Wearing Free China: Gendered Diplomacy and the Politics of the Qipao in Taiwan–Australia Relations During the Global Sixties

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This article explores how Chinese women living in and visiting Australia in the 1960s helped shape the international image of the Republic of China – not through formal diplomacy, but through dress, demeanor, and public presence. At a time when Taiwan was still claiming to be “Free China,” these women – trade fair hostesses, beauty queens, and ambassadorial wives – performed a modern, cultured Chinese femininity that softened the Republic’s authoritarian image and made it intelligible to Australian audiences. Wearing the qipao, they appeared in festivals, pageants, and media coverage not simply as ornaments of the state but as active cultural intermediaries. Their performances offered an accessible image of “China” at a moment when official recognition of the PRC loomed. Drawing on practice theory and feminist approaches to international relations, the article shows how the work of diplomacy often occurred not in embassies but in shopping centers, parades, and local celebrations. These women helped keep Taiwan visible in Australia, even as the name “Free China” faded from use. In foregrounding their work, the article reimagines diplomacy as a lived, gendered, and racialised practice—constituted not solely through treaties and official titles, but through the affective labour of those who navigated cross-cultural meaning on the ground.