The Confucius Institute (CI) program, which began establishing centers for Chinese language instruction in 2004, has been the subject of criticisms, concerns, and controversies during its international expansion.
Many such concerns stem from the CI's relationship to Chinese Communist Party (CCP) authorities, giving rise to criticisms about undermining academic freedom at host universities, engaging in industrial and military espionage, surveillance of Chinese students abroad, and attempts to advance the Chinese government's political agendas on controversial issues such as Taiwan, and human rights in China and Tibet.Free Tibet challenges China's propaganda in schools. Free Tibet. 30 March 2015. Retrieved 31 March 2015.Campaigners Shut Down Confucius Institute. Students for a Free Tibet. 29 October 2014. Retrieved 31 March 2015. Additional concerns have arisen over the institutes' financial and academic viability, teaching quality, and relations with Chinese partner universities.Starr, Don "Chinese Language Education in Europe: the Confucius Institutes" , European Journal of Education (2009). Volume 44, Issue 1, pages 78–79.
Confucius Institutes have defended their establishments, comparing them with other cultural promotion organizations such as Alliance française and Goethe-Institut. However, unlike the Alliance française or Goethe-Institut, many Confucius Institutes operate directly on university campuses, thus giving rise to unique concerns related to academic freedom and political influence. A report released by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) in February 2019 which reviewed 90 agreements establishing Confucius Institutes said "While 42 of 90 agreements contained language about the document being confidential, some were available online or upon request, and one-third of the 90 agreements explicitly addressed how U.S. school policies apply to the institutes." Some observers have noted that CIs are largely limited to teaching cultural and language programs, and the institutes' staff tend to see political and controversial subjects as human rights and democracy as outside the context of the mission of a Confucius Institute.Ulara Nakagawa (2011), "Confucius Controversy" , The Diplomat, 7 March 2011.
Background The Confucius Institute program began in 2004 and is financed by the quasi-governmental Office of Chinese Language Council International (colloquially, Hanban), which is chaired by Politburo member and Vice Premier Liu Yandong, former head of the United Front Work Department. Hanban is governed by "a council of high state and party officials" drawn from a variety of party and state ministries including Foreign Affairs, Education, and the State Council Information Office (also known as the "Office of Foreign Propaganda"). Marshall Sahlins of the University of Chicago describes Hanban as "an instrument of the party state operating as an international pedagogical organization". The institutes operate in co-operation with local affiliate colleges and universities around the world. The related Confucius Classroom program partners with secondary schools and school districts to provide Chinese language teachers and instructional materials.
The Confucius Institute has grown rapidly from one campus in Seoul in 2004 to more than 400 worldwideConfucius Institute, University of Nebraska, Lincoln , "Confucius Institutes around the globe" in 2013, and opposition to the program "has grown almost as dramatically". In 2023, there were 498 CIs and 773 Confucius Classrooms in more than 160 countries and regions. Critics have accused CIs of having restrictive hiring practices and not conforming to western political ideals on issues such as the legitimacy of the Taiwanese state and origins of the Korean War.Jon Marcus, West's universities reconsider China-funded Confucius Institutes , The Times Higher Education, 4 April 2013.
In evidence of the "spectacular proliferation" of CIs, Lionel Jensen notes they have become so familiar in the United States a segment of The Daily Show made a parody out of a community group's opposition to the CI teaching Mandarin in a public school.
Objectives Confucius Institutes' stated missions are to promote knowledge of Chinese language and culture abroad, as well as to promote commercial and trade cooperation. In the context of the Chinese Communist Party's foreign policy objectives, the institutes serve as tools of cultural diplomacy intended to bolster China's soft power abroad.
Official Communist Party literature describes the Institutes in the context of Hu Jintao's soft power initiatives, designed to influence perceptions of China and its policies abroad. Li Changchun, the 5th-highest-ranking member of the Politburo Standing Committee, was quoted in The Economist saying the Institutes were "an important part of China's overseas propaganda set-up".A message from Confucius; New ways of projecting soft power, The Economist. 22 October 2009.
The Economist notes China "has been careful not to encourage these language centres to act as overt purveyors of the party's political viewpoints, and little suggests they are doing so", but also noted the important goal of giving the world a "more accurate" understanding of China, as well as efforts in opposing Chinese dissident groups abroad, such as anti-communist party groups, separatist activities, and the Falun Gong in California.The Economist, China's Confucius Institutes: Rectification of statues , "Asia Banyan", 20 January 2011.
Lionel M. Jensen, associate professor of East Asian languages and cultures from the University of Notre Dame, while noting "so far there have not been any events in which the academic freedom of the host university was explicitly threatened by authorities of Hanban", expressed concerns regarding the CI's educational diversity and quality of teaching. Jensen said the Hanban has reduced the diversity of China's cultures to a "uniform, quaint commodity", characterized by Chinese opera and dance performances, which he calls "culturetainment", meaning "the abridgment of Chinese civilization in the name of digestible forms of cultural appeal can be readily shipped overseas."Elizabeth Redden (2012), Confucius Says ... Debate over Chinese-funded institutes at American universities , Inside Higher Ed 4 January 2012.
Randolph Kluver, Director of the Confucius Institute at Texas A&M University, said that the soft power paradigm was inadequate for understanding CIs, which could better be understood within a "communicative paradigm" of bringing China's cultural resources into a global conversation about values, politics, and culture.Randolph Kluver (2014), "The Sage as Strategy: Nodes, Networks, and the Quest for Geopolitical Power in the Confucius Institute" . Communication, Culture & Critique, 7(2).Randolph Kluver (2014), "Introduction: the Confucius Institute as a Communicative Phenomenon" . China Media Research, 10 (1). Kluver concluded that despite the Western suspicions of a Communist Party agenda, Confucius Institutes had little impact on attitudes towards the Chinese government.
The New York Times foreign correspondent Jane Perlez reported that the 2013 Pew Global Attitudes Project survey revealed China's approval rating in the United States had dropped 14 percentage points in two years, to the lowest rating for China in any region of the world. Perlez cited an article in the Journal of Contemporary China by Tao Xie, a professor of political science at Beijing Foreign Studies University, who said in an interview that his analysis "was rejected by Chinese academic publications because it criticized the Confucius Institutes that the Chinese government has opened in many countries."Jane Perlez (2013), In China and U.S., Mutual Distrust Grows, Study Finds , The New York Times 18 July 2013. Professor Tao statistically analyzed data from the 2007 Pew Global Attitudes survey for factors that affect cross-national variations in China's national image.Tao Xie and Benjamin I. Page (2013), What Affects China's National Image? A cross-national study of public opinion, Journal of Contemporary China, Routledge. Presuming that Chinese foreign direct investment would increase positive public perceptions of China among recipients, Tao tested and disproved a hypothesis that "the number of Confucius institutes in a country should be positively related to favorable opinions about China among that country's people."Tao and Page (2013), p. 7. Tao notes that the number of institutes many be endogenous in statistical terms, because the Hanban has opened most CIs in Europe and North America, "where perceptions of China have been the most unfavorable".Tao and Page (2013), p. 11. Professor Tao concludes that the data reveal, "the Confucius institutes and classrooms have not succeeded in reversing the rather negative image of China in most of the countries where they are located."Tao and Page (2013), p. 17. This conclusion was criticized by other Chinese scholars as "limited", who reject this causational relationship, claiming instead that favorability of China is not solely determined by Confucius Institutes.
Addressing a 2014 Dublin conference for European CIs, Liu Yunshan, Director of the Propaganda Department of the Chinese Communist Party, said Confucius Institutes had emerged at the right moment, and described them as a "spiritual high-speed rail" [心灵高铁], promoting friendship by connecting "Chinese dreams" with those of the rest of the world.Confucius says , The Economist, 13 September 2014.
Perceived influences
A number of criticisms surrounding the Confucius Institutes stem from their relationships with the Chinese government, through the Office of Chinese Language Council International or "Hanban". The Hanban website states that Confucius Institutes and Classrooms are non-profit educational institutions,Confucius Institute/Classroom , Hanban English website. but they have close ties to several senior CCP officials, including the current Hanban chair and Politburo member Liu Yandong,Hanban News, 'Madame Liu Yandong, State Councilor and Chair of the Confucius Institute Headquarters Delivers a New Year's Address to Confucius Institutes Overseas' , 1 March 2010. Accessed 7 September 2011. who was formerly head of the United Front Work Department. The Hanban members encompass twelve Chinese government institutions, from the Ministry of Education to the State Council Information Office (or "Office of Foreign Propaganda") and the National Development and Reform Commission, "through organizations dealing with Finance, Overseas Chinese, Foreign Affairs, Foreign Trade, Culture and all the media organizations."Valérie Niquet (2011), "'Confu-talk': the use of Confucian concepts in contemporary Chinese foreign policy," in China's Thought Management , ed. by Anne-Marie Brady, Routledge, p. 82.The Office of Chinese Language Council International (Hanban) , The University of Sydney Confucius Institute. "United Front Work" is a concept that harks back to the Chinese Civil War and refers to "Beijing's efforts to identify friends and isolate enemies. The logic here is that true friends will identify and isolate enemies from the CCP, while hiding any hint of direct involvement by the Party itself."Narayani Basu, Confucius Institutes In America: Soft Power or Propaganda? – Analysis , Eurasia Review, 8 August 2012. Steven W. Mosher, president of the Population Research Institute, testified the United Front Work Department's purpose "is subversion, cooption and control", and claimed one of the CI's chief purposes is "to subvert, coopt, and ultimately control Western academic discourse on matters pertaining to China."Mosher, Steven W. (2012), Confucius Institutes: Trojan Horses with Chinese Characteristics , Testimony Presented to the United States House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, 28 March 2012.