicly asking
for India to intervene, sparking fears of a proxy battle between the two Asian powerhouses,
which gained credence when Chinese naval vessels were spotted in the area during the crisis.66
Yameen went on to declare a state of emergency, which triggered many countries, including
57 Fran Bailey, Hendrick Gappy, Abdool Rahman, and Hanif Vally, Maldives People’s Majlis (Parliamentary) Elections:
Report of the Commonwealth Expert Team, London: Commonwealth Secretariat, May 9, 2009.
58 Dharisha Bastians and Harris Gardiner, “Chinese Leader Visits Sri Lank, Challenging India’s Sway,” New York Times,
September 17, 2014.
59 Hassan Moosa and Maria Abi-Habib, “Voters in Maldives Exhale as President Concedes Loss,” New York Times, Sep-
tember 25, 2018.
60 Mujib Mashal, “Political Crisis in Maldives Could Stir Trouble Between India and China,” New York Times, Febru-
ary 15, 2018.
61 Nayma Qayum, “The Crisis in the Maldives, Explained,” Washington Post, February 12, 2018.
62 Adam Taylor, “Why Countries Might Want Out of China’s Belt and Road,” Washington Post, August 22, 2018.
63
Maria Abi-Habib and Hassan Moosa, “Maldives Opposition Declares Upset Victory in Presidential Election,” New York
Times, September 24, 2018.
64 Ministry of Tourism, Republic of Maldives, “Arrival Updates,” webpage, October 2018.
65 Sudha Ramachandran, “India and the Maldives Emergency,” The Diplomat, February 8, 2018.
66 Editorial Board, “Trouble in Maldives Paradise Could Become Global Threat,” New York Times, February 11, 2018; and
Athaulla A. Rasheed, “Can the Maldives Steer Regional Power Politics?” E-International Relations, January 30, 2019.
China, to warn citizens against traveling to the Maldives. However, although the majority of
the world’s powers condemned Yameen’s naked power grab, China did not.67
These moves from Yameen, and tacit Chinese acceptance of them, appear to have been
too coarse for the majority of Maldivian citizens. Yameen’s actions unified a fractured oppo-
sition, and, in the 2018 elections, he lost the presidency to Ibrahim Solih. To the surprise of
many observers, Yameen generally played fairly in the elections, and Solih received 58 percent
of the vote; nearly 90 percent of voters turned out. Many Maldivians claimed that their vote
was largely a response to the perceived overdependence on Beijing and Yameen’s attacks on
democracy.68 When the new government assumed office, it claimed that state coffers had been
almost entirely emptied in the transactions with China. It immediately started reviewing the
deals with China and began planning to scrap the free trade agreement, which it saw as imbal-
anced toward Beijing.69 A year later, Solih’s party won nearly 75 percent of seats in the Maldiv-
ian Parliament.70
These events since 2018 indicate a profound societal backlash against Chinese influence,
and this backlash looks to be reflected in official policy. The new government has pledged
an “India first” foreign policy, and India has since provided a loan of $1.4 billion to help the
Maldives get out from under Chinese debt. In addition, India and the Maldives have increased
security cooperation.71 The end of the counterreaction may still be ahead, as new charges of
corruption continue to be brought against Yameen and officials from his government.
Although China did make a bid for increased influence in the Maldives during this
period, it is difficult to disentangle which aspects of the crisis were caused by China or were
simply the nature of politics in a new democracy. The institutions in the Maldives are still very
fragile, and the courts are not widely respected, which played into Yameen’s hands when he
arrested members of the court for corruption.72 Chinese financial backing likely gave Yameen
increased confidence in his ability to consolidate power through illegal means, but the extent
of China’s involvement in his authoritarian behavior is unclear.
China’s own status as a nondemocratic state certainly played a role in the public linking
Yameen’s behavior to perceived Chinese backing, and the Maldivian population largely saw
pro-democracy and anti-China as the same thing. The fact that China warned its own citizens
against visiting the Maldives may indicate that events strayed from Beijing’s vision, when its
intention was possibly to more subtly gain influence over time. Instead, the events sparked a
counterreaction to what many perceived as an overstep by China. This counterreaction was
also based partly on rumors about China’s military intentions with the islands, but the rumors
67 Qayum, 2018.
68 Moosa and Abi-Habib, 2018.
69 Shibani Mahtani and Gerry Shih, “China’s Xi Launches Philippine Charm Offensive,” Washington Post, November 21,
2018.
70 “Maldives Voters Sweep Away the Remnants of a Corrupt, China-Backed Regime,” World Politics Review, April 23,
2019.
71 N. C. Bipindra and Iain Marlow, “India Offers $1.4 Billion to Maldives amid Tussle with China,” Bloomberg, Decem-
ber 17, 2018.
72
Hassan Moosa and Jeffrey Gettleman, “President of Maldives Besieges Supreme Court over Imprisoned Foes,” New York
Times, February 6, 2018.
lack much public backing beyond sporadic and unverified reports.73 Overall, this episode has
largely been a failure for China, which will likely find it difficult to engage in such construc-
tion projects again in the Maldives anytime soon, and the new government has made a decisive
turn back toward alignment with India.
Mongolia
Mongolia has been on the receiving end of repeated Chinese pressure campaigns over the past
20 years. China temporarily closed the border in 2002 and canceled flights from Beijing in
2006 after Mongolia hosted visits by the Dalai Lama, and the Mongolian government began
taking steps to strengthen security cooperation with the United States as a hedge against Chi-
nese influence. Mongolia started exploring joint bids between Chinese companies and those
from other countries in an effort to reduce reliance on Beijing, and the country targeted trade
routes to other neighboring states to diversify its export portfolio.74 However, Mongolia has
been the recipient of a tremendous amount of Chinese investment, particularly in its com-
modities sector, so its economic vulnerability has only grown over the past ten years.
In 2010, China absorbed a full 84 percent of Mongolian exports, and both countries had
plans for much more. The two countries had further begun work on a rail line from the coal
fields at Tavan Tolgoi to the Chinese border, but signs of a negative reaction among the Mon-
golian population were already readily apparent in 2010. In 2013, Mongolia halted exports of
coal to China over a price dispute and threatened to scrap the deal. Ulaanbaatar eventually
attempted to play rival Chinese firms off each other in the dispute.75 It also passed a law that
designated “strategic sectors” and limited foreign influence in response to China’s activities.76
Because of these repeated episodes with China over the Dalai Lama or resources, Mongo-
lia was well aware of its vulnerability to economic pressure from Beijing by the time the Dalai
Lama was set to visit again in 2016. The country had mitigated some of its vulnerabilities, but
the government was then seeking a $4.2 billion loan from China to pull the country out of
a recession caused by the drop in commodity prices.77 China responded to the Dalai Lama’s
visit by closing the border again, canceling further talks to discuss the loan, and putting fees
on all cross-border shipments.78 The Mongolian government claimed that the new border fees
would cost $12 million annually on the shipment of coal, and the price of the border closing
was much higher.79
China’s steps appear to have initially chastened the Mongolian government, which took
steps to placate Beijing. Although the government allowed the Dalai Lama’s visit despite
73 David Brewster, “China’s Play for Military Bases in the Eastern Indian Ocean,” The Interpreter, May 15, 2018.
74 Andrew Higgins, “Rich with Coal, but Still Hungry,” Washington Post, July 17, 2011.
75 Chuin-Wei Yap, “Mongolia Bets on China Rivals to Break Impasse,” Wall Street Journal, January 28, 2013a.
76 Chuin-Wei Yap, “Mongolia Deepens Investment Ties with China,” Wall Street Journal, October 25, 2013b.
77 “Mongolia Welcomes Dalai Lama Despite China,” New York Times, November 20, 2016.
78 “China ‘Blocks’ Mongolia Border After Dalai Lama Visit,” Al Jazeera, December 10, 2016.
79
Elizabeth Shim, “China Raises Fees on Shipments from Mongolia After Dalai Lama Visit,” United Press International,
December 2, 2016.
hina’s objections, it expressed regret for allowing the visit and announced that the Dalai
C
Lama would not be welcome back to Mongolia while the administration was still in office.80
That administration’s time in office soon ran out, as challenger Khaltmaaglin Battulga
won a decisive victory in elections the following summer. Battulga campaigned on a national-
ist platform, opposing Mongolia’s economic dependence on China and supporting a new law
to require foreign companies to funnel revenue through Mongolian banks. He had previously
also participated in a documentary that claimed that the railroad project linking Mongolia to
China was an elite conspiracy to keep the country reliant on Beijing.81
President Battulga’s victory demonstrates the population’s negative reaction to Beijing’s
actions, and the new government followed suit with official policy. Mongolia began to partici-
pate more fully in Japan’s counterbalancing efforts throughout Asia, and it sought more invest-
ment from Tokyo instead of Beijing. Shinzo Abe’s government promised to reduce tariffs on
Mongolian products and to provide an additional $500 million in loans at 0.1-percent annual
interest for the construction of a new airport in Ulaanbaatar. The Mongolian government fur-
ther diversified the source of its loans, to include the IMF, the Asian Development Bank, and
South Korea, rather than relying on Chinese funds that come with political strings.82 China
makes up less than 10 percent of the new loan arrangement, representing a large reduction in
Mongolia’s reliance on Chinese capital.83 The new government also intensified its efforts to
expand security cooperation with the United States.84
Although Mongolia continues to be economically dependent on China, the two coun-
tries’ long histories and repeated incidents of Chinese pressure indicate that there has been and
will likely continue to be a deep wariness of Beijing’s influence among both the Mongolian
population and political officials in Ulaanbaatar. Thus far, Mongolia continues to seek eco-
nomic growth through trade with China while fiercely defending its sovereignty. The apology
provided after the Dalai Lama’s visit was without tangible consequences, and the new govern-
ment has not been constrained by the previous government’s promise to refrain from future
visits.
Mongolia has shown little reluctance to imperil its economic fortunes in order to guard
its autonomy. For example, as noted earlier, the fees China imposed on cross-border shipments
amounted to roughly $12 million annually, and Mongolia risked $350 million in the 2013
coal supply deal during a price dispute.85 Furthermore, by seeking security relationships with
Western powers and diversifying its economic partnerships, the government continues to plan
for ways to increase its ability to rebuff Chinese pressure in the future.
China is responding to Mongolia’s relatively successful attempts to insulate itself by
intensifying its focus on Mongolian society. Through the United Front Work Department,
80 Edward Wong, “Mongolia, with Deep Ties to Dalai Lama, Turns from Him Toward China,” New York Times, Decem-
ber 30, 2016b.
81 Boldsaikhan Sambuu, “Here Are 4 Things to Know About Mongolia’s Presidential Election on Monday,” Washington
Post, June 23, 2017.
82 Yiyi Chen, “China and Japan’s Investment Competition in Mongolia,” The Diplomat, August 1, 2018.
83
Cliff Venzon and Eri Sugiura, “Mongolia Hopes for Belt and Road Bonanza Without Heavy Debt,” Nikkei Asian Review,
May 30, 2019.
84 Michael J. Green, “The United States Should Help Mongolia Stand Up to China,” Foreign Policy, September 26, 2019.
85 Chuin-Wei Yap and Joanne Chiu, “China-Mongolia Coal Spat Heats Up,” Wall Street Journal, January 29, 2013.
Beijing continues seeking to exploit schisms in the Mongolian Buddhist community and use
that exploitation to establish bridges to the country’s business and political elites. China is also
seeking to be able to dictate the search, recognition, and final announcement of the next lamas
in a bid to use Buddhism to strengthen its power both inside and outside of China. Buddhist
leaders in Mongolia have thus far prevented China from gaining loyalty at the mass level, but
the period following the eventual death of the 14th Dalai Lama will be critical.86
Overall, even with the overwhelming amount of economic pressure that Beijing can bring
to bear, its influence over Mongolian politics appears limited. China provoked a nationalist
response among the Mongolian population and a governmental search for both economic and
security safety valves, but China’s efforts at the mass level are intensifying as it seeks to use
religion to its advantage. The lesson in Mongolia is that economic influence often may not
be enough for China to receive its preferred policy outcomes, even when that economic lever-
age is nearly total, and particularly in countries that have long histories with China. However,
China’s renewed effort on influencing Mongolian society through religion demonstrates that
Beijing’s influence-seeking will not simply halt when presented with resistance. China has
multiple tools at its disposal.
New Zealand
New Zealand is a member of the “Five Eyes” intelligence group (along with Australia, Canada,
the United Kingdom, and the United States), a member of the Comprehensive and Progressive
Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership, and a proposed member of Japan’s East Asian Com-
munity; however, New Zealand has shifted its foreign policy toward a more neutral stance on
China in recent years.87 New Zealand signed a free trade agreement with China in 2008, and
China now stands as New Zealand’s second-largest trading partner behind Australia. Chinese
telecommunications company Huawei won the contract to build New Zealand’s 4G network
in 2014.88 China consumed more than 25 percent of New Zealand’s dairy exports, and total
trade between the countries was worth $15 billion by 2017.89 A full 15 percent of tourists to
New Zealand come from China and contributed more than $16 billion to the economy in
2018.90 New Zealand has cooperated with China on near-space research, and a 2017 Chinese
space launch occurred from a New Zealand dairy farm owned by a Chinese firm.91
New Zealand is therefore increasingly reliant on Beijing economically. Its role in the Five
Eyes group and its status as a claimant state to Antarctica make it a target for Chinese efforts
and vulnerable because of its small size.
86 Miguel Martin, “Global Religion and the United Front: The Case of Mongolia,” China Brief, Vol. 18, No. 12, July 10,
2018.
87 Charlotte Graham-McLay, “New Zealand Fears Fraying Ties with China, Its Biggest Customer,” New York Times, Feb-
ruary 14, 2019a.
89 Observatory of Economic Complexity, “What Does New Zealand Export to China?” webpage, 2017.
90 Meaghan Tobin, “New Zealand Bans Huawei from 5G, China Has Message for New Zealand,” South China Morning
Post, February 17, 2019.
91 David Fisher, “Space Launch from Dairy Farm After John Key Met China’s President Xi,” New Zealand Herald, Septem-
ber 22, 2017.
A series of high-profile events have brought public attention to Wellington’s cozying rela-
tionship with Beijing. In 2017, it was exposed that a member of the New Zealand Parliament
had close ties to People’s Liberation Army military universities, where he taught English to
Chinese spies before immigrating to New Zealand. This lawmaker was reported to be close to
the Chinese community in New Zealand and to maintain ties to the Chinese embassy, where
he presented awards to individuals who blocked protests during the visit of Chinese Premier
Li Keqiang.92
Other incidents showed the potential sway of Chinese money in New Zealand’s politics.
For example, one individual was found to have donated $112,000 to a political candidate while
heading at least seven different United Front Work Department organizations in New Zealand.
A former prime minister sold property to a wealthy Chinese buyer for well above market rate.93
And a second Chinese–New Zealander lawmaker was shown to have deep connections to the
Chinese embassy and pro-Beijing community organizations.94 These examples demonstrate
how intertwined New Zealand’s politics have become with Chinese influence.
As one strategic analyst stated, New Zealand is the “ideal liberal democratic lab rat” for
China to experiment with in using “the very freedoms and transparency of democratic sys-
tems against them.”95 New Zealand is home to a significant ethnic Chinese population, which
makes it fertile ground for the use of the United Front Work Department’s tactics.96 During
the Cold War, this population was largely neutral, but now few activities in the community are
independent from Beijing. United Front activities have encouraged bloc voting for pro-Beijing
candidates among the ethnic Chinese population, and the department has established a branch
of the China Council for the Promotion of Peaceful National Reunification, which takes a
hard pro-Beijing line on issues related to Taiwan.
China’s efforts to influence New Zealand politics benefit from weak rules governing
political contributions. Foreign political contributions are not illegal in New Zealand, and
donors who give less than 15,000 New Zealand dollars are allowed to remain anonymous,
increasing the opportunities for wealthy individuals to filter their contributions through mul-
tiple anonymous donors. Foreign lobbyists are not required to register with the government,
and investigations of influence operations must gain the permission of the service ministers,
who are political officials with little incentive to potentially embarrass their own party.97
In addition, New Zealand’s universities have seen efforts to stifle anti-Beijing speech on
campuses, where multiple incidents of violence have occurred, particularly related to protests
about the unrest in Hong Kong. These universities, many of which are home to Confucius
Institutes, seem ill-prepared to deal with the issue and are widely self-censoring in fear of Bei-
jing’s response. Anne-Marie Brady, a prominent scholar at the University of Canterbury who
has published work critical of Beijing, has been the victim of break-ins at her home and office,
along with tampering of her vehicle. She continues to share a building with a Confucius Insti-
92 Charlotte Graham, “New Zealand Lawmaker’s Past Raises Alarms About China’s Reach,” New York Times, October 5,
2017.
94 Graham, 2017.
95 Patrick and Stoakes, 2019.
tute, and neither the New Zealand government nor the university has taken significant action
to find the perpetrators or guarantee her safety.98
Such incidents have much the same effect as events in Australia, where individuals and
institutions refrain from speech that goes against Beijing’s preferences for fear of reprisals or
the loss of investment in the education sector. Every pro-democracy protest at New Zealand’s
universities is confronted by well-organized Chinese students, who are encouraged by the
Chinese embassy and its partners in society and who sometimes engage in violence or intimi-
dation tactics.99
Officials in Wellington have so far taken relatively few concrete actions to counter the
growing direct Chinese influence over politicians or the indirect influence over messaging
and organization in New Zealand society. The government has not taken up any legislation
to limit foreign influence over the political system. Individuals critical of the impact of Chi-
nese money in the system have been removed from major parties, but lawmakers who have
significant ties to Chinese intelligence have not.100 Wellington’s limited efforts have included
banning Huawei from constructing New Zealand’s new 5G network as part of the country’s
commitment to the Five Eyes group, but it did so only after the United States expressed strong
opposition to Huawei’s involvement.101 The country’s judicial system remains relatively free
of Chinese influence and has repeatedly called on the government to take Beijing’s human
rights record more seriously.102
New Zealand stands as an example of a highly liberal democracy with unique vulner-
abilities. Its alliance structure has kept it from defecting too far into the realm of Chinese
preferences over its foreign policy, but Wellington has continued to show limited enthusiasm
for efforts to resist Chinese influence. Only after heavy protests from Washington did New
Zealand ban a Chinese company from building the country’s 5G network, and New Zealand’s
military contributions to its alliances have been relatively small. In the absence of its alliance
system, New Zealand may have simply been overwhelmed by the amount of resources China
can bring to bear in its influence efforts, and even with powerful friends, New Zealand’s level
of resistance has been minimal.
Norway
In 2010, the Norwegian Nobel Committee awarded its Peace Prize to Chinese dissident Liu
Xiaobo in recognition of his “long and nonviolent struggle for fundamental human rights in
China,”103 despite warnings from Chinese officials that such a selection would negatively affect
98
Charlotte Graham-McLay, “China Watchers Demand Action on Harassment of New Zealand Professor,” New York
Times, December 7, 2018b.
99 Patrick and Stoakes, 2019.
100 Charlotte Graham-McLay, “Campaign Contribution Raises Concerns About China’s Meddling in New Zealand,” New
York Times, October 25, 2018a.
101 OnHuawei, see Graham-McLay, 2019a. We also offer two additional examples in which New Zealand has cooperated
with the United States and taken steps that run counter to Chinese interests: On P-8 aircraft purchases, see Rob Taylor,
“New Zealand to Buy Boeing Patrol Aircraft,” Wall Street Journal, July 10, 2018. On financial backing with island states,
see Rachel Pannett, “U.S. Allies Vie with China to Make Pacific Island Friends,” Wall Street Journal, November 8, 2018.
102 Charlotte Graham-McLay, “New Zealand Halts Plan for Chinese Extradition,” New York Times, June 12, 2019b.
103 Norwegian Nobel Committee, “The Nobel Peace Prize for 2010,” October 8, 2010.
relations between the two nations.104 Beijing reacted promptly and with fury, suspending all
diplomatic relations with Norway and most notably tabling ongoing talks for a free trade
agreement.105 China issued 14 demands that Norway would need to fulfill before relations
could be normalized, according to unofficial sources.106 These demands included a promise
that the Nobel Committee would never again award its Peace Prize to a Chinese dissident.
China sought to pressure Norway into acquiescence by establishing several regulatory
measures at its expense. China enacted stringent food-safety regulations that targeted Norwe-
gian fish, primarily fresh and frozen salmon.107 Before the Nobel dispute, Norway provided
90 percent of China’s salmon imports. Following the dispute, Norwegian salmon dropped
to less than 30 percent of Chinese salmon imports.108 One estimate suggests that the dispute
cost Norway between $125 million and $176 million in fish exports alone and that, given that
trade between Norway and China had been projected to rise, the dispute cost Norway between
$780 million and $1.3 billion in overall exports.109 In 2013, China also excluded Norway from
a 72-hour visa-free travel program that China created for states sending a large number of tour-
ists to Beijing, despite including all other European nations. Chinese officials explained that
some countries had been excluded from the initiative because of the “bad behavior” of their
governments and the “low quality” of their citizens.110
Norway took several conciliatory steps in response to Chinese pressure, particularly after
Prime Minister Erna Solberg’s conservative government took power in 2013.111 Norway helped
admit China as an observer to the Arctic Council in May 2013,112 after expressing hopes that
the council would provide a channel to cooperate with China.113 In May 2014, Solberg refused
to meet with the Dalai Lama out of a desire to improve relations with China, despite an out-
pouring of public disapproval.114 In 2015, the chairman of the committee who awarded the
Peace Prize to Liu Xiaobo, Thorbjoern Jagland, became the first in history to be ousted from
his position, with many attributing this as a peace offering to China.115
Yet Norway held firm on other issues and even struck back against China. For instance,
in its February 2015 national threat assessment, the Norwegian Police Security Service identi-
104 Andrew Jacobs and Jonathan Ansfield, “Nobel Peace Prize Given to Jailed Chinese Dissident,” New York Times, Octo-
ber 8, 2010.
105 Sarah Lyall, “Winner’s Chair Remains Empty at Nobel Event,” New York Times, December 10, 2010.
106 Benjamin David Baker, “Soul or Salmon? Norway’s Chinese Dilemma,” The Diplomat, May 9, 2014.
107 Andrew Higgins, “In Philippines, Banana Growers Feel Effect of South China Sea Dispute,” Washington Post, June 10,
2012.
108 Baker, 2014.
109 Ivar Kolstad, “Too Big to Fault? Effects of the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize on Norwegian Exports to China and Foreign
Policy,” International Political Science Review, Vol. 41, No. 2, 2020. However, other estimates suggest that the overall impact
was negligible (Ben Bland, Tom Hancock, and Bryan Harris, “China Wields Power with Boycott Diplomacy,” Financial
Times, September 5, 2017).
110 Jamil Anderlini and Clare MacCarthy, “China Snubs Norway in Visa Reforms,” Financial Times, December 6, 2012.
111
Sewell Chan, “Norway and China Restore Ties, 6 Years After Nobel Prize Dispute,” New York Times, December 19,
2016.
112 Steven Lee Myers, “Arctic Council Adds Six Members, Including China,” New York Times, May 16, 2013.
113 Alister Doyle, “Despite Nobel, Norway Favors China Role in Arctic,” Reuters, January 24, 2011.
114 Rick Gladstone, “Norway’s Leaders Snub Dalai Lama in Deference to China,” New York Times, May 7, 2014.
115 Thom Poole, “Why Has the Nobel Peace Prize Chairman Been Demoted?” BBC News, March 5, 2015.
fied China as an entity potentially interested in espionage in Norway, and Norway expelled
two guest researchers affiliated with a Chinese university for illegal research into dual-purpose
technology.116 Norway also canceled an agreement with the European Incoherent Scatter Sci-
entific Association, a multinational space research organization in which China plays a lead-
ing role, to construct a radar facility that Beijing had long desired.117 Furthermore, despite the
steps taken to appease China, Norway chose not to apologize for the committee’s choice of the
Chinese dissident, ultimately choosing to weather the storm of Chinese retaliation.
On December 19, 2016, China and Norway reached a compromise that restored dip-
lomatic relations between the two countries. In their statements, Norway announced that it
“fully respects China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity” and would not seek to undermine
China’s core interests, while Beijing claimed that Norway had “deeply reflected upon the rea-
sons bilateral mutual trust was harmed.”118 In the resolution, neither side made specific con-
cessions, and each would be able to claim victory in the dispute. This led outside observers to
question both the true causes of the compromise and its timing. There is little evidence that
Chinese retaliation had escalated to the point that it could force Norway into an agreement.
Indeed, even before the dispute was publicly resolved, bilateral trade between the two nations
reached record highs in 2015.119
Thus, the dispute’s resolution appears to have been determined by the potential for eco-
nomic benefits on both sides rather than by Chinese influence efforts. Discussions over the
free trade agreement, which were put on hold in 2010, could resume with the dispute resolved.
Talks remain ongoing at this time, with little evidence of continued enmity and no further
attempts at compellent Chinese pressure. Such an agreement would provide obvious economic
benefit for Norway’s fisheries and oil firms.120 However, the benefits for Beijing should not
be understated. China seeks to use the Arctic sea route to transport goods to Europe, which
will dramatically lower transportation times.121 Perhaps more importantly, China is looking to
develop free trade relationships with the West in light of a more hostile U.S. trade policy under
U.S. President Donald Trump. Indeed, it is likely little coincidence that this resolution came
just one month after Trump’s election in 2016.
When assessing the extent to which China’s unofficial demands were met, it seems clear
that Norway compromised very little. Given that each side possessed the economic might to
withstand hostile relations, saving face and responding to public sentiment had long remained
the driving forces behind the continued diplomatic tension. China’s attempts at influence were
therefore limited, Norway’s attempts at conciliation were minimal, and Chinese pressure con-
tributed very little to the dispute’s resolution. The strongest lessons of this case are that China
utilizes the same tools to punish perceived slights as it uses to exert influence and that China
will forgo its outrage to preserve key interests when necessary.
116 Benjamin David Baker, “Sino-Norwegian Relations, 5 Years After Liu Xiaobo’s Nobel Peace Prize,” The Diplomat, Janu-
ary 4, 2016.
117 Baker, 2016.
118 Chan, 2016.
119 Marc Lanteigne and Bjørnar Sverdrup-Thygeson, “Towards the Thaw: Seeking Clarity in China-Norway Relations,”
The Diplomat, January 16, 2016.
120 Nerijus Adomaitis, “With Energy High on Agenda, China’s No.3 Leader Visits Norway,” Reuters, May 15, 2019.
121 Lieke Bos, “Norway-China Relations ‘Unfrozen,’” The Diplomat, December 21, 2016.
The Philippines
Claims to the South China Sea, where disagreements have arisen persistently over questions
of territorial control, oil and gas reserves, fishing resources, and the region’s strategic location,
have been at the center of many historical disputes between China and the Philippines.122 In
April 2012, this conflict reached a fever pitch when a Philippine warship encountered eight
Chinese fishing vessels near the disputed Scarborough Shoal. Boarding the ships, the Philip-
pine Navy found illegal fish and coral and attempted to arrest the fishermen. However, two
Chinese surveillance ships arrived and prevented the arrests.123 Negotiations between the two
states provided no diplomatic solution, and vessels on both sides remained in the nearby waters
for several months before the Philippine vessels ultimately retreated.124
The Philippines and President Benigno Aquino brought the dispute to the international
community, seeking support from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and
the United States and announcing that the Philippines would initiate international arbitra-
tion of the issue.125 China attempted to influence the Philippine position through two pri-
mary mechanisms. First, China halted imports of Philippine fruit—primarily bananas, as
well as papayas, mangoes, coconuts, and pineapples.126 Before the crisis, roughly one-fourth
of all bananas originating from the Philippines had been exported to China.127 After the
confrontation, China began to enact strict quarantine procedures on bananas from the Phil-
ippines, citing health concerns. To provide cover for its actions, China pointed to an initial
warning in March, before the crisis. However, because this warning targeted imports solely
from a single Japanese conglomerate operating in just one island—Mindanao—such claims
held little weight.128 Second, China began restricting tourism to the Philippines. Beijing
issued a travel advisory telling its citizens that they were not safe in the Philippines because
of strong anti-China sentiment.129 This led Chinese travel agencies to suspend all Philippine
tours and Chinese air carriers to cut their daily flights to Manila in half, leading to a cascade
of cancellations.130
Despite the economic hardships imposed and the fact that China retained “de facto con-
trol” over the shoal in the aftermath of the crisis, President Aquino did not back down.131
122 Leszek Buszynski, “The South China Sea: Oil, Maritime Claims, and US–China Strategic Rivalry,” Washington Quar-
terly, Vol. 35, No. 2, 2012.
123
Jane Perlez, “Dispute Between China and Philippines over Island Becomes More Heated,” New York Times, May 10,
2012a.
124 Jane Perlez, “Philippines and China Ease Tensions in Rift at Sea,” New York Times, June 18, 2012b.
125 Michael
Green, Kathleen Hicks, Zack Cooper, John Schaus, and Jake Douglas, Countering Coercion in Maritime Asia:
The Theory and Practice of Gray Zone Deterrence, Washington, D.C.: Center for Strategic and International Studies, May
2017.
126 “The China-Philippine Banana War,” Asia Sentinel, June 6, 2012.
127 Higgins, 2012.
128 Higgins, 2012.
129 Jason Gutierrez, “China Issues Warnings on Philippines,” ABS CBN News, May 10, 2012.
130 Green et al., 2017.
131 Rouchelle R. Dinglasan, “China Has de Facto Control over Panatag Shoal, Says Former DFA Senior Official,” GMA
News, October 6, 2012.
Instead, the Philippines continued to escalate the dispute in the international arena. In 2013,
the Philippines challenged China’s broader claim to the South China Sea at The Hague under
the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea. The Permanent Court of Arbitration ultimately
ruled in favor of the Philippines in 2016. The Hague tribunal found that China had no legal
basis to claim historical rights to much of the South China Sea, stating that neither China’s
historical claims nor the sea features that China identified were sufficient to generate an exclu-
sive economic zone and subsequent maritime rights.132 The ruling was a clear, definitive defeat
for China. China proved unable to leverage its economic influence to alter the behavior of the
Philippines and instead suffered a rebuke in the international community.
The outlook for China, however, changed little as a result of the court’s decision. The
ruling itself provided no mechanism of enforcement, and with China refusing to participate in
the process and rejecting the tribunal’s decision, any real consequences would be based on the
willingness of the Philippines to assert the ruling.133 The likelihood of any attempts at enforce-
ment decreased dramatically following the transition from former Philippine President Aquino
to President Rodrigo Duterte. Duterte pivoted away from the United States shortly after his
election; during his campaign, U.S. officials had been critical of his commitment to human
rights and his connections to extra-judicial killings.134 In October 2016, Duterte announced
a “separation” from the United States both militarily and economically.135 In turn, Duterte
has grown closer to China, increasing efforts to build stronger economic ties between the two
countries, and he has therefore been reluctant to challenge Beijing on the Permanent Court of
Arbitration ruling. China has responded by promising the sought-after economic incentives.
During Duterte’s first visit in 2016, Chinese President Xi pledged $24 billion in investments
and financing for the Philippines.136 Duterte has clearly linked this economic cooperation to
the 2016 ruling, noting that Xi offered the Philippines a controlling stake in a joint energy deal
in exchange for ignoring the international arbitration.137
Yet, despite this shift toward China, both the lessons learned from this case and the long-
term outlook for China and the Philippines remain in question. As noted earlier, it is difficult
to attribute any improvement in relations to Chinese attempts to assert influence. Rather,
the improved relations can more directly be linked to the domestic political change from the
Aquino administration to the Duterte administration. Indeed, under Aquino, the influence
effort inspired retaliation. Furthermore, there remains substantial uncertainty over the extent
to which this newfound cooperation will persist. The vast majority of the funding pledged by
Xi has yet to materialize.138 Philippine public opinion on China, and the government’s inac-
132 Hunt, 2016.

133 Hunt, 2016.
134 Juliet Perry, “Obama Calls Duterte, Highlights Shared Human Rights Values,” CNN, May 18, 2016.
135 Ben Blanchard, “Duterte Aligns Philippines with China, Says U.S. Has Lost,” Reuters, October 20, 2016.
136 Yen Nee Lee, “Philippine President Duterte Says He’ll Stand Up to China—He Might Not Deliver,” CNBC, August 27,
2019b.
137 Helen
Regan, “Duterte Says Xi Jinping Offered Him an Oil and Gas Deal to Ignore South China Sea Ruling,” CNN,
September 12, 2019.
138
Nyshka Chandran, “The Philippines’ Pivot Toward China Has Yet to Pay Off, as Manila Awaits Promised Funds,”
CNBC, November 23, 2018.
tion toward it, has cratered,139 and the public no longer trusts Duterte to handle disputes with
China.140 In response, Duterte began to take nominal steps in opposition to Beijing, raising the
issue of the South China Sea in talks with Xi.141 Duterte also cultivated a “great relationship”
with U.S. President Trump since the latter took office,142 even making overtures to the United
States for assistance against Chinese aggression.143 Duterte continued constructing new facili-
ties for visiting U.S. forces, opening the first on the island of Luzon in early 2019, and a second
is scheduled to be built on Palawan.144 Thus, even as the election of Duterte improved the long-
term outlook for China, any gains remain volatile and subject to both Duterte’s whims and the
possibility of future changes in government.145
South Korea
Following months of consultations that began in February 2016, the United States and South
Korea announced on July 7, 2016, that they had approved the deployment of a U.S.-made
THAAD anti-ballistic missile system in South Korea.146 In the announcement, the United
States and South Korea identified the deployment as a defensive measure against North Korea’s
ballistic missiles and its pursuit of weapons of mass destruction and stated that South Korea’s
THAAD system would not be deployed against any third-party nations.147 Nevertheless, China
quickly protested this agreement. Despite its defensive nature, China feared a military buildup
on its doorstep. Most importantly, China believed that the radar capabilities included in the
system could be used to track Chinese missile systems, giving the United States an advantage
in a potential military conflict.148
In addition to making official statements opposing the THAAD deployment, Beijing
retaliated with several unofficial sanctions designed to influence South Korea’s behavior. The
China National Tourism Administration ordered domestic travel agencies to step selling pack-
ages to South Korea, cutting tourism from roughly 8 million visitors per year to just 4 million
in 2017. This resulted in losses to South Korea that have been estimated as high as $15 bil-
139
“Third Quarter 2018 Social Weather Survey: Pinoys Maintain Anti-Chinese Stance on West Philippine Sea Issue,”
Social Weather Stations, November 20, 2018.
140 Isabel Guarco, “Filipinos Don’t Trust Duterte to Handle China,” Foreign Policy, July 12, 2019a.
141 Yen Nee Lee, “Philippine Finance Secretary: Duterte Talked South China Sea with Xi,” CNBC, August 30, 2019a.
142 Julie Hirschfield Davis, “Trump Lauds ‘Great Relationship’ with Duterte in Manila,” New York Times, November 13,
2017.
143 Isabel Guarco, “Is Duterte Really Asking for U.S. Aid Against China?” Foreign Policy, July 18, 2019b.
144 Seth Robson, “Facility for US Forces Opens on Philippines’ Main Island; Another Slated for Palawan,” Stars and Stripes,
January 31, 2019.
145 Some have even called for Duterte’s impeachment in light of his conciliatory response to China, particularly after the
sinking of a Philippine fishing boat by a Chinese vessel on June 9, 2019, inside Manila’s EEZ (Martin Petty, “Impeach Me,
I’ll Jail You—Philippines’ Duterte Dares Foes to Test Him,” Reuters, June 28, 2019).
146 Missy Ryan, “Pentagon to Deploy Anti-Missile System in South Korea,” Washington Post, July 7, 2016.
147 U.S. Department of Defense, “U.S. to Deploy THAAD Missile Battery to South Korea,” July 8, 2016.
148 AdamTaylor, “Why China Is So Mad About THAAD, a Missile Defense System Aimed at Deterring North Korea,”
Washington Post, March 7, 2017.
lion.149 China canceled several events featuring South Korean music and television stars, which
negatively affected the stock prices of South Korea’s top entertainment companies.150 Follow-
ing a boycott of South Korean products, food exports from South Korea to China fell 5.6 per-
cent year on year in March 2017, from $92.5 million to $87.3 million. China also shuttered
75 of 99 retail markets belonging to Lotte, a South Korean conglomerate,151 in retaliation for
Lotte offering a golf course as land for THAAD use,152 and Hyundai announced a drop in
sales in China of 64 percent in 2017.153 The economic impact was substantial, as South Korea’s
$227.3 billion trade with China in 2015 dropped to $211.4 billion in 2016.154
Despite these pressures, South Korea did not initially meet China’s demands. Under
South Korean President Park Geun-hye, the deployment persisted and became operational in
early May 2017.155 A change in government again appeared to signal a change in resolve. New
South Korean President Moon Jae-in, who took office just one week after the THAAD system
became operational, had opposed the deployment in his election campaign, claiming that it
had divided the nation and “aggravated foreign relations.”156 After taking office, Moon initially
suspended further THAAD deployment.157
However, following two North Korean intercontinental ballistic missile tests in July 2017,
President Moon shifted course, asking the United States to finish the deployment.158 Neverthe-
less, in the months following this decision, Moon also took conciliatory steps in response to
China. While stopping short of endorsing China’s Belt and Road Initiative, Moon expressed
an openness to integration between the initiative and his own New Northern Policy. Most
directly, in late 2017, Moon’s administration gave China three assurances regarding South
Korea’s defense policy:
• There would be no further THAAD deployment.

• South Korea would not deploy any further U.S. missile defense systems in the region.
• South Korea would not join a trilateral military alliance with the United States and
Japan.159
149 Matt Stiles, “Upset over a U.S. Missile Defense System, China Hits South Korea Where It Hurts—in the Wallet,” Los
Angeles Times, February 28, 2018.
150 AmyQin and Choe Sang-Hun, “South Korean Missile Defense Deal Appears to Sour China’s Taste for K-Pop,” New
York Times, August 7, 2016.
151 Joyce Lee, “South Korea’s Lotte Group Says Missile Row No Reason to Pull Out of China,” Reuters, April 2, 2017.
152 Taylor, 2017.
153
Hudson Lockett, “Hyundai Motors Q2 Profit Comes up Short as China Sales Drop 64%,” Financial Times, July 25,
2017.
154 Kim Bo-gyung, “South Korea-China Trade Volume Rises to Pre-THAAD Levels,” Korea Herald, December 19, 2018.
155 Jeremy Herb and Ryan Browne, “Anti-Missile System in South Korea Operational in ‘Coming Days,’” CNN, April 27,
2017.
156 Anna Fifield, “Interview with Moon Jae-in, Set to Become South Korea’s Next President,” Washington Post, May 2, 2017.
157 Taehoon Lee and James Griffiths, “South Korea Suspends THAAD Deployment,” CNN, June 8, 2017.
158 J. Weston Phippen, “South Korea Asks to Increase Its Firepower,” The Atlantic, July 29, 2017.
159 AnkitPanda, “China and South Korea: Examining the Resolution of the THAAD Impasse,” The Diplomat, Novem-
ber 13, 2017.
Solidifying the improved relations between states, President Moon visited Beijing in Decem-
ber 2017, and the nations celebrated the tenth anniversary of the South Korea–China Strategic
Partnership in 2018.160
Assessing the success of Chinese influence efforts in this case requires a closer analysis of
the desired outcome. The THAAD system remains deployed in South Korea, so China clearly
did not achieve its proximate goal. Yet South Korea did make concessions to China, and some
analysts attribute that result directly to the economic sanctions.161 The concessions appear not
to have been coordinated with the United States.162
China has subsequently made progress in relations with South Korea. For example, China
specifically noted South Korea’s important role in nuclear talks between North Korea and the
United States, emphasizing that both sides have a natural convergence of interests.163 Further-
more, the progress has come at a time when the relationship between South Korea and Japan is
eroding. In 2019, South Korea terminated an intelligence-sharing agreement between the two
nations after Japan removed South Korea from its list of preferred trade partners.164 As a result,
there is a clear void that China seeks to fill.
However, China’s efforts have scarcely supplanted cooperation between the United States
and South Korea. In fact, in June 2019, President Moon vowed to find common ground
between the Indo-Pacific Strategy proposed by the U.S. Department of Defense for counter-
acting China and his own New Southern Policy, an effort to reduce South Korea’s dependence
on China by enhancing economic relations with Southeast Asia and India.165 This is just one
example of how, although the Moon administration has maintained ties with China, it has also
taken steps designed to reduce the vulnerabilities caused by reliance on China—for instance,
by upgrading its relations with Indonesia, the United Arab Emirates, and others.166 This shift
away from Beijing is also reflective of overall public opinion in South Korea, which has become
significantly more hostile in the wake of China’s punitive measures.167 Thus, although China
received nominal diplomatic concessions in the dispute with South Korea, this has furthered
China’s goals only in the short term. In the long term, it appears that China’s attempts at influ-
ence have harmed, rather than helped, its relations with South Korea, as Moon’s government
seeks to free the country from Beijing’s grasp.
160 Jina Kim, “China and South Korea’s THAAD Dispute May Be Set to Reignite,” News Lens, February 25, 2019.
161
Bec Strating and James Leibold, “Coping with the Beijing Freezer,” The Strategist, June 28, 2018; and David Josef
Volodzko, “China Wins Its War Against South Korea’s US THAAD Missile Shield—Without Firing a Shot,” South China
Morning Post, November 18, 2017..
162 Panda, 2017.
163 Lee Seong-hyon, “Beijing-Seoul Ties After Xi’s Pyongyang Visit,” Korea Times, September 17, 2019.
164 J.
Berkshire Miller, “China, Japan and South Korea Cautiously Look to Renew Their Collective Ties,” World Politics
Review, September 24, 2019.
165 Uri Friedman, “How to Choose Between the U.S. and China? It’s Not That Easy,” The Atlantic, July 26, 2019.
166 Richard Fontaine, Kristine Lee, and Hannah Suh, “Can South Korea and America Find a Common Position on China?”
War on the Rocks, July 16, 2019.
167 Kim Jiyoon, “South Korean Public Opinion,” Asan Forum, February 27, 2018.
Sri Lanka
Persistent unrest, including a decades-long civil war, created an opportunity for China to seek
influence in Sri Lanka, which India has traditionally viewed as a critical strategic interest in the
Indian Ocean. When human rights abuses during the waning years of the war led to increasing
international isolation for Sri Lanka, China became a consistent ally for Sri Lanka’s president,
Mahinda Rajapaksa. China provided Sri Lanka with political cover at the UN, supporting the
country against human rights allegations and blocking potential sanctions from the UN Secu-
rity Council.168 China also provided military equipment and economic support, leaving the
more reticent India scrambling to counterbalance Beijing’s increasing influence.169
When the war ended in 2009, President Rajapaksa and his three brothers consolidated
their hold on government, controlling numerous ministries that accounted for 80 percent
of total government spending. China’s investment in Rajapaksa had seemingly paid off, as
his total control of government ensured that Beijing had a direct line to the decisionmak-
ing process in Sri Lanka. China’s economic support continued after the war concluded, and
R ajapaksa sought to rapidly develop the nation. Most notably, China provided a series of
loans for the construction of an ill-fated port in Hambantota. Chinese loans funded the proj-
ect, to be built in Rajapaksa’s home district, despite misgivings from Sri Lanka’s own govern-
ment about the port’s economic viability. Providing loans when others refused gave China
leverage with Rajapaksa to tilt influence away from India in South Asia. For example, the
port came with a clear directive by China that it would be used to further intelligence-sharing
between the two nations.170
As officials and outside observers had predicted, the port proved to be an economic fail-
ure, with few ships choosing to berth at Hambantota rather than the existing port at Colombo.
Chinese loans instead helped drive Sri Lanka further into debt at a time when the country
experienced persistent balance-of-payment issues that left it with insufficient foreign currency
inflows to finance foreign debt repayments.171 Despite relatively consistent economic growth,
the rising debt, combined with increasing distaste for Rajapaksa’s corruption and disregard for
democracy, left Rajapaksa vulnerable in the January 2015 presidential election.
Given its deep ties with the Sri Lankan government, China sought desperately to help
Rajapaksa maintain office and engaged in widespread intervention in Sri Lankan politics.
Many of the payments for the port—totaling at least $7.6 million—directly supported
Rajapaksa’s reelection activities, and China’s ambassador explicitly lobbied voters in support of
Rajapaksa.172 However, in a surprise result, Rajapaksa lost the election to Maithripala Sirisena,
who headed a pro-democracy party that promised to establish more-equal relations with India
and China, as well as Pakistan and Japan.173
168 Neil DeVotta, “Sri Lanka: From Turmoil to Dynasty,” Journal of Democracy, Vol. 22, No. 2, 2011.
169 Jayadeva Uyangoda, “Sri Lanka in 2009: From Civil War to Political Uncertainties,” Asian Survey, Vol. 50, No. 1, 2010.
170 Abi-Habib, 2018.

171 Umesh Moramudali, “Is Sri Lanka Really a Victim of China’s ‘Debt Trap’?” The Diplomat, May 14, 2019.
173
Ellen Barry and Dharisha Bastians, “Sri Lankan President Concedes Defeat After Startling Upset,” New York Times,
January 5, 2015.
This appeared to be a significant blow for China’s influence after it had devoted substan-
tial time and resources into cultivating a relationship with Rajapaksa. President Sirisena sought
to investigate deals made under the prior regime, putting many of the projects on hold and
looking deeply into the terms of Chinese loans.174 However, despite a stated desire to turn to
India, Japan, and the West, Sirisena found it difficult to fill the void of Chinese investment.
Sri Lanka’s economy was in such dire straits that government revenues were insufficient to
pay even the interest on its loans.175 Sirisena’s government would be forced to take out further
loans, including from China, to meet its debt payments.
Desperate to avoid default on its loans, in July 2017, Sri Lanka handed over the Hamban-
tota Port and 15,000 acres of land around it to a state-owned Chinese company for 99 years.176
This deal granted China territory only a few hundred miles off the coast of India, improving
China’s strategic position in South Asia. The agreement explicitly rules out any military use
of the port without prior Sri Lankan consent. However, there is fear that China maintains the
ability to pressure for this consent if it so desires, because even after ceding the port, Sri Lanka
remains in massive debt, especially to China.177 China has demonstrated its ability to retain
influence over Sri Lanka even through the change of government administrations.
Although this threat of economic power lingers, Chinese influence has remained mostly
unrealized. However, the relationship between China and Sri Lanka might improve dramati-
cally since the presidential election in November 2019. In October 2018, President Sirisena,
facing decreased support, threw the nation into constitutional crisis when he dismissed Prime
Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe following an alleged attempt on Sirisena’s life, which Sirisena
claimed had been carried out by India’s intelligence agency and supported by a minister in
Wickremesinghe’s cabinet.178 Sirisena sought to appoint former president Mahinda R ajapaksa
as prime minister, even attempting to dissolve the parliament when it refused to endorse
Rajapaksa, before finally backing down in light of a rebuke by the constitutional court.179 This
left the coalition that had backed Sirisena’s election in 2015 in shambles, and analysts noted
that this political turmoil favored China.180 The candidate for the Sri Lanka People’s Front was
Gotabaya Rajapaksa, the brother of Mahinda Rajapaksa and a former member of his ruling
coalition. During his campaign, Gotabaya Rajapaksa met with senior Chinese officials and
vowed to restore relations between the nations if elected, and he did win the contest in 2019.181
This change in administration has the potential to turn Sri Lanka into a point of leverage, par-
ticularly in China’s competition with India.
174 Annie Gowen, “Can Sri Lanka’s New Government Break Free from China?” Washington Post, August 16, 2015.
176 Kai Schultz, “Sri Lanka, Struggling with Debt, Hands a Major Port to China,” New York Times, December 12, 2017.
177 Tim Fernholz, “China’s “Debt Trap” Is Even Worse Than We Thought,” Quartz, June 28, 2018.
178 Akhilesh Pillalamarri, “Asian Rivalries and the Sri Lankan Constitutional Crisis,” The Diplomat, October 31, 2018.
179 Jeffrey
Feltman, Sri Lanka’s Presidential Elections: Progress, Regression, or Paralysis? Washington, D.C.: Brookings Insti-
tution, April 2019.
180 Maria Abi-Habib and Dharisha Bastians, “‘The Fear Is Coming Back’ as Political Crisis Brings Sri Lanka to Brink,”
New York Times, October 29, 2018.
181
Shihar Aneez, “Sri Lanka Presidential Nominee Rajapaksa Would Restore Relations with China: Adviser,” Reuters,
September 19, 2019.
The case of Sri Lanka must be considered a success for Chinese influence efforts. China
successfully leveraged its diplomatic and economic role, as well as its military capabilities, to
gain a close relationship with Rajapaksa’s government. Although its efforts in the 2015 elec-
tion proved futile, China was able to exert influence through its financial might even after the
change of government. Furthermore, the relationship that Beijing cultivated might pay even
greater dividends now that it once again has its preferred candidate in office.
This is ultimately one of the most substantial displays of China’s ability to exert influence
over other nations; as a result, there are several lessons to be learned. First, China has succeeded
in this case by choosing a particularly vulnerable target. Sri Lanka was rife with civil conflict
and debt, and the first Rajapaksa administration had military, diplomatic, and economic needs
that Beijing could fulfill. Second, China sought to cultivate influence with particular political
elites. Although targeting elites can be a risky proposition, given that they can be—and, in this
case, were—removed from office, this allowed a depth of cooperation that made it difficult for
subsequent governments to turn away from China’s role. This case thus highlights the condi-
tions under which Chinese influence can change behavior and persist over time.
Taiwan
The relationship between China and Taiwan has historically been conflictual, but political
change in Taiwan has once again brought tensions between the two countries into stark focus.
On May 20, 2016, Tsai Ing-wen of the Democratic Progressive Party was elected president of
Taiwan in a landslide. Although the party has traditionally been in favor of Taiwan indepen-
dence, Tsai, in her post-election news conference, emphasized the importance of her adminis-
tration and Beijing finding mutually acceptable ways to interact that would “ensure no provo-
cation and no surprises.”182 Despite this, China pointed to the “grave challenges” posed by
Tsai’s election and noted opposition to any activities seeking Taiwan independence.183 China
quickly threatened to cut off relations with President Tsai unless she would acknowledge the
One China status quo that had persisted under the previous regime. President Tsai refused to
do so, claiming that it went against the will of the people.184
In response, China triggered a cascade of punitive measures intended to damage Taiwan
economically and isolate it diplomatically. In 2016, after Beijing limited group tours to Taiwan
to express displeasure with President Tsai, Chinese tourists to Taiwan dropped by as much as
one-third.185 China stopped issuing individual travel permits to Taiwan in July 2019, suspend-
ing a program that had generated 82,000 arrivals per month the previous year.186 China also
took steps to cut off Taiwan from the larger international community. At the behest of the
Chinese government, Taiwan has been excluded from the World Health Organization’s health
182 Katie Hunt and Kristie Lu Stout, “Taiwan Elects Its First Female President; China Warns of ‘Grave Challenges,’” CNN,
January 17, 2016.
183 Hunt and Stout, 2016.
184 LallyWeymouth, “Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen: Beijing Must Respect Our Democratic Will,” Washington Post,
July 21, 2016.
185 Curtis S. Chin and Jose B. Collazo, “Japan Take Note: Chinese Tourism Has Strings Attached,” Japan Times, Septem-
ber 9, 2019.
186 Ralph Jennings, “Taiwan Will Easily Overcome China’s Ban on 82,000 Tourists per Month,” Forbes, August 15, 2019b.
summit each year since Tsai’s election.187 Also since her election, Burkina Faso, the Dominican
Republic, El Salvador, Kiribati, Panama, São Tomé and Príncipe, and the Solomon Islands all
switched allegiances from Taipei to Beijing, often as the result of direct economic incentives
from Beijing. Reporting suggests that China convinced Kiribati to shift its diplomatic recog-
nition by promising full funding, rather than loans, for airplanes and commercial ferries that
Kiribati had sought to purchase with Taiwan’s assistance.188 A Chinese construction conglom-
erate signed an $825 million contract with the Solomon Islands for a gold-mining project the
same day the country switched its recognition policy.189
Chinese influence also extended to private businesses. In 2018, China pressured several
international airlines into referring to Taiwan as part of China; fined a Japanese retailer, Muji,
because items in some of its stores were labeled “Made in Taiwan;” and forced the Gap cloth-
ing company to apologize for selling a T-shirt that depicted a map of China without including
Taiwan.190
China’s long-term goal in this dispute is the unification of the People’s Republic of China
and Taiwan (officially, the Republic of China) under the rule of the Chinese Communist Party.
In pursuit of unification, China also pursues several more-proximate goals. Currently, China
seeks the election of a government in Taiwan that will accept the One China principle. Initial
returns of China’s economic influence were strong. Tsai’s government lost seats in local elec-
tions late in 2018 because of a lagging economy, and several successful opposition candidates
pledged to improve the local economy by creating city-to-city channels to mainland China.191
Polls in early summer 2019 suggested that the opposition Kuomintang was likely to return to
power under Kaohsiung Mayor Han Kuo-yu, who sought to improve relations with China.192
However, support for Tsai was reinforced by Hong Kong’s pro-democracy protests.193
The protests began in summer 2019 in response to a bill introduced in Hong Kong that would
allow extradition to China for certain criminal suspects, and the demonstrations persisted as
the protestors sought further reforms, including direct elections for all lawmakers and the chief
executive.194 These protests highlighted several of the underlying flaws in the “one country,
two systems” model that China seeks to impose on Taiwan. Polling in May 2019 found that
83.6 percent of the Taiwanese public rejected the model,195 and 57 percent expressed support
187 Nick
Aspinwall, “Taiwan Picks Up International Support After Being Barred from World Health Assembly,” The Dip-
lomat, May 10, 2019.
188 David Crawshaw and Gerry Shih, “China Intensifies Pacific Offensive as Taiwan Loses Another Ally,” Washington Post,
September 20, 2019.
189 Steven
Lee Myers and Chris Horton, “As Taiwan Loses Influence, China Gains Ground in Race With U.S.,” New York
190 Steven Lee Myers and Chris Horton, “China Tries to Erase Taiwan, One Ally (and Website) at a Time,” New York Times,
May 25, 2018.
191 Richard C. Bush, “Taiwan’s Local Elections, Explained,” Brookings Institution, December 5, 2018.
192 Kathrin Hille, “Taiwan President Secures Nomination for 2020 Vote,” Financial Times, June 13, 2019.
193 Joyu Wang, “Taiwan Rallies for Hong Kong to Resist Beijing’s Influence,” Wall Street Journal, September 29, 2019.
194 Amy Qin, “Hong Kong’s Leader Partly Relents. Will the Protests Continue?” New York Times, September 4, 2019.
195 Mainland Affairs Council, “Mainstream Opinion in Taiwan Opposes Mainland’s Intimidation, Pressuring, and United
Front Work to Divide Taiwan and Supports the Government’s Position on Defending Taiwan,” press release, May 16, 2019.
for the Hong Kong protests.196 August 2019 polling suggested that President Tsai maintained
a significant advantage over her opponent,197 and increases in Tsai’s approval ratings tracked
with her anti-China stance, rising more than 10 percentage points in the months follow-
ing an increase in her anti-China rhetoric.198 There is further evidence that Chinese tactics
have inspired public backlash, with surveys showing large numbers of the Taiwanese citizenry
decrying China’s use of influence and more than 80 percent of the public expressing opposi-
tion to Beijing’s attempted intervention into Taiwanese elections.199 Thus, China’s attempts to
exert influence worked in President Tsai’s favor and provided further momentum in her reelec-
tion fight. Indeed, in January 2020, Tsai was reelected as president “by a landslide” and with
a record number of votes.200
Furthermore, the attempted international isolation of Taiwan pushed it closer to the
United States rather than China. In July 2019, President Tsai spent four days—an unusually
long time—in the United States, warning of overseas threats to democracy in a clear reference
to China.201 And Taiwan and the United States agreed to an arms package of $8 billion for
66 F-16 fighter jets, the fourth and most substantial arms sale during the Trump administra-
tion.202 The United States has also postured to prevent the breakdown of any further diplo-
matic ties with the remaining states that recognize Taiwan.203 Rather than bringing Taiwan
closer to China, the attempts at influence appear to have increased the resolve of both Taiwan
and the United States to combat Chinese power.
Perhaps the most fundamental lesson learned from this case is that China’s attempts at
influence do not exist in isolation. Ultimately, the attempts were most directly undermined
not through China’s interactions with Taiwan but through its interactions with Hong Kong.
Mayor Han rose to prominence promising that a return to the One China consensus would
stabilize relations between Taiwan and China and allow Taiwan to prosper.204 Following the
Hong Kong protests, this position appeared increasingly naïve, and even Han was forced to
take a hardline stance against the One China policy.205 China’s actions in Hong Kong undid
much of its work in Taiwan, serving as a reminder that cases of Chinese influence can inform
one another.
196 Shelley Rigger, “Why Taiwan Is Watching Hong Kong Very Closely,” Washington Post, September 4, 2019.
197 Keoni Everington, “Latest Poll Has Tsai Leading Han by 20% in Taiwan Presidential Race,” Taiwan News, August 9,
2019.
198 Ralph Jennings, “How China Will Dominate Taiwan’s 2020 Presidential Election Campaign,” Voice of America,
July 15, 2019a.
199 Mainland Affairs Council, 2019.
200 Charlie Campbell, “Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen Wins Reelection with Record Support,” Time, January 11, 2020a.
201 Ben Westcott, “Taiwan’s Tsai Ing-wen Warns Against ‘Overseas Forces’ at Beginning of US Trip,” CNN, July 12, 2019.
202 Edward Wong, “Trump Administration Approves F-16 Fighter Jet Sales to Taiwan,” New York Times, August 16, 2019.
203 Jonathan Stutte, “US Blustering at Taiwan’s Departing Allies Won’t Work,” The Diplomat, September 25, 2019.
204 Stanley Cheung and Emerson Lim, “‘1992 Consensus’ Key to Stabilizing Cross-Strait Ties: Han Kuo-yu,” Focus Taiwan,
March 25, 2019.
205 Rigger, 2019.
Thailand
Recent tensions between Thailand and China can be tied to two inciting events, each centered
on tourism. In July 2018, the Phoenix, a boat carrying 105 passengers, including 93 Chinese
tourists, had traveled to Koh Racha, a popular snorkeling island, despite severe weather warn-
ings.206 While returning, the boat capsized off the coast of Phuket, leaving 47 Chinese tourists
dead. Just two months later, tensions between Beijing and Bangkok resurfaced in the public
consciousness. In September 2018, a security guard at Don Mueang International Airport in
Bangkok was captured on video slapping a Chinese tourist. These events prompted substantial
concern over the welfare of Chinese citizens in Thailand.
As a result, China issued a safety warning discouraging travel to Thailand,207 which led
to an immediate and precipitous decline in Chinese tourism: The Chinese market, which
accounted for more than one-fourth of tourism to Thailand, plunged 20 percent in October
2018. Effects persisted into 2019, resulting in a 4.3-percent year-on-year contraction in the
first five months of 2019.208 This resulted in one of Thailand’s worst tourist seasons on record,
and hotel occupancy on the island dropped below 50 percent.209 In hopes of boosting tourism,
Thailand waived visa fees for visitors from China, along with several other nations,210 although
there were minimal positive returns as of the writing of this report.
Despite the very real safety concerns that arose after the deadly Phoenix incident, many
analysts have pointed to the tourism dispute as reflecting larger geopolitical tensions among
China, Thailand, and the United States. A U.S. ally, Thailand has appeared to be particularly
vulnerable to Chinese influence following a 2014 coup by the military and the subsequent
election in 2019 of the junta’s leader, Prayut Chan-o-cha.211 As a result, the targeted reduction
in tourism to Thailand may also reflect Beijing’s desire to demonstrate to Thailand the value
of its relationship with China. Relations between China and Thailand did improve following
the tourism dispute. Shortly thereafter, Beijing held joint military drills with Thailand and
Malaysia, as well as with Thailand and the rest of ASEAN, both the first of their kind.212 In
April 2019, Prayut appeared at the second Belt and Road Initiative forum in Beijing, promising
to accelerate construction of a high-speed rail between China and Thailand that had previ-
ously stagnated.213 In September 2019, the Royal Thai Navy signed a shipbuilding agreement
206 AngieChan and Hannah Beech, “Tourist Boats Capsize off Thai Resort Island, Leaving at Least 33 Dead,” New York
Times, July 6, 2018.
207 Alice Yan, “Safety Warning Issued to Chinese Tourists After Drownings in Thailand,” South China Morning Post, Sep-
tember 20, 2018.
208 Dusida Worrachaddejchai, “Thai Tourism Still Wounded,” Bangkok Post, June 25, 2019.
209 John
Reed, “Tourism Was a Powerful Economic Engine in Thailand. Then a Boat Full of Chinese Sank,” Los Angeles
Times, August 23, 2019.
210 Mercedes
Hutton, “Why Thailand Needs Chinese Tourists, Waives Visa Fee in Hope of Enticing Them Back,” South
China Morning Post, November 14, 2018.
211 Helen Regan and Kocha Olarn, “Thailand’s Junta Chief Elected as Country’s Next Prime Minister,” CNN, June 6,
2019.
212 Prashanth Parameswaran, “What’s in China’s Military Exercise with Malaysia and Thailand?” The Diplomat, Octo-
ber 17, 2018b.
213 David Green, “Thailand Pushes China’s Belt and Road Despite Differing Visions,” Nikkei Asian Review, May 2, 2019.
with China worth $130 million for the construction of a landing platform dock.214 Later that
month, China and Thailand announced an intention to boost ties in all areas, specifically
noting increases in economic cooperation and tourism.215 Sino-Thai cooperation has indeed
increased following China’s tourism measures.
However, it is not clear in this case that Chinese attempts to exert influence have been
determinant in accelerating cooperation. First, cooperation between China and Thailand ini-
tially deepened not as the result of Chinese pressure but because of the coup that brought the
military junta and current government to power. Indeed, the months following the coup saw
the first-ever joint air force exercise between China and Thailand, a planned Thai purchases of
tanks, and discussions about constructing a joint military production facility to manufacture
and repair armaments.216 The shipbuilding agreement likewise did not mark the beginning of
cooperation between the Royal Thai Navy and China; the Navy had purchased three subma-
rines from Beijing in June 2015.217 China may have indeed improved its relations with Thai-
land, but this was spurred by shifts in Thailand’s domestic politics rather than the targeted
execution of Chinese influence.
Second, although Thailand’s relative position with China and the United States may
have changed, this shift likewise finds its roots in domestic policy. The strain began when the
United States ceased military cooperation with Thailand following the ouster of the civilian
government.218 Because the United States chose to halt arms sales to Thailand, it was forced to
turn elsewhere, attempting to procure weapons not just from China but also from Russia and
European suppliers.219 After the election of U.S. President Trump, Thailand and the United
States sought to improve relations. Trump invited Prayut to the White House in 2017 and
praised U.S.-Thai relations rather than pressing for political reform.220
Following the 2019 Thai elections and the nominal legitimation of Prayut’s rule as demo-
cratic, improvements in relations between Thailand and the United States have accelerated. In
July 2019, the U.S. State Department approved the transfer of 60 Stryker armored vehicles to
Thailand for $96 million, and in September, Thailand began receiving the vehicles.221 ASEAN
also participated in joint exercises with the United States, beginning at a Thai naval base,
which reinforced the idea that Thailand and the members of ASEAN are seeking to cooperate
214 Prashanth
Parameswaran, “China-Thailand Military Ties in the Headlines with New Shipbuilding Pact,” The Diplo-
mat, September 13, 2019.
215 Mongkol Bangprapa, “China, Thailand Agree to Boost Ties,” Bangkok Post, September 20, 2019.
216
Prashanth Parameswaran, “What’s with the New China-Thailand Military Facility?” The Diplomat, November 17,
2017.
217 Prashanth Parameswaran, “Where Is the New China-Thailand Submarine Deal Headed?” The Diplomat, September 5,
2018a.
218 Panu Wongcha-um and Panarat Thepgumpanat, “Thailand to Acquire 120 U.S. Armored Vehicles,” Reuters, August 28,
2019.
219 Ron Corben, “Thailand, China Step Up Military Cooperation,” Voice of America, May 26, 2016.
220 Joshua Kurlantzick, “The Rest of the World Has Warmed to Thailand’s Military Rulers,” World Politics Review, July 10,
2018.
221 Marwaan Macan-Markar, “Thailand-US Defense Ties Heal as China Makes Gains in Cambodia,” Nikkei Asian Review,
September 18, 2019.
with both China and the United States.222 Although improvements in the relationship between
China and Thailand initially reflected the void left by the United States, current Sino-Thai
cooperation accelerates alongside improvements in the U.S.-Thai relationship.
The actions taken by Thailand reflect the desire of Prayut’s administration to hedge
between the United States and China rather than the success of Chinese influence. However,
this does not necessarily indicate that China’s attempts at influence have failed: China used
limited measures to alter Thailand’s behavior and was met with limited success. Instead, this
cooperation reflects the ability of China to present an alternative to the United States. The
larger lesson of this case is not that China can exert influence when it wishes to change the
behavior of other states but rather that shifts in domestic politics—particularly those that
change the relationship between the United States and another state—can provide an oppor-
tunity for China to increase its reach. Often, pursuing influence activities is less important
than seeking out partners when circumstances become favorable, as this case reveals.
222 Hunter Marston, “The U.S. Navy and Southeast Asian Nations Held Joint Maneuvers for the First Time. What Are The
Key Takeaways?” Washington Post, September 13, 2019.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Historical Influence Case: Finland in the Cold War
One of the most significant modern cases of influence-seeking by a major power during
peacetime was the Soviet Union’s essential veto power over many of Finland’s policies during
the Cold War. This process, which scholars termed Finlandization, significantly restricted
Finland’s sovereignty in ways that left the country less able to engage in political and security
cooperation with its Nordic neighbors, other European members of NATO, and the United
States than its national interests and democratic values might have implied. In the United
States’ current strategic contest with China, avoiding similar outcomes—that is, the Chinese
Finlandization of other countries, especially in Asia—must be a major U.S. focus. We there-
fore undertook a case study of the Finnish experience to derive lessons for the current influ-
ence competition.
The Foundations of Soviet Influence in Finland
Finland’s unique position in the Cold War order arose from its role in World War II. Finland
initially entered the conflict seeking to repel a Soviet invasion in the Winter War (1939–1940)
and later attempted to regain its lost territory with the assistance of Nazi Germany in the
Continuation War (1941–1944). Because Finland was a co-belligerent with the Axis Powers,
the terms of the Paris Peace Treaties were quite harsh for Finland. It was required to pay
$300,000,000 in reparations; cede substantial tracts of territory to the Soviets and lease the
naval base at Porkkala; legalize the Communist Party of Finland; and prevent anti-Soviet
propaganda within its borders. These terms reinforced Finland’s perception that the West
had failed to protect it from the Soviets and highlighted the continued vulnerability of the
Finnish position.
To secure its survival, Finland sought a policy of harmonious relations with the Soviet
Union. This policy—later known as the Paasikivi–Kekkonen doctrine after its main archi-
tects, Finnish President Juho Kusti Paasikivi and his successor Urho Kekkonen—resulted in
the Agreement of Friendship, Cooperation, and Mutual Assistance, signed in 1948. Previous
treaties that the Soviet Union had signed with Hungary and Romania called for unlimited
political consultations and automatic mutual assistance in the event of war, but the treaty with
Finland required only that, if Germany or a state allied with Germany were to attack Finland
or attack the Soviet Union through Finnish territory, Finland would fight to repel the attack
115
within its borders, with the aid of the Soviet Union if necessary.1 By making this agreement,
Finland was able to maintain its democratic institutions, making it unique among European
nations bordering the Soviet Union.
Nevertheless, the Soviet Union remained a dominant presence in Finnish political
thought and behavior. The threat of invasion was ever present, particularly in the immediate
years following the Soviets’ devastating surprise invasion of 1939.2 The Soviets also threat-
ened economic reprisals, often by leveraging Finnish reliance on oil from the Soviet Union.3
Finland became so conditioned to fear Soviet intervention that it began voluntarily accom-
modating Soviet interests, restricting its own sovereignty to avoid even the pretext for a Soviet
use of force.4 Scholars termed this behavior Finlandization, which one analyst defines as the
process by which “a democratic nation living in the shadow of a militarily powerful totali-
tarian state gradually submits to the political domination of its neighbor and finally loses its
internal freedom.”5
Degree of Soviet Influence
The extension of Soviet influence into Finnish domestic politics was substantial. The Soviet
reach was firmly entrenched in 1958, after friction in the Finnish ruling coalition led to the
dissolution of the standing government. The Social Democratic Party, long regarded with dis-
trust by the Soviet Union, formed a coalition government, including the conservative National
Coalition Party (a primary critic of the Soviet Union) and excluding the Finnish People’s
Democratic League (the nation’s communist front). The Soviets responded swiftly on multiple
fronts, first withdrawing their ambassador from Helsinki, halving their embassy personnel, and
attacking the newly formed government in the Soviet press. Moscow delayed ongoing negotia-
tions on trade, Finnish use of the Saimaa Canal, and fishing rights and cut off the delivery of
oil. The Soviets eventually suspended both Finnish imports and ongoing payments, causing
particular harm in Finland’s woodworking and shipbuilding industries.6 As a result of Soviet
measures, Soviet-Finnish trade fell by 20 percent.7 In light of these pressures, the government
resigned, allowing a Soviet-approved government to take its place and firmly establishing the
ability of the Soviet Union to veto unfavorable Finnish governments.
This implicit veto power hung over every potential domestic political change in Finland.
In 1961, the Soviet Union threatened to invoke the 1948 treaty unless President Kekkonen was
1 Carolyn Ekedahl, “Finlandization” in Action: Helsinki’s Experience with Moscow, Washington, D.C.: Directorate of Intel-
ligence, Central Intelligence Agency, August 1972.
2 George H. Quester, “Finlandization as a Problem or an Opportunity?” The ANNALS of the American Academy of Politi-
cal and Social Science, Vol. 512, No. 1, 1990.
3 Ekedahl, 1972.
4 Tuomas Forsberg and Matti Pesu, “The ‘Finlandisation’ of Finland: The Ideal Type, the Historical Model, and the Les-
sons Learnt,” Diplomacy and Statecraft, Vol. 27, No. 3, 2016.
5 Max Jakobson, Finland in the New Europe, Westport, Conn.: Praeger, Washington Papers No. 175, 1998, p. 88.
6 Raimo Väyrynen, “A Case Study of Sanctions: Finland—The Soviet Union in 1958–59,” Cooperation and Conflict,
Vol. 4, No. 2, 1969.
7 Ekedahl, 1972.
Historical Influence Case: Finland in the Cold War 117
reelected.8 After the 1970 parliamentary election, despite a substantial swing in the electorate
toward more-conservative parties (including the National Coalition Party), the government
coalition led by the Social Democratic Party and the Centre Party was maintained by Presi-
dent Kekkonen to avoid tension with the Soviets.9 At the individual level, when politicians
were labeled as anti-Soviet, they were often prevented from pursuing a significant career in
politics.10 The Soviet Union thus utilized both direct pressures and implicit threats to place
substantial restrictions on Finnish domestic governance.11
The Soviet Union was also able to shape Finnish foreign policy to a large degree. The
Soviets restricted Finland’s relationships with the European Economic Community and the
European Free Trade Association, delaying Finland’s full membership in the latter organiza-
tion until 1986 and preventing Finland from joining the EU, which did not occur until 1995,
after the Soviet Union collapsed. Finland also concluded a treaty with the Soviet-led Council
for Mutual Economic Assistance in 1973 in order to balance then-deepening ties with the
European Economic Community.12 In addition, Soviet pressures often ensured that Finnish
initiatives also supported Soviet interests. In 1963, Kekkonen proposed that Finland, Den-
mark, Norway, and Sweden formally bind themselves to not manufacture nuclear weapons or
permit the placing of such weapons on their territory, which would result in the Soviets main-
taining nuclear dominance in the region.13 Furthermore, Finland’s 1968 suggestion that the
Finnish-Norwegian border be neutralized implied that a NATO country pull back forces with
no corresponding reduction in Soviet force projection.14
In the UN, Finland did not vote against the Soviet Union;15 instead, it either voted in
support of Moscow or abstained from the vote, as in 1980, when the UN otherwise over-
whelmingly voted to demand the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Afghanistan.16 Even Finn-
ish promotion of the Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe arose from a Soviet
initiative intended to solidify its control over Eastern Europe.17
However, Finland was able to successfully maintain its military independence, retaining
control of its defense capability and rejecting joint military exercises with the Soviet Union.18
After the Porkkala base was returned to Finland in 1955, Finland also avoided the presence of
further Soviet military bases on its territory.19 Finland even engaged in clandestine intelligence-
8 Walter Z. Laqueur, “Europe: The Specter of Finlandization,” Commentary, Vol. 64, No. 6, December 1977.
9 Ekedahl, 1972.
10 Forsberg and Pesu, 2016.
11 These interventions were not completely without limits. Moscow recalled ambassador Alexei Belyakov and forced the
Communist Party of Finland to support President Kekkonen’s wage and price control measures when their critiques grew
pervasive, in an effort to placate Kekkonen (Ekedahl, 1972).
12 Marjo Uutela, “‘The End of Finlandization’: Finland’s Foreign Policy in the Eyes of the Two German States 1985–1990,”
International History Review, Vol. 42, No. 2, 2020.
13 Ekedahl, 1972.
14 Ekedahl, 1972.
15 John Lukacs, “Finland Vindicated,” Foreign Affairs, Vol. 71, No. 4, Fall 1992.
16 George Maude, “The Further Shores of Finlandization,” Cooperation and Conflict, Vol. 17, No. 1, 1982.
17 Ekedahl, 1972.
19 Quester, 1990.
sharing with the West, likely without the knowledge of its own politicians.20 Most importantly,
Finland was able to maintain its military neutrality even in light of the 1948 treaty with the
Soviet Union.
This neutrality was most directly tested during the Note Crisis in 1961. The Soviet Union
sent Finland a diplomatic note insisting that the two states begin consultations on securing
the defense of both countries in light of what Moscow claimed was increased West German
militarization. President Kekkonen, knowing that he could not accept the invitation without
ending his preferred course of neutrality or reject it without causing a confrontation, deftly
convinced Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev to postpone such consultations indefinitely.21
Although Finland remained at a power disadvantage in its relationship with the Soviet Union,
it was able to hold some firm policy lines.
Costs and Benefits of Finlandization
This policy of accommodation is likely one that Finland would choose again, although it
certainly did not come without costs. The economic restrictions imposed by Moscow limited
Finnish options for growing its economy. For instance, for fear of Soviet reprisal, Finland
was forced to reject an invitation to participate in the Marshall Plan and develop coop-
erative relations with the West outside of the major economic institutions.22 Finland none-
theless experienced significant economic growth through much of this period. However,
despite Finland’s substantial efforts to minimize its dependence on the Soviet Union,23 a
large share of exports from Finland became specialized to serve the Soviet markets,24 and the
collapse of the Soviet Union hit Finland hard, leading to a decline in trade and an increase
in unemployment.25
In addition, the quality of democracy in Finland was greatly restricted during this time.
President Kekkonen often exceeded his constitutional powers, working through personal net-
works rather than government channels and concealing relevant information from the public
to keep the Soviets satisfied.26 Finland engaged in voluntary censorship in its media in an effort
to avoid anything that could be considered propaganda hostile to the Soviet Union.27 Yet,
although the Soviets had a substantial impact on Finnish policy, Finland remained a largely
independent, sovereign nation, unlike many of its neighbors. The Soviets explicitly and implic-
itly placed restrictions on the policy choices and government composition of Finland, but they
20
Jukka Rislakki, “Secret History: How Close Were Finnish-American Relations in the Cold War,” The Economist,
December 1, 2011.
21 Ekedahl, 1972.
22 Ekedahl, 1972.
23
Erkki Berndtson, “Finlandization: Paradoxes of External and Internal Dynamics,” Government and Opposition, Vol. 26,
No. 1, Winter 1991.
24 Krista Taubert, “Finlandization Is Not a Perfect Recipe for Ukraine,” Time, March 21, 2014; and Mark P. Lagon and
William Moreland, “‘Finlandization’ Abandons Ukraine,” Foreign Policy, November 3, 2014.
25 Lukacs, 1991.
27 Ekedahl, 1972.
Historical Influence Case: Finland in the Cold War 119
did so in a largely reactive fashion, with few proactive interventions, and Finland was able to
develop friendly relations with the East and the West. Finland ultimately proved able to keep
its long-term independence by limiting it temporarily.
The broader question of this case study concerns the implication of Finlandization for the
security of the West. There is good reason to believe that Finlandization prevented further vio-
lence. The Soviet Union and Finland had a bloody history, and the Finnish policy of accom-
modation reassured the Soviet Union that it need not take more violent action. Furthermore,
as noted earlier, the policy of accommodation allowed Finland to avoid deeper military align-
ment with the Soviet Union. More broadly, some analysts have argued that the Finnish tilt
toward the Soviets helped maintain the balance in the Nordic region, which could have oth-
erwise been a powder keg.28 Indeed, the presence of neutral zones across Europe and elsewhere
was seen by the Soviets as reducing the likelihood of conflict between the East and the West.29
And, although the Soviet Union shaped Finnish foreign policy initiatives, many of these (such
as the Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe) nonetheless supported peaceful
relations or led to the weakening of the tension between East and West.30
However, there are limits to the extent to which Finlandization enhanced Western secu-
rity interests. For instance, it led to Finland’s continued reluctance to join the Western security
order even in the wake of the Soviet collapse. After the fall of the Berlin Wall, Finland worked
quickly to join the Western economic order but remained cautious militarily and reluctant to
abandon its foreign policy of equivocation between the East and the West.31
Even today, President Sauli Niinistö argues that Finland has not joined NATO for fear
that it would damage the country’s positive relationship with Russia, which he argues is a
prerequisite for Finnish security.32 This has led to claims that Finnish passivity in its rela-
tions with Russia under Vladimir Putin is leading to re-Finlandization.33 Observers note that
Finnish trepidation may provide Russia an opening to drive a wedge between Finland and
NATO.34 However, particularly since 2014, Finland has been deepening its defense coopera-
tion with Sweden, the United States, and NATO as a whole. Any decision not to challenge the
future Finlandization of countries must be taken with a long-term lens, as these states might
remain permanently outside the Western security order even in the event that great-power
competition subsides.
Scholars also emphasize the unique nature of the Finnish position during the Cold War
and suggest that this case does not truly provide a model for future nations to follow.35 Fin-
land’s culture was very different from the Soviet Union’s, and few Finns spoke the Russian
28 Mikko Majander, “The Paradoxes of Finlandisation,” RUSI Journal, Vol. 144, No. 4, 1999.
29 Phillip A. Peterson, “Scandinavia and the ‘Finlandization’ of Soviet Security,” Proceedings of the Academy of Political Sci-
ence, Vol. 38, No. 1, 1991.
30 Berndtson, 1991.
31 Uutela, 2019.
34 CarlBergqvist, “Determined by History: Why Sweden and Finland Will Not Be More Than NATO Partners,” War on
the Rocks, July 13, 2016.
35 Tapio Juntunen, “Helsinki Syndrome: The Parachronistic Renaissance of Finlandization in International Politics,” New
Perspectives, Vol. 25, No. 1, May 2017.
language, so occupation and integration would have been very difficult. Such differences do
not exist for many present-day contentious geopolitical areas.36 In those cases, controlling the
foreign policy of a targeted state may not prove sufficient enough for a U.S. competitor, and
more-intrusive goals may be preferred to advance the competitor’s interests.
To use Ukraine as an example, a democratic, Slavic government on Russia’s borders may
provide an attractive alternative model of governance for Russian citizens and cause inter-
nal instability for the Russian government.37 Ukraine’s current government is therefore likely
to face continued challenge from Russia. Furthermore, Finland’s navigation of its relation-
ship with Moscow required adept political maneuvering and could have easily led to military
conflict—a fact that was particularly evident during the 1961 Note Crisis. Although Finland-
ization as a political outcome is more preferable to the West than is the Russian annexation of
Crimea or the imposition of a satellite government by the Soviet Union in Hungary, expecting
the same peaceful outcome as seen in Finland entails great risk for the West.

37 Taubert, 2014; Lagon and Moreland, 2014.
CHAPTER NINE
Overall Findings and Implications
After analyzing the evidence reviewed for this study, including data and case studies, we iden-
tified several overarching findings about the nature and impact of China’s influence efforts.1
Each of the overarching findings can be traced to the more specific findings identified in pre-
vious chapters of this report.
Overall, the evidence we found provides a very mixed picture. Other studies have exam-
ined the influence effects of China’s comprehensive economic diplomacy and generally found
mixed results; in particular, they have found a few anecdotal cases of a state changing its policy
or behavior but no cases in which a state shifted its general geopolitical alignment from the
United States to China.2 Our research agrees; we found significant Chinese influence in a
handful of outcomes but very uneven results across the board.
Most importantly, our research suggests that simple, linear pronouncements about Chi-
nese influence, either in general or relative to U.S. influence, do not match the facts. China’s
economic rise unquestionably has provided it with a powerful attractive force: Countries and
companies badly want access to China’s markets, FDI, and economic aid. In many cases, they
are willing to compromise on other issues or values—such as foreign policy toward Taiwan or
the South China Sea, opposition to China’s human rights violations, and opposition to Chi-
nese state-led technology firms—to sustain access to these economic opportunities.
In Asia, that vast economic clout is especially pronounced; the dependence of Asian coun-
tries on Chinese trade, as a natural consequence of proximity, is higher there than elsewhere. In
addition, China casts a shadow of geopolitical power over the region: Countries and businesses
in Asia generally prefer to avoid antagonizing Beijing when they can. In this sense, China’s
size, economic muscle, and growing military power clearly have furnished it with tremendous
power and influence to wield. Especially in Asia, countries live with this reality on a daily
basis, and nothing in our analysis should be taken as dismissing the significance of that power
and influence.
At the same time, the evidence that we uncovered points to many natural limits
on China’s influence, especially in Asia. As noted in Chapter Four, although some input
variables—especially those in economic categories—have grown significantly over time, that
growth has leveled off in many categories (such as FDI). Chinese activities in other areas,
1 The research to assess the factors described in this report was completed in mid-2020. The analysis here does not evalu-
ate developments after that time. However, as of June 2021, we continue to believe that the basic findings in the report
remain valid.
2 For example, Philippe Le Corre examined Chinese influence in Portugal, Greece, the Czech Republic, and Serbia and
found only a few cases of changed policy or behavior (Philippe Le Corre, China’s Rise as a Geoeconomic Influencer: Four
European Case Studies, Washington, D.C.: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, October 2018).
121
such as security cooperation, lag far behind those of the United States and its allies. In Chap-
ter Five, we stressed that the effects of those inputs can be limited by intervening factors,
especially value and interest conflicts with China. The case studies reviewed in Chapter Seven
show a clear pattern of resistance to overt Chinese coercion: In many cases in which China has
overtly sought to punish countries that did not behave as it wished, those inputs did create a
disincentive to anger Beijing—but they also created lingering resentments and suspicions of
China’s power.
In Table 9.1, we summarize our overarching findings, divided into the three categories of
inputs defined in Chapter Three: public power, private power, and generalized influence. As
the table suggests, in two of the three categories, we determined that the effectiveness of Chi-
na’s influence efforts was mixed and constrained. Private power is the input type that seems to
be most successful for China.
Our research highlighted a difference between making a country generally reluctant to
challenge China and achieving a very specific behavioral outcome—for example, forcing coun-
tries to abandon territorial claims or end U.S. military relationships. China has made signifi-
cant progress in the first area but very little in the second on truly major issues. Part of the chal-
lenge in assessing more-elaborate outputs is that China does not yet appear to be demanding
Table 9.1
Evaluation of China’s Influence Efforts, by Input Type
Measurable Examples from Evaluation of the Degree of

Input Type Definition Our Research Evidence Effectiveness
Public power The direct, intentional, • Economic coercion of Moderate but constrained
and open employment South Korea over the • China has succeeded in making
of tools of statecraft THAAD deployment countries want to avoid directly
directed at other states • Military intimidation challenging Beijing.
to affect their policies of Vietnam in the • However, direct coercion has
through outright South China Sea seldom produced the immediate
coercion or reward • Economic penalties outcomes desired.
for Japan over fishing • These types of inputs have
clashes generated the most-significant
public backlash of any input type.
Private The direct, intentional, • Election and other Significant and growing
power but private or clandestine political interference • Private-power activities have
use of threats or rewards in the Maldives, Sri the potential to create the same
to manipulate the views Lanka, and Taiwan unwillingness to confront Beijing
or actions of specific • Bribery and United without the same degree of
individuals Front activities in blowback that public-power
Australia and New inputs have.
Zealand • These inputs are the most
consistently associated with
positive outcomes for Beijing.
• China is devoting significant
resources to these inputs.
• Open societies are vulnerable to
such inputs.
Generalized The indirect shaping • Proclamations of the Modest and highly constrained
influence of beliefs, views, or China model’s success • There is no clear China model to
preferences of others • Confucius Institutes convey to targeted countries.
through one’s own • Spread of autocratic • Generalized influence actions
general policies, tools belie the attraction of China’s
outreach, or other • Expanded presence system.
actions unrelated to a of Chinese media • There is little evidence of growing
specific desired output attraction to China’s model,
beyond its economic success.
Overall Findings and Implications 123
them. For example, Beijing has not tried to insist that countries abandon security cooperation
activities with the United States and exit an alliance.
Yet our analysis strongly suggests that such efforts would fail and be counterproductive,
and there is little reason to expect this fact to change soon. Some of the intervening factors out-
lined in Chapter Five are decisive in this regard: Targets of Chinese influence have their own
interests that they are determined to uphold and, in some cases, values that they consider to be
central to their identities. When China is asking a country to look the other way on China’s
human rights practices or disputes with a third party, that is one thing. But if China were to
explicitly demand actions that appear to turn a country into a vassal state, entirely dependent
on Beijing for its security and prosperity, the evidence amassed for this analysis suggests that
most countries will strongly resist.
This again points to the predominant importance of private power in China’s campaign
for influence in Asia and beyond. Our analysis suggests that China is much more likely to
attain really fundamental influence goals—pulling partners and allies away from the United
States, for example—by slowly and gradually gaining decisive influence over critical groups
and individuals in targeted societies than by making direct coercive threats.
Findings and Conclusions
Apart from those general themes, the foregoing analysis supports several findings and con-
clusions about China’s efforts to influence countries around the world and how those efforts
affect the strategic competition with the United States. We present these findings in italics in
this section.
The most effective source of influence in the various cases and data sources that we investi-
gated was the weight of attraction of China’s economy. China’s burgeoning economic power was
bound to produce significantly more power and influence throughout the world. Treating
growing Chinese influence as something unusual, or something to be contested across the
board, misses the essential dynamic. Countries’ desire for trade, direct investment, technology
transfer, and other economic benefits far outweighed other potential sources of influence, such
as direct military threats or any form of the China model (e.g., development, sociopolitical).
In addition, some of the most-powerful economic tools for coercive influence were tourism,
foreign exchange student programs, and regulations on foreign companies investing in China.
Although China can adjust its overall trade and foreign investment levels to garner influence
in a targeted country, it has more commonly achieved coercive effect using economic tools that
can be metered and quickly reversed.
The most easily measurable components of influence—the inputs (e.g., trade, foreign direct
investment, number of visits by senior officials, presence of an influence country’s media)—are
imperfect predictors of outcomes. Powerful intervening factors in the targeted country, such as
the role of specific interest groups, the head of state’s preferences, and the current economic or
political context, play a more decisive role in determining how much and what kind of influ-
ence the outside actor will ultimately have on the policies of the targeted state.
As a result, inputs are not necessarily the best indicators of potential influence and go only so far
in defining the scope and severity of the influence challenge. It is critical to have a rough snapshot
of the landscape for influence—such as how a country becomes dependent on another country,
the scale of an influencer’s efforts to buy favorable opinions, and the trends emerging over time
in measurable variables. But the important questions about influence are more complex and
qualitative. For example, which input types are most effective in which countries, what specific
outcomes are being shaped by the influencer, and how do the causal relationships of influence
work? Understanding the evolving competition is much less about counting inputs and more
about understanding country-specific dynamics. The route to key outputs, such as the geopolit-
ical alignment of states, positive attitudes toward the influencer, or changes to specific policies
in the targeted state, can be long, winding, and filled with barriers and unexpected variables. It
has become common to count certain influence inputs and make at least implicit assumptions
about the resulting trajectory of influence. But the connection between inputs and outputs is
anything but linear, and our study suggests that the most-important factors determining out-
puts are often abstract factors highly resistant to quantitative assessment.
The second-most-effective source of influence was China’s targeted, often clandestine
outreach—sometimes with financial incentives—to specific leaders, elites, and opinion-shapers in
targeted countries. China has demonstrated significant capability to build sympathetic reser-
voirs of support among other countries’ elites and public officials. One pattern that emerged
repeatedly across many of the focus countries is that China appeared able to build good rela-
tionships with elites and officials in the targeted countries even when broader public opin-
ion remained or became negative toward China. We found clear evidence of this pattern in
Australia, Indonesia, the Philippines, South Korea, and Sri Lanka, and China is likely pursu-
ing significant influence campaigns of this sort in most other focus countries as well. China
appears to be able to foster influence with these individuals through a combination of devel-
oping financial relationships, targeting elites and officials with a natural affinity for China
and its objectives, playing on anti-American sentiment in some places, using scholarships and
conferences to build relationships, and other means. It is unclear whether this route would ever
provide China with an ability to determine the behavior of a targeted country’s government.
At the end of the day, a government is still primarily concerned with pursuing the country’s
collective interests, and we find little evidence that these Chinese activities can overwhelm
this foundational impulse. However, in some cases, China appears to be making significant
inroads through these techniques.
The contest for influence is primarily, indeed dominantly, nonmilitary in character. Although
China’s growing military power does provide a backdrop to the influence competition, that
power’s direct effects are mostly limited to countries with which China has a direct territorial
dispute. Few, if any, countries appear to be acceding to Chinese influence because they fear
large-scale, direct Chinese military aggression. China’s chief tools of influence-seeking and its
main areas of competitive advantage lie in nonmilitary areas of statecraft: economic attraction
and coercion; informational and narrative-shaping campaigns; clandestine efforts to manipu-
late local political processes; diplomatic engagements; efforts to enhance Chinese power in
international organizations; and large-scale cultural engagements through student exchange
programs, popular films, and other means. Meanwhile, China’s security cooperation activities
are likely to lag those of the United States and its allies for years and possibly decades, and its
use of overt military force has often been counterproductive to its long-term goals. The contest
for influence is first and foremost a nonmilitary endeavor and must be viewed as such. Thus,
bolstering U.S. military capabilities in Asia is a useful step in some ways but cannot compen-
sate for failures to address Chinese activities in other realms.
China can sometimes successfully move to fill a vacuum—of economic investment or capital,
security engagement, or diplomatic attention—to gain influence. Many of China’s more success-
ful influence efforts have been of just this sort—for example, Thailand’s drift toward China
in the wake of Western sanctions for the military coup there, Chinese financial assistance to
Greece and others in the wake of the 2008 global financial crisis, and Chinese investment in
Malaysia at a time of possibly cooling interest by Western companies. Our research suggests,
in fact, that U.S. and allied actions create as many influence opportunities for China as it cre-
ates for itself. In some cases, the United States and its friends and allies take these risks with
eyes wide open—for example, when they impose sanctions on a country for human rights vio-
lations knowing that China will not respect those sanctions. But if the strategic competition
with China is becoming a higher priority for U.S. foreign policy, then the United States will
have to think very carefully about any actions that it takes that might create opportunities for
Chinese influence.
China faces a dilemma in exercising influence: The more strongly China tries to use its clout
to force outcomes in other countries, the greater the backlash it foments and the more those coun-
tries reject its influence. This partly accounted for the limited success of China’s significant
soft-power influence activities. The dilemma was even present for private-power activities but
was especially true for coercive and public displays of power. This dilemma was very much in
evidence, for example, in Southeast Asia, where reactions to Chinese maritime belligerence
were overwhelming any positive influence results from Chinese investment, aid, propaganda,
or other tools of statecraft. The United States can seek to intensify this dilemma with public
diplomacy activities.
Yet that insight is somewhat counterbalanced by another finding: For countries in Asia,
fear of China and its potential coercive and retaliatory actions is a significant constraint on better
relations with the United States. Many targets of Chinese influence might seek more-active
security engagement with the United States if they were not concerned about China’s reaction.
Apart from the intrinsic commitment of many regional states to variations of nonalignment,
China’s coercive actions toward South Korea on the THAAD issue, as well as similar exam-
ples, have made clear that states face potential Chinese punishment for more-explicit military-
oriented collaboration with the United States.
Many of China’s influence relationships appear largely transactional rather than grounded in truly
shared goals, interests, or values. This is the case, for example, with China’s growing relationships
with key Persian Gulf states, which appear to see China as a useful alternative to other potential
arms merchants, trading partners, and geopolitical allies. Those relationships are strengthened
by China’s growing dependence on foreign sources of oil, and U.S. or Western rebuffs or sanc-
tions tend to drive some governments in China’s direction. Nonetheless, Saudi Arabia, the United
Arab Emirates, and other countries in the Gulf region do not appear to see China as a formal ally
or sole sponsor; their hedging is not designed to choose China against the West.3
China does not appear to be engaged in a global campaign to promote autocracy but rather a
global campaign to serve its interests and cultivate influence. Where this involves close cooperation
with fellow autocracies, China happily pursues that process. But it seems to be neither trying
to topple democracies as a rule nor restricting itself to close relations with other autocracies.4
China has significant challenges in legitimacy that impede its quest for influence. Our analysis
focused primarily on identifying measures of Chinese influence relative to that of the United
3 Galip Dalay, “Why the Middle East Is Betting on China,” Project Syndicate, August 22, 2019.
4 This conclusion largely accords with the analysis in Oisín Tansey, “The Problem with Autocracy Promotion,” Democra-
tization, Vol. 23, No. 1, 2016.
States and assessing the bilateral competition. But much of the analysis highlights a more
encompassing theme: China’s autocratic governance, hierarchical instincts in dealing with
other countries, penchant for secrecy, and bellicose territorial demands all pose very substan-
tial barriers to achieving predominant influence. These and other factors heavily tilt the larger
national competitive landscape against China.
The most generalized geopolitical reaction to growing Chinese power is hedging. Especially in
Asia, countries both fear and respect Chinese power. Their preferred approach is to hedge—that
is, to defend essential interests without unduly aggravating Beijing. This pattern will make it
more difficult to assess Chinese influence-seeking or the relative balance of U.S. and Chinese
influence; countries will often hesitate to take sides in ways that would indicate clear outcomes.
Nonetheless, a pattern of hedging generally supports U.S. interests because the United States is
interested in preventing China’s coercive dominance, not forcing outcomes on other countries.
Despite that predominant trend of hedging, the general geopolitical alignment of the focus
countries that we assessed for this study remains highly positive for the United States. As part of
this study, we used seven weighted variables to create a geopolitical alignment index, similar to
the affinity index (Figure 5.1) and vulnerability index (Figure 5.3) described in Chapter Five.
As Figure 9.1 shows, the index includes such variables as the existence of a formal alliance,
Figure 9.1
Geopolitical Alignment Index
15 10 5 5 10 15
In China’s shadow—
but not necessarily
aligned by choice:
Cambodia
Laos
The democratic U.S. allies:

Australia
Germany
Italy Essential Findings
Japan • China’s strategic challenge is that
Philippines the post–World War II
South Korea international order, national
interests, and histories leave
alignments favorable to the
Variables in Index The hedgers and United States.
(by degree of weighting) nonaligned: • Formal or informal nonalignment
Brazil Mexico is a dominant pattern.
• Existence of a formal alliance Ethiopia Nigeria • All the major economies are
• History and scope of security India Thailand slightly or significantly aligned
cooperation Indonesia Singapore with the United States.
Kenya Sri Lanka • Even China’s more-aligned
• Elites’ opinion Malaysia Vietnam neighbors (e.g., Cambodia, Sri
• Position on regional issues Lanka) have reasons for suspicion
• Security strategy threat analysis and a desire for multiple ties.
• The hedging middle group is the
• Territorial disputes key focus of alignment
• UN votes on key issue competition.
the opinion of elites in the targeted country, and UN votes on key issues. The variables in the
darkest-shaded rows in the list were weighted most heavily, and the variables in the lightest-
shaded rows were weighted most lightly.
The results from the index suggest that a few of the United States’ democratic allies
align much more closely with the United States than with China, but the majority of the
focus countries sit roughly in the middle, reflecting their general preference for hedging. It is
a snapshot that reflects an overall U.S. geopolitical advantage. The primary challenge that this
reality presents to the United States is that it must deal with hedging countries that refuse to
take unambiguous positions against China, whether on human rights, the role of Huawei in a
country’s 5G network, South China Sea territorial disputes, or other key issues.
China’s steps to acquire influence, such as investing in infrastructure and providing aid, can
have side benefits for U.S. interests—for example, by promoting development and stability. Chinese
investment can promote a more diversified economy and, in some cases, improve governance
in the targeted country (although the opposite can also occur). Evaluating the outcome of any
specific case of attempted Chinese influence therefore depends, to some degree, on considering
whether the outcome aligns with U.S. interests or places those interests at risk.
The emerging competition for influence is not strictly government to government. Increasingly,
governments seeking influence in foreign countries operate in a complex and busy network of
nongovernmental organizations, interest groups, and empowered individuals. The United States
potentially enjoys a natural competitive advantage in this space—given its more open, liberal
society—and can make the nongovernmental aspects of the competition work for its interests.
Lessons of Chinese Influence-Seeking During the COVID-19 Pandemic
This analysis was completed before the COVID-19 pandemic crisis broke in January 2020.
The novel coronavirus that causes the disease was first documented in the central China city
of Wuhan, and China’s reputation around the world suffered as a result of perceptions that
China did not do enough to contain the outbreak in its early stages.5 Since then, Beijing has
employed a variety of tools to buff its image based on its response. For instance, Beijing con-
ducted a global information campaign to shape the narrative about the pandemic, both trum-
peting its own, eventually decisive response and dropping hints that the United States was
somehow responsible for the outbreak.6 Beijing also delivered medical supplies to more than
100 affected countries, developed and developing alike, and even used People’s Liberation
Army Air Force assets to conduct military humanitarian missions.7 Chinese diplomats have
aggressively pushed Beijing’s line on the crisis and sought to engage with officials and influen-
tial leaders in key countries.8 And Beijing has used economic threats to muzzle critics abroad.9
5 Charlie Campbell and Alice Park, “Inside the Global Quest to Trace the Origins of COVID-19—and Predict Where It
Will Go Next,” Time, July 23, 2020.
6 Alicia Chen and Vanessa Molter, “Mask Diplomacy: Chinese Narratives in the COVID Era,” blog post, Stanford Uni-
versity Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, June 16, 2020.
7 Anthea Mulakala and Ji Hongbo, “Covid-19 and China’s Soft-Power Ambitions,” Asia Foundation, April 29, 2020.
8 Charlie Campbell, “China’s ‘Mask Diplomacy’ Is Faltering. But the U.S. Isn’t Doing Any Better,” Time, April 3, 2020b.
9 Steven Erlanger, “Global Backlash Builds Against China over Coronavirus,” New York Times, May 3, 2020.
These efforts have generated some undeniable results. For example, several African gov-
ernments have credited China with important and early programs of aid, and the Serbian
president kissed the Chinese flag.10 China has managed to coerce some governments and inter-
national institutions, including the World Health Organization, to downplay criticism of Chi-
na’s initial response.11 And Beijing’s anti-American propaganda has contributed to conspiracy
theories that have muddied the waters of assigning accountability and complicated the effort
to build objective awareness.12
Early results from this image-building strategy, however, suggest that the COVID-19
pandemic only exacerbated rising skepticism about China’s intentions and credibility. An
obvious problem is the clear evidence that the Chinese Communist Party sought to cover
up the initial evidence of the outbreak, delaying its response, muzzling critics, and forfeiting
an early opportunity to clamp down on the virus before it had spread more widely.13 Partly
as a product of worsening relations across the board, attitudes toward China plummeted in
the United States.14 And many developing nations seemed unimpressed with China’s offer
of supplies, partly because some of the gifted materials appeared to be defective and partly
because the offer was tied to such an overbearing public relations campaign.15 Early reports
that African migrant workers and students were being expelled from their homes in parts of
China—accompanied by suggestions of outright racism expressed in the process—sparked
bitter reactions in African nations.16
Some of these negative reactions built on major neighbors’ or rivals’ existing skepticism
of China. Official and public attitudes toward China hardened in India, where people were
largely unreceptive to China’s pandemic diplomacy.17 In Vietnam, skepticism over China’s
public claims combined with resentment over its belligerent approach, even though the com-
munist government in Vietnam restrained its public criticism of Beijing.18 And after reviewing
the reactions of several major powers, including the United States, one internal Chinese report
to the government in Beijing reportedly warned that, because of its conduct during the crisis,
China faced a “rising wave of hostility” equivalent to the post-Tiananmen backlash.19
10
David O. Shullman, “How China Is Exploiting the Pandemic to Export Authoritarianism,” War on the Rocks, March 31,
2020.
11 Kathy Gilsinan, “How China Deceived the WHO,” The Atlantic, April 12, 2020.
12
Shayan Sardarizadeh and Olga Robinson, “Coronavirus: US and China Trade Conspiracy Theories,” BBC News,
April 25, 2020.
13
Simon Marks, “Coronavirus Ends China’s Honeymoon in Africa,” Politico, April 16, 2020; and Michael Green and
Evan S. Medeiros, “The Pandemic Won’t Make China the World’s Leader,” Foreign Affairs, April 15, 2020.
14 Kat Devlin, Laura Silver, and Christine Huang, “U.S. Views of China Increasingly Negative amid Coronavirus Out-
break,” Pew Research Center, April 21, 2020.
15 Charles Dunst, “Beijing’s Propaganda Is Finding Few Takers,” Foreign Policy, April 20, 2020.
16 Celine Sui, “China’s Racism Is Wrecking Its Success in Africa,” Foreign Policy, April 15, 2020.
17 Yasmeen Serhan, “Indians Aren’t Buying China’s Narrative,” The Atlantic, April 21, 2020.
18
Bac Pham and Bennett Murray, “Behind Vietnam’s COVID-19 Response, Deep Distrust of China,” The Diplomat,
May 14, 2020.
19 Peter Hirschberg, ed., “Internal Chinese Report Warns Beijing Faces Tiananmen-Like Global Backlash over
Virus—Sources,” Reuters, May 4, 2020.
One major theme in these recent events has been China’s recurring tendency to undertake
extreme, ham-handed, and counterproductive actions of belligerent diplomacy in service of its
viewpoint. China’s so-called Wolf Warrior cadre of diplomats—a group of officials, named
for a 2015 nationalist Chinese action film—has generated blowback with an increasingly bel-
ligerent assertion of Chinese interests.20 Beijing’s “clumsy and ugly disinformation campaign”
in Europe, according to one European journalist, has ended up alienating EU governments,
prompting a formal report to catalog China’s malicious propaganda.21 The writer concluded,
Somehow, Chinese officials have managed to offend Europeans across the continent who
usually agree on nothing. At the beginning of the year, the calendar for 2020 was filled
with Sino-European summits celebrating ever deeper ties. Instead, the pandemic is likely to
be the occasion for Europeans to begin emancipating themselves from a bad relationship.
Another survey of reactions described the recent events as “a disastrous own goal” for China’s
efforts to boost its global reputation.22
The crisis has also highlighted risks embodied in some of China’s other means of achiev-
ing influence—notably, economic dependency. Given its abundant lending through the Belt
and Road Initiative and other programs, China reportedly now holds more than half a trillion
dollars’ worth of developing world debt—much of which will now have to be renegotiated,
given the financial crisis those countries are facing.23 With dozens of countries now spending
more on debt service than on their health care systems, Beijing faces a painful dilemma: Either
offer highly concessionary loan forgiveness, extensions, or deferrals, which would cost it bil-
lions, or enforce the terms of the loans, which would impose intense pain on many countries
where China has worked for years to cultivate influence. If it uses the resulting leverage for
“debt-trap diplomacy,” seizing local assets as it did with a Sri Lankan port in 2017,24 China
could spark even more outrage from countries that see the tactic as a form of neocolonial
appropriation. Using massive lending and investment as a route to influence and coercive
power, in other words, comes with real constraints and possible costs.
The COVID-19 pandemic and China’s attempts to capitalize on it have revealed yet
another dilemma for China as it seeks to use a variety of tools to cultivate global influence.
In particular, the clash between China’s territorial claims and its desire to cast itself as a
responsible, trustworthy leader of the international community often leads to backlash. For
instance, if Chinese ships continue to harass and, in some cases, ram the ships of other claim-
ants to disputed areas in Asia, that will undermine China’s elaborate effort to cultivate a global
reputation for altruism through its pandemic response and win-win approach to diplomacy.
Indeed, in 2019 and 2020, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Vietnam have pushed
back in newly vigorous ways against Chinese coercion in the South China Sea. And in Japan,
20
Kathrin Hille, “‘Wolf Warrior’ Diplomats Reveal China’s Ambitions,” Financial Times, May 11, 2020; and Chun Han
Wong and Chao Deng, “China’s ‘Wolf Warrior’ Diplomats Are Ready to Fight,” Wall Street Journal, May 19, 2020.
21 Andreas Kluth, “How China Is Losing Europe,” Bloomberg, May 7, 2020.
22
Jamil Anderlini, “Why China Is Losing the Coronavirus Narrative,” Financial Times, April 19, 2020. See also Erlanger,
2020.
23 Maria Abi-Habib and Keith Bradsher, “Poor Countries Borrowed Billions from China. They Can’t Pay It Back,” New
York Times, May 18, 2020.
24 Abi-Habib, 2018.
generally warming ties with China—amid Beijing’s renewed effort at outreach during the
pandemic—have been partly upset by fresh Chinese harassment of Japanese operations near
the Senkaku Islands.25
The experience of Chinese influence-seeking during the COVID-19 pandemic, there-
fore, broadly supports our general assessment that Beijing confronts very real limits in its quest
for predominant regional and global influence. As an autocratic state with unbending terri-
torial claims against neighbors and a diplomatic tradition of harshly hierarchical and ethno
centric relations with others, China is not well positioned to succeed for a battle over influence
in an international system still dominated by value-sharing democracies. China’s economic
heft, growing informational toolbox, and geopolitical savvy are undeniable. But its experience
during the COVID-19 pandemic shows that it suffers from major challenges that the United
States could use to its advantage.
Recommendations for a U.S. Response
These findings and the broader evidence base for this analysis highlight ways that the United
States might improve its response to China’s influence-seeking activities—or the activities of
any foreign influence-seeker, such as Russia and its attempts to cultivate influence in Africa.
Table 9.2 summarizes our recommendations for the U.S. response in two categories of Chi-
nese influence activities that appear to have the most effect: economic support and private
power.
Table 9.2
Potential U.S. Responses to China’s Most-Effective Tools of Influence
Tool Potential U.S. Responses
Economic support: the • Expand the activities of the U.S. International Development Finance
trade, investment, overseas Corporation to more directly counter the Belt and Road Initiative.
development aid, tourism, and • Support the targeted country’s journalists and nongovernmental
other business-related tools that organizations that are exposing China’s predatory practices.
can promote prosperity and • Conduct public diplomacy on debt-trap risks and problematic Chinese
improve the economic prospects investment practices.
of the targeted country • Create example cases of countries where the cost of standing up to
China is offset by aid and investment from the United States, develop
explicit partnerships with other countries to counteract China’s economic
influence, and reward countries that stand up to it.
• Discourage U.S. companies from giving in to financial pressure from
China.
Private power: the direct, • Develop more-extensive and timely sources of information on the nature
intentional, but private or of China’s efforts to manipulate targeted societies.
clandestine use of threats or • Support local journalists, nongovernmental organizations, and
rewards to manipulate the views government officials who are working to uncover such campaigns.
or actions of specific individuals • Conduct counterinfluence campaigns designed to neuter or defeat
to shape policies or decisions of Chinese influence.
other states • Coordinate efforts with multilateral partners on all these activities.
• Accelerate multilateral efforts to develop mechanisms of resilience
against social media–based disinformation and manipulation.
25 Luke Patey, “COVID-19 Pandemic Is No Soft Power Victory for China,” Japan Times, April 15, 2020.
In addition, the United States can watch the following indicators over time to gain a sense
of how the competition for influence is playing out:
• Major geopolitical alignment: Do countries remain or become formal treaty allies of the
United States or China or remain engaged in less-formal security or political coalitions
or partnerships?
• Economic dependency: Does the dependency of other countries on China for trade and
FDI continue to level off or possibly decline at the margins?
• Security relationships: Do countries allow China to build bases on local territory or create
agreements to grant China military access? Do countries expel U.S. bases or forces?
• Territorial disputes: Do countries abandon claims contrary to China’s objectives, or do
they continue to assert rights to contested areas?
• Soft power and cultural indicators: Do the numbers of international students studying
in China change significantly? Are new restrictions placed on educational or cultural
exchanges for any reason? Does Chinese supplant English as the default common lan-
guage in key industries or professions?
In the remainder of this section, we expand on the recommended U.S. responses outlined
in Table 9.2.
For countries that are the target of Chinese influence, the United States should continue to
offer the credible promise of assistance when they stand up to Chinese coercion. A critical U.S.
role in the process of Chinese influence-seeking is to prevent outcomes in which any targeted
countries conclude grimly that they have no alternative but to accede to China’s demands.
This balancing function should not be difficult to play; it does not imply especially demand-
ing military missions, and it supports the natural interests of third-party nations. This role
demands a continued credible U.S. deterrent power in Asia, although this can be of a strictly
defensive variety. It will also increasingly require coordination and support in nonmilitary
areas of coercion—for example, helping make up for lost tourist revenues or investment in the
event of economic punishments from China, supporting responses to Chinese cyber intrusions
or attacks, and providing geopolitical backing during diplomatic clashes. One critical U.S. role
in the influence competition is to provide targeted countries with the reassurance to stand up
to China as often as possible—recognizing that, even with such offers, many countries will
still hesitate to take a stand.
The U.S. government needs a comprehensive approach to understanding, tracking, and
responding to China’s targeted influence programs aimed at specific leaders or elites. The United
States and others would be well served to develop reliable sources of intelligence on these
unfolding programs and to invest in means of ensuring that China’s influence through these
mechanisms will be checked. Part of this response is to improve intelligence-gathering on
China’s relationships with specific senior officials and thought leaders in targeted countries.
In some cases, where governments are undemocratic, China can parlay a small number of
such ties into significant policy effects, as in some African countries. In other cases, China
can use high-profile friends to legitimize aspects of its role. This has been among the most-
consistent patterns of Chinese influence-seeking and demands a focused, dedicated U.S.
intelligence effort.
Beyond using traditional classified intelligence, the U.S. response can include two other
important components. One is to create an intelligence fusion center devoted to the problem—a
single coordination point in the U.S. government designed exclusively to understand the indi-
viduals and interest groups that China is engaging around the world. This center would gather
information from around the U.S. government (from embassies, the U.S. military, and other
entities and individuals who engage regularly with foreign governments) and convene regular
cross-departmental dialogues to comprehend the challenge.
As the second piece of this response, there should also be an open-source component for
intelligence-gathering. As we discovered, there is immense information available simply by
interacting with journalists, scholars, and former officials in key countries. But an open-source
component is also essential to serve another goal: transparency. Part of the response to China’s
activities, especially those involving corrupt means, is to expose them in the targeted coun-
tries. This would help discredit both China and its local helpers and would create a deterrent
mechanism that increases the cost for others to work with China in such clandestine ways in
the future.
One way to expose Chinese influence-seeking is to support nongovernmental organiza-
tions seeking transparency in foreign relationships in their own countries. Recent events in
Australia and New Zealand make clear that such exposure can have a helpful deterrent effect.
What is needed is a sort of Bellingcat for corrupt influence-seeking—that is, a nongovernmen-
tal organization that gathers open-source data and informs the world of what it finds.26 The
U.S. government would have to be careful in designing its role in such an organization; part of
the group’s credibility would depend on its independence.
If the United States is not willing to simply accept the unqualified effect of China’s economic
growth, it must do much more to develop investment tools capable of offering countries an alterna-
tive to Chinese money—especially in infrastructure. China’s most effective source of influence is
its economic support because many countries have a significant and sometimes desperate desire
for trade and investment. But China’s influence exists, in part, because of the absence of alter-
natives; we do not know how much this desire might be tempered in a world with more choices
for economic support. The United States should expand the Better Utilization of Investments
Leading to Development (BUILD) Act of 2018 and other sources of official investment financ-
ing to targeted countries with strategic significance and the greatest appetite to counteract
Chinese influence. In the process, the United States can and should work closely with Japan,
building on Tokyo’s Partnership for Quality Infrastructure, to develop jointly promulgated
standards and investment funds.27
The United States should support independent research, journalism, and transparency initia-
tives focused on China’s activities in key countries. In many cases, elites and populations in these
countries begin with a generally positive view of China due to the economic benefits they gain.
When few independent researchers and journalists examine the Chinese role in more detail
these perceptions can persist.28 The United States has an opportunity to intensify multiple
dilemmas China faces in expanding its influence at the expense of the freedom of action of
targeted countries, and a leading way to do this is to support local voices seeking to catalogue
26 Bellingcat is an independent group of journalists and researchers in more than 20 countries around the world who spe-
cialize in fact-checking and investigative reporting using open sources.
27 See, for example, Tobias Harris, “‘Quality Infrastructure’: Japan’s Robust Challenge to China’s Belt and Road,” War on
the Rocks, April 9, 2019.
28 This is true, for example, in some European countries with “sparse” communities of China-watchers (Le Corre, 2018,
p. 5).
and call out Chinese influence programs—especially the sort of private influence that some-
times escapes public notice.
The United States should develop an influence strategy with a broader network (beyond jour-
nalists) to rally nongovernmental sources of opinion and action in targeted countries. The emerging
contest to shape beliefs and behavior is not about governments alone. The United States needs
a comprehensive strategy for engaging with nongovernmental actors—organizations, business
groups, social media influencers, media organizations, academics, and more—to support those
who are willing to stand up to China’s coercive activities.
In this and many other aspects of its response to Chinese influence-seeking, the United
States enjoys the great comparative advantage of being an advocate for the interests, goals, and
values of most of the countries in the crosshairs of Chinese power. The United States is, in
most cases, working to support these countries’ right to determine their own futures free of
China’s coercive hegemony. Partly as a result of China’s position as a power-seeking, hierarchi-
cally minded revisionist, our analysis suggests that China faces multiple dilemmas in acquiring
greater influence. The United States can support the resistance of others and magnify these
dilemmas in ways that will continually erode the degree of influence China is able to acquire.
And over time, China’s slowing growth and rising domestic challenges are likely to dim the
appeal of its economic model, the one area of huge relative advantage in the competition. The
United States, in other words, has a clear potential route to success in the competition for
influence if it makes wise choices and investments.
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NATI ONA L DE FENS E RESE ARCH INSTITUTE
O
ver the past two decades, China’s role in the geopolitical landscape
has grown, particularly as a result of the country’s rising economic
and military power. Thus, U.S. leaders now view China as a strategic
competitor—one that seeks to upend the post–World War II liberal
international order. One of China’s strategies in that competition
is to seek influence in countries around the world. In this report, the authors assess
China’s ability to use various mechanisms of influence to shape the policies and
behavior of 20 countries, as well as the lessons that these examples offer for the United
States’ strategic competition with China. With this study, the authors aim to produce
a transferable framework (comprising inputs, intervening factors, and outputs) and
other tools of analysis that can provide reliable means of assessing bilateral influence
relationships in other cases.
Among the study’s chief findings is that China’s burgeoning economic power, above
and beyond any other considerations, is the foundation for its influence. Furthermore,
Beijing’s ability to manipulate local political, economic, and social events to its benefit is
an important factor in its influence efforts. If China’s mammoth economic magnet is
the gravitational center of its influence, its ability to reach into other countries and
effectively manipulate perceptions and events is the predominant tool. Nevertheless,
success in the competition for influence is as much about how the United States
responds to current challenges as it is about anything China does or does not do.
$42.00
ISBN-10 1-9774-0642-4
ISBN-13 978-1-9774-0642-2
54200
www.rand.org 9 781977 406422
RR-A290-1

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C O R P O R AT I O N

MICHAEL J. MAZARR, BRYAN FREDERICK, JOHN J. DRENNAN, EMILY ELLINGER,

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available for this publication.

Published by the RAND Corporation, Santa Monica, Calif.

Limited Print and Electronic Distribution Rights

Implicit Societal Influence, or Soft Power. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60

Findings and Conclusions

ASEAN Association of Southeast Asian Nations

Defining Power and Influence

Modern Conceptions of Power

Types and Categories of Power

More-recent analyses of power tend to emphasize nonmilitary and noncoercive sources. As

20 Moyer et al., 2018, p. 4.

Power in International Relations

27 Wrong, 1995, pp. 41, 49.

Concepts and Definitions: Influence

41 Feklyunina, 2016, pp. 777, 780.

47 Zimmerling, 2005, pp. 105–109, 122–123, 127–128.

Existing Literature on Influence

Conspicuously absent in popular and scholarly debates is an understanding of what inter-

52 Moyer et al., 2018, p. 4.

Variable Weight (%) Variable Weight (%)

Total trade 35 Total trade as % of GDP 28

Intergovernmental membership 19 Aid as a % of GDP 21

Trade agreements 14 Total trade as % of trade with state B 16

Military alliances 13 Arms imports as % of arms imports with state B 13

Level of political representation 11 Aid as % of aid with state B 12

Total arms transfers 8 Arms imports as a % of military stock with state B 10

SOURCE: Moyer et al., 2018, pp. 9–10.

53 Moyer et al., 2018, p. 7.

Theoretical Review: Lessons and Implications

57 Custer et al., 2018, p. 5.

Framework for Assessing Chinese Influence

Framework Components and Variables

Input Type Definition General Examples Recent Chinese Casesa

Generalized The indirect shaping of beliefs, • Investments in exchange • Confucius Institutesb

Methodological Challenges to Measuring Influence

• The main variables at stake—power, influence, coercion, and others—remain disputed

Because of these methodological challenges, a purely quantitative analysis using measur-

Measuring Chinese Influence: Inputs

Economic Variables: Trade and Foreign Direct Investment

Australia Brazil Cambodia Ethiopia Germany India Indonesia

Australia Laos Malaysia Philippines South Korea

SOURCE: UN Comtrade, undated.

SOURCE: UN Comtrade, undated.

Australia Brazil Cambodia Ethiopia Germany India Indonesia

SOURCE: Horn, Reinhardt, and Trebesch, 2020, p. 6. Used with permission.

Top 8 Countries (%)

Dependence on China Dependence on China

The Reputational Effects of Economic Interdependence

Security Variables: Security Cooperation and Military Posture

SOURCE: Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), undated.

1,400 Southeast Asia

SOURCE: SIPRI, undated.

Total Military Aid

Diplomatic Variables: Programs and Activities

In addition to reviewing economic input variables, we considered Chinese activities in public

28 See Custer et al., 2018.

30 Custer et al., 2018, pp. 3–4.