Darfur: China’s sophisticated, and not so sophisticated PR Strategy February 15, 2008
Posted by paulprdixon in : Crisis Communications, PR in the PRC , trackbackStephen Spielberg has been making the headlines this week over his decision to quit as an artistic advisor to the Beijing Olympics. The multi-award winning director announced his decision on Tuesday, after almost a year of unsuccessfully prodding China to do more in ending Sudan’s attacks in the Darfur region.
Prodding not having the desired effect on Hu Jintao, Spielberg delivered a hammer blow to Beijing through the public way he announced his decision – forcing the Chinese government to respond on an issue it doesn’t want to talk about.
I don’t recommend wearing the T-shirt in Tiananmen Square
By Wednesday, a spokesperson at the Chinese Embassy in Washington said, “As the Darfur issue is neither an internal issue of China nor is it caused by China, it is completely unreasonable, irresponsible and unfair to link the two as one.” But as the International Herald Tribune notes, Beijing had yet to respond to requests for comment on Spielberg’s decision.
On Thursday, after a long night in Zhong Nan Hai (China’s White House meets Camp David and planted in the center of Beijing) crafting its response, Beijing did make comment. And it was actually pretty good; if today’s front page of English language government mouthpiece - the China Daily – is anything to go by.
In a crisis, which this so clearly is with the Olympics becoming a source of national pride for the Chinese, it is essential to apply the CAP principle: concern, action and perspective. And that’s what came through in the China Daily article. Foreign Ministry spokesman, Lin Jianchao, expressed “regret” (for Spielberg’s decision) and “[China] has noticed these or those discussions and moves on China’s stance on Darfur”. That’s probably the most they could have said considering the international community is vociferously against Beijing’s obvious willingness to exchange crates of weapons for barrels of oil regardless of where those crates may end up.
But here comes the perspective bit; the strongest weapon China has got in its crate labeled media offensive. We are bombarded with round after round of statistics, for example: “China has so far offered $11.1 million in humanitarian aid to Sudan”. I’ll spare you the rest.
What is also interesting is that the printed story is missing the part about Bush’s (the US has been accused of being just as complicit in letting another genocide continue in Africa) interview with the BBC where he claims that he will attend the Olympics because it’s a sporting event and Spielberg’s decision is his own. It’s missing because the BBC story was published on-line after today’s China Daily had gone to print, but someone decided to stick it in the web edition later on, for obvious reasons.
But let’s not go as far to say that China is fully embracing sophisticated communications’ strategies; because it’s not, as another BBC article from today so aptly demonstrates.
One of my favorite journalists, the BBC’s John Simpson, writes about the relationship between China and Sudan in a special report. He describes how he and his team went round to a site overlooking the Blue Nile where the headquarters of the state-owned Chinese National Petroleum Corporation is located. The head of public relations, who was Sudanese, agreed to be interviewed.
John Simpson says: We were standing in front of the building, and he was just answering my second question, when there was an angry shout from one of the windows. He hurried off, and came back a few seconds later. ‘Sorry,’ he said sheepishly, ‘they say no.’ ‘Who do?’ ‘The Chinese.’
Not so sophisticated after all.
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