Joseph Nye on China: Straight from the horse’s mouth…

I don’t know about you, but I find that learning can sometimes be much easier when a teacher simply presents me with their theory, as opposed to reading their theory independently. That’s why I was happily surprised to find Joseph Nye’s lecture on Global Power Shifts on Ted.com. In this brief lecture Nye, not only sets out his theory on oft power in the 21st century, he also addresses the “raise of China.” Nye acknowledges two new shifts in power: (1) what he calls the “resifting of Power from West to East” and (2) power shifting from State to Non-State actors (the new free flow of information allows for the dissemination of many messages, thus the state’s power is largely diffused.
Nye defines power as the ability to affect others to get the outcome that you want, which can be accomplished through the stick (through threats/coercion), the carrot (incentives), and soft power (getting others to want what you want). Meaning, the new power, isn’t whose army wins, but whose story wins. Which is all things we have discussed in class, but helpful to hear directly from the designer.
Regarding the “rise of china and decline of the US,” Nye warns that focusing on solely economic power, doesn’t say anything about China’s soft power. Similar to what we read in Soft Power in Chinese Discourse, Nye also asserts that China’s soft power strategies has not been effective with its neighbors, who remain largely hostile, and prefer America’s soft power. In reading Soft Power in Chinese Discourse, I get the impression that China’s failings in Soft Power stem, at least in part, from their emphasis on “culture being the main source of soft power.”
Nye closes by asserting that soft power will be even more important in this century as our increasingly connected world will require compromise. As opposed to simply exporting the value of their cultures, States need to combine both hard and soft power, into strategies of smart power, which Nye defined as win-win strategies. China has stronger soft power in Latin American and Africa, where it has invested in mutually beneficial strategies, and this will be the winning power strategy of the 21 century.