Thesis (M.A.)--Kansas State University, 2006. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 82-89).

This study seeks to ascertain whether Chinese soft power can shape or sway the sense of belonging and identity of Uighurs within the Chinese state. The methodology used for this study will involve surveys and interviews, employing the two primary quantitative and qualitative methods. The findings from this study suggest that Chinese soft power, in the form of education in a controlled environment, does have this ability to sway Uighur to identify with the Chinese state. However, gauging the views of the wider educated Uighur community, indicates that the effectiveness of Chinese soft power is constrained by multiple social, political and economic issues. Based on the analysis of these findings, there appears to be three potential solutions: (i) create a multi-ethnic culture, (ii) incorporate civic nationalism as a component of PRC citizenship and (iii) to reformulate soft power into the form of shared goals that would require cooperation between Uighur and Hans to accomplish.

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Special economic zones are one of the tools utilized by Chinese government to stimulate the growth of local economy, especially through foreign investment. This thesis is focused on special economic zone in Shenzhen and on use of special economic zones for development of inland provinces of China in recent years, which are lagging in economic development in comparison with the developed provinces on the eastern coast. Western development plan is demonstrated on the example of the province of Xinjiang. The thesis further sumarizes bow is the approach to establishment of special economic zones changing in recent years, compared to the period of early 1980s.

This thesis will analyse the identity politics of the Chinese party-state’s nation-building project in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. It will examine how the party-state intends to overcome the barrier of ethnic boundaries in the production of a shared sense of multi-ethnic, national belonging. Uyghurs and Han can be thought of as belonging to different civilisations (Chinese and Turkic-Islamic) but in modern times they are often thought of as divided by ethnic boundaries. The party-state’s idea of the Chinese nation (Zhonghua Minzu) is a nation-building project to eliminate these boundaries so as to produce a multi-ethnic nation. Fieldwork was conducted after the riots of July 2009 engulfed the region. Ethnically targeted violence against both Han and Uyghurs destabilised the city of Ürümchi and challenged the party-state’s vision of China as a unified and harmonious nation. The official Chinese explanation was that this was an internationally funded and synchronised terrorist attack but Uyghur rights groups have blamed tensions on government policy repressing Uyghur culture and stoking Han nationalism. The theoretical framework employed draws from the concepts of production and performativity in Post-Structuralist and Critical International Relations (IR) theory, particularly the work of Cynthia Weber (1998) and David Campbell (1998). The critical approach adopted here takes security as a process of performative enactment of identity, which produces the units we take for granted as worthy of security. The analysis will examine official performances of what it means to be Chinese and Uyghur. It will then ask how these performances are received and (re)performed by members of the postulated nation. The party-state seeks to include Uyghurs as Chinese but it also excludes and securitises Uyghur Turkic and Islamic identities as ‘outside’ threats to the unity of the nation. The research is a result of one year of fieldwork (September 2009-August 2010) in Ürümchi, the capital city of Xinjiang. This was the first ethnographic study of responses to the violence of July 2009. Furthermore, the incorporation of Han perspectives has been very limited thus far in the literature on Xinjiang. The analysis uses a top-down approach, which employs discourse analysis of official texts to understand what type of national identity the party-state seeks to produce. However, these methods are coupled with a bottom-up analysis using ethnographic methods, particularly detailed, semi-structured interviews, to explore how these official discourses are received. The perspectives of Han and Uyghurs in Xinjiang can inform us how nation-building will unfold and what type of social dynamics it will engender. Analysing perspectives on the nation from below can help us understand the type of nation we expect to be produced in China rather than the type of nation the party-state narrates. The findings of this research demonstrate that both Uyghurs and Han are turning official Chinese nationalist discourses against themselves to articulate separate ethnic nations. Uyghurs frame China as an assimilationist transgression of ethnic boundaries for the benefit of the Han. Han frame their nation as under threat from Uyghurs and articulate China as a Han nation. The party-state’s nation-building project is unintentionally producing insecurity and reinforcing ethnic boundaries which remain obstacles to a shared sense of nationhood.

In Xinjiang, China’s largest autonomous region situated in the country’s north-western corner, severe violations against the human rights of its inhabitants, primarily the native muslim minority Uyghur people, has been committed by the Chinese state. According to investigations from the European Parliament in 2020, over a million people are currently, or have previously been, incarcerated in so-called internment camps in 2020. These internment camps have received worldwide attention since their reveal; something that the Chinese state have worked to succumb by restricting access by foreign journalists through barring their entrance to the Xinjiang province, an action taken to limit the reports about the camps, according to Amnesty International.In view of this background, this study aims to draw conclusions on the ability of Swedish journalists to accurately report on the issue of the Uyghurs given the Chinese authoritarian rule. It also focuses on investigating how the media reporting frames the Uyghur issue and creates a discours for reporting on this very issue. Continuing, the study consists of interviews with six Swedish correspondents based in China and one foreign editor, as well as a critical discourse analysis of 16 articles from the Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter. Given the research questions and the interviews, this study draws the conclusion that the interviewed Swedish foreign correspondents lack proper access to the issue at hand to accurately report on it. This, because of actions taken by the Chinese state to limit access to the Xinjiang region through surveillance and pressure. This, furthermore, creates a situation in which the reporting could be considered static given this very lack of access and new information on the issue. Additionally the analysis of the 16 articles show that there is an apparent lack of cohesion in what words are used primarily describing the camps in Xinjiang; which in turn creates different connotations for the readers.

The purpose of this research is to examine China’s emerging role in peacebuilding. With a fast-growing economy, China is becoming very influential and has increased its political leverage in conflict-affected countries. At the same time, China’s foreign policy and strategy are evolving and Beijing is becoming more proactive in engaging and intervening on peacebuilding efforts. China has developed a unique peacebuilding approach, one that is based on economic growth as way to alleviate poverty and social unrest. China could contribute to bringing these alternative and complementary perspectives to the Peacebuilding debate and open this field to non-Western understandings. This research is going to examine China’s approach, its origins in China’s domestic situation and how China is exporting this model at the international level. Some of the aspects that will be analyse include: general aspects of the Chinese civilisation, philosophy and history, the domestic situation as well as on the ways that China handles its domestic conflicts in Xinjiang and Tibet; and some of the particularities and characteristics of Chinese foreign policy that shape the way it exports peacebuilding policies to the international arena. The intervention of China in the conflict of Kachin, Myanmar will illustrate how Chinese peacebuilding is evolving and moving away from its Westphalian principles of non-interference. China has thus become a key actor in supporting peace and stability and it should be part of any debate around peacebuilding moving forward based on shared interests in, and concern to promote peace and stability.

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