Power, Public Diplomacy, and Cultural Diplomacy in China’s Education: From Soft Power to the Chinese Dream

Abstract

Over the last two decades, China has a strong interest in pursuing a smart power strategy toward the world and has worked hardly to engage with regional countries economically, politically, and socially. Along this line, the academic research on Chinese Dream, soft power aspirations, and public and cultural diplomacy into the ideological and political education of school students has become a hot spot. The question of how the Chinese Government has deployed its soft power in the past and the present (also known as the Chinese Dream in this study) through the use of music in national community education in China will be investigated in this chapter. This chapter will demonstrate how select songs are used to examine soft power, improve national communication capabilities, and undertake domestic purposes to achieve three goals, including the cultivation of cultural diplomacy through traditional Chinese culture, the development of cultural diplomacy, and the fulfillment of the Chinese Dream, soft power, and public and cultural diplomacy in China’s education.