Chinese Dream

Interpretations

The Chinese Dream is vaguely defined, and has led to multiple interpretations describing the phrase's meaning. Although the content of the Chinese Dream is described variously, the phrase generally describes a set of aspirational qualities, values, and goals for the Chinese nation and people. Varying historical interpretations have tied it to ideas including the Confucian tradition and the May Fourth Movement. Xi's articulation of the China Dream has led to an outpouring of commentary.

Economic and political reform

The core task of the China Dream is economic development. The primary means of developing the economy pursuant to the China dream is infrastructure development, including via the Belt and Road Initiative.

Some government officials and activists view the Chinese Dream as a need for economic and political reform. Sustaining China's economic growth requires economic reform encompassing urbanization, the reduction of government bureaucracy, and weakening the power of special interests. Chinese liberals have defined the Chinese Dream as a dream of constitutionalism. Southern Weekly, a liberal newspaper based in Guangzhou, attempted to publish an editorial titled "The Chinese dream: a dream of constitutionalism" which advocated the separation of powers, but was censored by the authorities.

Both Xi Jinping and Premier Li Keqiang support economic reform, but have shied away from discussing political reform. Premier Li has said that "But however deep the water may be, we will wade into the water. This is because we have no alternative. Reform concerns the destiny of our country and the future of our nation." According to official CCP sources, the Chinese Dream is the "essence of Socialism with Chinese characteristics."

In October 2013, Britain's Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Osborne, described the Chinese Dream as a political reform that includes "rebalancing from investment to consumption."

Financial inclusion is an important component of Xi's view of the Chinese Dream.

Sustainable development

The China Dream has been defined as sustainable development. Peggy Liu and the NGO JUCCCE coined the phrase "China Dream" as a movement based on sustainability, which was later popularized in China through a New York Times article and adopted by Xi Jinping. Pollution and food safety are significant concerns in China. China's rising middle class is expected to increase by 500 million people by 2025 and will continue to put a strain on the country's dwindling resources. Xi Jinping's conception of the Chinese Dream has incorporated the idea of ecological civilization and increased its prominence.

According to Liu, the Chinese Dream of sustainability can be achieved through the promotion of green technologies and the reduction of widespread conspicuous consumption. China's high growth has caused widespread environmental damage, and without environmental reforms, the deterioration could threaten the legitimacy of the CCP. The Chinese Dream is a dream of a prosperous lifestyle reconciled with a sustainable lifestyle. According to academic Zhang Yiwu's articulation, "Chinese citizens have expressed a desire for both continued economic development and increased environmental protection. People need both cars and blue skies. How to achieve a balance between these two interests is a long-term challenge for the government."

Foreign policy

Xi's emphasis on the Chinese Dream also relates to his call to develop a Community of Shared Future for Mankind. foreign policy concept as part of its effort to build relationships with a network of like-minded foreign partners in order to facilitate the Chinese Dream. Chinese diplomat Wu Jianmin described the concept as "about the rejuvenation of China; democracy; cultural strength and harmony and it is not just a dream for China but for the world."

In diplomatic discourse, the China Dream is generally framed more ambiguously than in domestic-oriented discourse. Among occasions when the Chinese Dream has been part of diplomatic discourse are the 2015 visit by Premier Li Keqiang to Latin America, where he stated that sharing the Chinese Dream with Latin America will promote "mutual learning in the fields of culture, education, and society". During her time as Vice Foreign Minister, Fu Ying asserted, "The Chinese Dream is also part of the dream of many in the developing world who now have a great opportunity to grow their economy."

Military

The Chinese Dream is sometimes tied to the idea of a strong military. In 2010, Liu Mingfu advocated for a Chinese Dream of a strong military. In November 2013, China's first aircraft carrier, the Liaoning, bore the words "Chinese Dream, Strong Military Dream." "Aircraft carrier dream" is also a related slogan.

Ethnic nationalist revival

The Chinese Dream has been viewed as a call for China's rising international influence. Xi Jinping refers to the dream as a form of national rejuvenation. Young Chinese are envious of America's cultural influence and hope that China could one day rival the US as a cultural exporter.

The Chinese Dream is also a process to promote national rejuvenation through domestic ethnic policy. The adoption of Chinese nationalistic ideologies has increased as policies in line with the Chinese Dream have been enacted. Zheng Dahua has noted that the increase in domestic public concern surrounding the Chinese identity and connected to the self-consciousness movement in country. Dahua argues that the Chinese Dream has been internalized within the consciousness of the domestic public and as a result, nationalistic attitudes and opinions in China have subsequently increased.

Second-generation minzu policy in 2012

The purpose of the second-generation ethnic policy is to cooperate with the ethnic assimilation project as part of the "national rejuvenation" to create a whole "Chinese nation-state." Some scholars suggest the first-generation of policy focuses on the recognition of 56 nationality (minzu) and on keeping the national unity while developing all groups. The second-generation ethnic policy was originally introduced in line with Xi Jinping's "national rejuvenation" theory of the Chinese dream. It was first proposed in 2011 by two Chinese scholars of National Conditions Institute of Tsinghua University, Hu Lianhe and Hu Angang.

Hu Lianhe and Hu Angang suggest that the proof of multiculturalism in the US, Brazil, and India adopting the model of the "ethnic melting pot" can prove the correctness of second-generation ethnic policies in China.

"Ethnic mingling" after 2014

The new policy of "ethnic mingling" (jiaorong) proposed by Xi in 2014 is an assimilation policy based on "national integration" and "national unity." Xi attended the Second Xinjiang Work Forum, and stressed that:

We must strengthen the interaction, interchange and intermingling between ethnic groups; we must prepare and expand all kinds of shared constructive projects, advance "bilingual education" and promote the building of social structures and community environments in which the people of different ethnic groups are mutually embedded.

The Forum's full set of document have not been made public. In his speech, Xi emphasized the term "national integration" many times. His goal is to establish a unified national identity between each ethnic group and to replace ethnic identities with the Zhonghua minzu. The substance of the "ethnic mingling" policy is a step in addition to the theory of the "melting pot" of the second-generation ethnic policy. For Xi, the creation of the unified identity of the Chinese nation is a key factor in realizing the great rejuvenation of Chinese Dream; however, some scholars argue that the national revival campaign will make China lose cultural diversity and "indigeneity" (tuzhuxing).

Persecution of Uyghurs in China

Some scholars, journalists, and governments claim that the "ethnic mingling" policy implementation by the government evolved into cultural genocide against minorities in Xinjiang since 2017, most prominently against the Uyghurs. The period from 2017 to 2020 is the stage when the government took tough measures to implement the assimilation of ethnic minorities. These scholars claim that cultural genocide is a stage to deepen destruction of the group identity of ethnic minorities. Article 14 was the new regulations to lay the foundations to establish mass internment "re-education" system. The Chinese government promulgated new regulations on the grounds of "de-extremification of Muslims" in Article 14.

Since 2014, the trial implementation of intermarriage project established in some places of Xinjiang. The local government of Qiemo County in Xinjiang established a new regulation in 2014, called "Regarding the Incentive Measures for Families Encouraging Intermarriage Between Ethnic Minorities and Han." This policy is very generous with regard to ethnic-Han intermarriage families, with priority consideration and resolution in politics, housing, and children's employment, including a 10,000 yuan award each year for no more than five consecutive years and free tuition for their children from elementary school to high school, etc. County CCP Secretary Zhu Xin remarked:

Our advocacy of intermarriage is promoting positive energy ... Only by promoting the establishment of a social structure and community environment in which all ethnic groups are embedded in each other ... can we boost the great unity, ethnic fusion and development of all ethnic groups in Xinjiang, and finally realize our China dream of great rejuvenation of our Chinese nation

James A. Millward, a scholar of Xinjiang at Georgetown University, stated that "state-sponsored efforts at 'blending' and 'fusion' will be seen by Uyghurs in China or by China's critics anywhere as really aimed at assimilating Uighurs into Han culture."

Other social issues

Zhang Gaoli, as Vice-Premier, stated that the Chinese Dream also belongs to the millions of disabled people in China.

Provincial versions of the Chinese Dream, such as the "Henan Dream" or the "Guangdong Dream" have also been expressed.

Individual dreams

Some Chinese have interpreted the Chinese dream as the pursuit of individual dreams. Evan Osnos of The New Yorker comments that "Xi Jinping has sought to inspire his people by raising the flag of the China Dream, but they have interpreted it as China Dreams—plural." According to Osnos, the Chinese Dream is "the proliferation of 1.3 billion China Dreams."

According to Shi Yuzhi, a professor at the National University of Singapore, the Chinese Dream is not about individual glory, but about collective effort. Measuring public sentiment on Sina Weibo, Academic Christopher Marquis and Zoe Yang found that the Chinese Dream refers more to the common goods bestowed by civil society than it does to individual achievements.

A main aim of the Chinese state propaganda is therefore the construction of links between individual and national aspirations, which also signifies the convergence of the values of the market economy and state nationalism. This is evident in Chinese entertainment television. In a genre of reality shows in public speaking, for example, contestants frequently connect between their "dreams" and the triumph of China and further emphasize the legitimacy of the CCP in delivering a better future.

Compared to the American Dream

State media in China sometimes contrasts the Chinese Dream with the American Dream, contending for example that while the Chinese Dream seeks national rejuvenation, "the characteristic of the American Dream is the maximization of private benefit, and the profit motive is its driving force. So-called universal values are applied selectively according to US interests."

In 2015, Xi stated, "I have the impression that the Americans and people in all other countries share the same dream about the future: world peace, social security and stability, and a decent life .... The dreams of various peoples, however different in meaning, are sources of inspiration for them and all these dreams create important opportunities for China and the United States, as well as other countries to engage in cooperation."

According to Shi Yuzhi, a professor at the National University of Singapore, the Chinese Dream is about Chinese prosperity, collective effort, socialism, and national glory. Shi compared the relationship between the phrase and the American Dream.

Academic Suisheng Zhao writes that the conceptualization of "[t]he Chinese Dream is thus distinguished from the American dream in that people can pursue individual dreams and contribute to the national dream at the same time." In contrast to the individualist American Dream, the Chinese Dream is expressed as a collective desire for China to reclaim its historical role as a major power.

Reactions

Some scholars argue that the Chinese Dream slogan, and its connection to morality and tradition, is a method for constructing CCP legitimacy.

In October 2015, Roderick MacFarquhar, a China expert at Harvard University, spoke at a conference on Marxism in Beijing. He said that Chinese leader Xi Jinping's talk of the so-called "Chinese Dream" was "not the intellectually coherent, robust and wide-ranging philosophy needed to stand up to Western ideas."

Ravi Kant, a financial writer, commented on Asia Times that Xi Jinping himself is hindering the Chinese people from realizing their dreams. He said that much of Xi's rise can be attributed to his belief in fajia, which emphasizes absolute power and authority of the ruler. He compared and contrasted Xi to Deng Xiaoping, who he said believed in empowering people instead of leaders, and whose policy contributed to China's economic rise. Kant said, "The only man standing between the Chinese people and the Chinese dream is Xi Jinping."

Former United States Secretary of State John Kerry promoted the idea of a "Pacific Dream" to accommodate China's rise through regional collaboration over shared interests like the environment and economic growth.

Derek Hird, a China expert at Lancaster University, said that Xi Jinping has built Confucian values, including conservative views of Chinese women's role in the family, into his Chinese Dream of nationalist revival. The Wall Street Journal reported that in the Xi era, new political slogans emphasizing "family, family education and family virtues" or "pass on the red gene" have come along with efforts to censor voices on women's rights.

According to some commentators, the "great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation" (中华民族伟大复兴), on which the Chinese Dream is based, is a mistranslation. A better translation of the phrase would be the "great rejuvenation of the Chinese race". Jamil Anderlini, an editor for the Financial Times, said that the concept of "Chinese race" (or "Chinese Volk") nominally includes 56 officially recognized ethnicities (including Tibetans and Uyghurs) in China, but is "almost universally understood to mean the majority Han ethnic group, who make up more than 90 per cent of the population." He said that such race-based ideas are deeply connected to the history of the 20th century and earlier European colonialism.

Survey data compiled by academic Bruce Dickson indicates that around 70% of the Chinese population approve of the Chinese Dream. Through a survey of 17 Chinese cities, academic Lu Chunlong concludes that the Chinese Dream is generally understood through "Chinese traditional culture: respect for political authority, desire for social order and support for a powerful government." Lu's study also found that 92.4% of those surveyed had heard of Xi's explanation of the China Dream.