Can Pop Culture Allay Resentment? Japan’s Influence in China Today

Yuqing Wu

doi:10.17645/mac.v9i3.4117

Abstract

In China, despite the traumatic collective memory relating to militaristic Japan during World War II, an increasing number of Chinese young adults have developed an obsession with Japanese culture, due to its export of anime, movies, pop music, and other popular culture. Based on interviews with 40 Chinese and Japanese young adults, this work examines how contemporary pop culture and historical war memories related to Japan influenced Chinese young adults, who had to reconcile their contradictory sentiments toward the Japanese government, people, and culture. The success of Japanese pop culture in China also shows how the allegedly apolitical, virtual sphere of entertainment has helped build Japan’s soft power through shaping a cool image of Japan in Asia and worldwide.

Highlights

China today occupies the center of global attention as a rising power that may challenge the US‐centric world order
Most Chinese respondents reported their impressions of Japan as ‘neutral’ or ‘favorable.’ In contrast to a 1996 sur‐ vey in which 84% of the Chinese respondents gave the ‘Nanjing Massacre’ as their most immediate association upon hearing the word ‘Japan’ (Qiu, 2006), in my inter‐ views, only two interviewees mentioned Japan’s relation‐ ship with China as their immediate impression, and half of the Chinese respondents said ‘anime.’
While China is a rising hard power in Asia and beyond, the media flow between China and Japan still tends to be one‐way, in that China is a heavy importer of Japanese media content

Summary

Introduction

China today occupies the center of global attention as a rising power that may challenge the US‐centric world order. With substantial economic and military strength, China does not evoke either admiration or trust internationally (Shambaugh, 2015). Ever since 2004, the Chinese Ministry of Education has been trying to build Confucius Institutes to promote Chinese language and culture globally (Hartig, 2012). Since 2007, Beijing has invested billions of dollars into building ‘the Chinese dream’ and ‘the Asia‐Pacific dream’ What China lacks is not hard power that can scare people away but the cultural influence to convincingly tell its own side of the story. China is in shortage of soft power—the persuasive approach to exert influence without force (Nye, 2012)

Methods

Results

Conclusion