Representing China in the South Pacific Jonathan Sullivan and Bettina Renz, University of Nottingham. This is a pre-pub version of a paper forthcoming in East Asia. This draft Feb 2012. Comments to [email protected]

Abstract Chinese diplomacy, aid, economic interactions and manifestations of soft power have increased the country’s influence in the South Pacific region. By some accounts, China’s influence is already approaching that of traditional stakeholders Australia and New Zealand. In Africa and other regions state-led and private activities in established powers’ perceived spheres of influence has caused concern and inspired particular narratives about China’s motivations. In this article we examine how media discourses in Australia and New Zealand have represented China’s role in the South Pacific. We find that China’s role has been constructed using multiple negative frames, which seek to establish China as unequivocally ‘different’. More than being unencumbered by the constraints of public opinion and a free press, China is portrayed as operating in a different moral universe, in which the cold hearted exploitation of vulnerable island nations (often in cahoots with venal island elites) is entirely normal. The article shows how such constructions reveal some of the complex issues involved in Australia and New Zealand’s relationships both with China and other South Pacific nations.

Keywords China; South Pacific; Media coverage; Australia; New Zealand; Popular geopolitics

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Introduction In recent years China’s involvement in the South Pacific has expanded substantially. Diplomacy, aid, economic interactions, and various manifestations of soft power, both stateled and private, are increasing. By some accounts, China’s influence in the region may soon approach that of traditional powers Australia and New Zealand [68]. Policy makers and scholars have responded to these developments by warning of China’s growing strategic leverage and debating the possibility of Chinese hegemony in the region [16, 69]. Although China’s initial post-opening and reform engagements in the region were stimulated by diplomatic competition with the Republic of China (ROC) [10, 71], improving cross-Strait relations and the intensification of investment and other connections with South Pacific nations after 2006, has refocused attention on China’s role and impact in the region. Much scholarly and popular analysis, and concerns over China’s increasing economic and political power, has been couched in neo-realist terms, conceiving conflict as the inevitable consequence of multiple concurrent great powers [44]. Although realist concerns may explain the negative orientations of much commentary on China’s increasing visibility in regions across the world, we must look further for an explanation of the nature of rhetorical claims. Why, for example, in the case of Sino-African relations, do discursive patterns employed by western media ‘systematically endorse images of African weakness, Western trusteeship and Chinese ruthlessness’ [42, p. 517]? Prior research suggests that the main determinant of western images of China is the west itself, with ideas and changes in the west being projected onto China. For instance, Mawdsley’s analysis of British media reactions to China in Africa identifies a simplistic binary between the ‘sometimes mistaken, but essentially well-intentioned west and the amoral, greedy and coldly indifferent Chinese battling over a corrupt and/or helpless Africa’ [42, p. 523]. In these media constructions, popular images of Africa highlight the exotic, 2

timeless, tribal, corrupt, helplessness, misery and violence. As Brautigam [13] points out, representations of China similarly draw on longstanding stereotypes and misunderstandings. Western representations of the west’s own role in Africa show the transition from mission civilisatrice, through colonial administration to partners in post-colonial development. However, the resilient notion of western trusteeship goes against the grain of long and ongoing exploitation, marginalization and insufficient redress of systemic inequalities and injustices in the West-Africa relationship [45]. The popular geopolitical discourse helps to establish and maintain ‘hegemonic regimes of representation’ [42, p. 510], while establishing ‘new international relations villains’ [17, p.154]. If popular geopolitics can help shape public opinion and thereby influence policymaking, this is unhelpful, since, as realists remind us, the established western powers and a resurgent China will inevitably meet and compete at more and more venues around the world. The goal of this article is to examine whether a similar pattern pertains to representations of China’s role in another part of the world, i.e. the South Pacific. Here, Australia and New Zealand constitute the established, advanced economy, liberal democracy, post-colonial powers. Just as European post-colonial powers conceive of parts of Africa, they have long regarded the South Pacific as ‘a special patch’ [71], overseeing security and development in Polynesia (New Zealand) and Melanesia (Australia) in an informal division of labour with the United States (Micronesia and the North Pacific). Similar to how Europe, in the mid-2000s, was shocked by China’s substantial new influence in Africa, because it had underestimated the implications of China’s economic expansion [24], so Australia and New Zealand were late to recognize the extent of China’s outreach to the island Pacific [11]. Reacting to these developments, how has China’s role in the South Pacific been framed and constructed in Australian and New Zealand newspapers? What does this reveal about the two countries’ attitudes towards China, the Pacific island nations and their own role in the Pacific? 3

Does a similar set of issues pertain to Australia and New Zealand in the Pacific as it does with European powers in Africa? To address these questions empirically, the article carefully analyses more than 300 newspaper articles from the last two decades.

China’s international outreach Increasingly close connections between China and South Pacific island nations are one part of the expansion of Chinese foreign relations witnessed across the globe during the last decade. As China’s economy has grown and the country has become a major world power, so it has increased its contacts with Africa, Latin America, South, Central and Southeast Asia and Europe. The equation for China is apparently straightforward. The threat of internal unrest or challenges to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) require a continuation of economic growth, which in turn requires additional natural resources, trade, markets and investment opportunities [57]. These needs underpin the ‘going out’ (zouchuqu) strategy encouraged by Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao. It would be naïve however, to believe that commercial interests are not also accompanied by the desire for increasing China’s political influence. Several long term strategic Chinese ambitions are directly or indirectly advanced by expanding foreign relations and influence. These notably include increasing South-South collaboration as a way of offsetting American hegemony, gaining influence in the United Nations and other global and regional institutions where small, developing nations have an equivalent vote, and in terms of containing and actively trying to reduce the number of states that recognize the ROC. These objectives are accompanied by China’s insistence on ‘noninterference’ in the internal affairs of other nations, ostensibly based on the respect for sovereignty that it demands from others. Consequently, China does not often use its economic or political leverage to improve human rights and does not tie its aid to good governance etc. Among other perceived behaviours, this leads to the impression of China as a 4

‘reluctant stakeholder, often content to continue taking a free ride on the provision of public goods by others’ [23]. However, as Friedman notes, ‘despite Beijing insisting that no strings are attached to Chinese money, actually those funds do come with political strings’ [24]. Countries accepting Chinese aid must declare and adhere to (China’s interpretation of) a ‘one China’ policy, which includes breaking relations with the ROC. Recipients of Chinese aid are expected to use their votes in the United Nations to protect China from embarrassing human rights and other issues, and to thwart Taiwan’s periodic mobilization of diplomatic allies to table motions on its behalf. Aid recipients are also expected to take the ‘correct’ stance on issues of core interest to China, such as Tibet and Xinjiang, and to reinforce this stance by their actions, such as refusing to meet the Dalai Lama or Rabiye Kadeer. China’s increasing economic and political influence has fed in to a discourse readily taken up by nations concerned for the implications of a ‘rising China,’ in terms of a China threat [14, 28, 52] a Chinese grand strategy [33] and potentially revisionist Chinese nationalism [27]. To date the area that has received the most attention is China’s role in Africa. Here analyses of Chinese actions have been motivated by the idea that China is an ideological competitor to the west [43]. Much popular discourse relies on ill-informed stereotypes [13], exaggerates the homogeneity of Chinese actors [6], and misrepresents China’s role in Africa [53]. A common, often explicitly normative, narrative casts China as an exploitative villain, with African elites as venal and/or incompetent co-conspirators, and African publics as powerless victims [42]. As Sautman and Yan observe, the idea of Chinese neo-colonialism in Africa is fostered by ‘portrayal[s] of China as a country that is uniquely supportive of illiberal regimes […and…] Chinese activities are harmful to the environment’ [53, p. 76]. Yet, as work on India’s role in Africa demonstrates, there is an unequal treatment of different countries. Mawdsley and McCann for instance, argue that ‘China has been lambasted over its engagement with a number of pariah or repressive states […] yet India has been engaged in 5

similar economic endeavours largely without parallel international or indeed significant domestic political fallout’ [43, p. 88]. For the African journalist cited by Sautman and Yan, western media and politicians’ framing of China’s search for African resources, something that western actors are also heavily engaged in, ‘smacks of racist double standards’ [53, p.81]. Despite western colonial powers’ less than distinguished record of concern for Africa, western media discourses emphasize African rulers as ‘authoritarian, inept, corrupt allies of China, attracted to it by mutual unconcern with western-urged good governance, transparency, human rights and environmental protection’ [54, p. 734]. The expansion of Chinese economic and political interests in Africa is framed in terms of ‘a monolithic Chinese dragon in an unvariegated African bush stripped of historical and political context’ [36, p. 45]; a representation that is exacerbated when governments view China as a strategic competitor in Africa [54].

China’s expanding activities in the South Pacific For many years, China’s relations with the south Pacific islands were shaped by the country’s diplomatic rivalry with the ROC. Although most Pacific island nations adhere to the PRC’s one China policy, one quarter of the small number of states that recognise the ROC are located in the South Pacific. In their competition for diplomatic recognition, the resulting ‘chequebook diplomacy’ pursued by China and Taiwan has been widely criticised [12]. The short-term economic benefits it brought to some South Pacific nations were generally outweighed by the negative long-term effects it had on corruption levels, social stability, and the development and consolidation of democracy in the region. However, when Ma Yingjeou was elected President of the ROC in 2008, he quickly enacted a series of rapprochement policies towards the PRC. This led to an improvement of cross-Strait relations and removed overt diplomatic competition in the region. As a result, the focus on chequebook diplomacy 6

as the predominant element of Chinese activities in the South Pacific has declined. On the other hand, the implications of increasing Chinese aid and trade in the region, as well as the perceived security challenges arising from them, have increased in salience. Concerted state-led Chinese activities in the South Pacific can be traced back to 1999. Levels of trade with the region saw a steady increase and aid programs in the form of large, Chinese-financed infrastructure projects became more common [56]. Diplomatic activities that were generally conducted at a low level have increased in profile, culminating in Premier Wen Jiabao’s attendance at the first Ministerial Conference of the China-Pacific Island Countries Economic Development and Cooperation Forum in Fiji in 2006. From the Chinese point of view, increasing investment and trade with other regions has been a response to the general challenges facing the country as a result of the rapid expansion of its economy and population. As China’s demand for natural resources and international markets continues to grow, both private and state-owned businesses have been encouraged to seek investment opportunities around the world, including in the South Pacific. Having to deal with a multitude of interrelated social and economic challenges, Chinese foreign policy has been framed within the concepts of the ‘harmonious world’ (hexie shijie) and ‘peaceful development’ (heping fazhan). These are seen as essential if the momentum of economic growth required to avoid the exacerbation of social problems is to be maintained in the long term [57]. However, when Premier Wen Jiabao pledged to increase Chinese investments in the region in 20061 it was met with suspicion by many western commentators. Similar to the concerns voiced by analysts with regard to China’s role in Africa, its influence in the South Pacific tends to be interpreted as a potential security threat to the west [20, 32; 70, p. 306]. Such projections even suggest that if China’s influence in the region 1

Available in English at http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2006-04/05/content_560573.htm Accessed March 10th 2012.

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continues to grow, ‘island states would owe their allegiances to a country outside of the US system of regional alliances’ [68, p. 29]. More nuanced assessments of Chinese activities in the South Pacific do not appear to support such conclusions either empirically or strategically. For instance, trade volume has increased since 2006 but continues to be at a relatively low level. Australian trade with the Pacific Islands in 2008 reached US$ 59.7 billion and that of New Zealand US$ 4.4 billion [70, p. 317]. In contrast, China’s trade volume with 14 Pacific Islands in 2009 accounted for less than US$ 2 billion. Moreover, it is clear that both Australia and New Zealand are more significant trading partners for China than the Pacific Islands. China’s Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with New Zealand and Australia’s reserves of natural resources make these countries substantially more important to China than the Pacific Islands ever could be in purely economic terms. Hanson’s summation is that ‘displacing Australia and New Zealand in the Pacific would come at huge cost to China and bring no tangible additional benefits’ [29, p.8]. Chinese aid to the South Pacific Islands similarly remains at much lower levels than that provided by either Australia or New Zealand [30].2 As our analysis of media coverage will show, Chinese aid has been criticised for providing the region with unsuitable trophy projects that benefit the Chinese economy more than the recipient states [24]. An especially contentious episode in Chinese activities in the South Pacific region was its aid to post-coup Fiji in 2006. Australia and New Zealand suspended all aid to Fiji following the military coup, while China increased its aid from less than US$ 1 million in 2005 to US$ 161 million in 2007 [70, p. 305]. It is not known if this was a calculated strategy or mutation of China’s ‘non-interference’ policy [31, 24], i.e. supporting nations that have been the victim of interference by western nations. This incident has contributed to concerns over China’s

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Note that identifying levels of ‘Chinese aid’ is often complicated by various definitions and calculations and the conflation of ‘foreign aid’ and ‘development assistance/cooperation’ [13].

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growing influence in the South Pacific, economic and political stability in the region, and Australia and New Zealand’s security interests [70]. As yet however, there is little concrete evidence that China has ‘gained influence by exploiting regional vulnerabilities or that it’s activities have encouraged corruption and instability in Oceania’ [67, p. 2].

Methods and data The major objective of this article is to critically evaluate how newspapers in Australia and New Zealand have represented China’s relations with the South Pacific Island states and how they reflect on their own role and the west’s role more broadly in this region. Our decision to focus on news media is due to the important role that media images play in representing China’s rise to western publics and policy communities. Our particular focus on newspapers is justified by the notion that ‘newspapers play a particular and very significant role in shaping the reading publics’ geopolitical imaginaries in both the domestic and international realm’ [42, p. 516]. To obtain materials for analysis, we used the Nexis (formerly LexisNexis) news database to search for Australian and New Zealand newspaper articles with 3 or more mentions of China and adjectival variations in the same paragraph as the phrases ‘Pacific island’ or ‘island nation’, between January 1st 1991 and December 31st 2010. We specified these search parameters in order to ensure that these articles were really ‘on topic’, addressing the China issue fully rather than merely mentioning it in passing. Filtering out newswire reports and pieces about other island nations (Sri Lanka, Singapore etc.) the search procedure resulted in 306 articles. This sample for analysis is shown in Table 1. More than half of the articles (170) were published since 2006. The whole of the 1990s produced a modest 53 articles, and consistent coverage did not reach a significant level until 2002. Both authors read the entire document set several times in order to identify patterns in issues, arguments, semantics and images. We read the articles in chronological order in order to 9

discern possible variations over time and read Australian and New Zealand press articles separately so that differences in the frames used to discuss Chinese involvement in the Pacific Islands could be distinguished.

[Table 1 about here]

The results of this analysis are presented in the following section, which constitutes the major focus of the article. However, before proceeding with the in-depth reading of the articles, we provide a supplementary quantitative summary of the entire document set. First, each article was coded according to judgments about the predominant tone with which it dealt with China’s activities in the South Pacific, i.e. whether the article was predominantly positive or predominantly negative. Chart 1, below, shows the net tone of coverage (i.e. the number of positive articles minus the number of negative articles) for New Zealand and Australian newspapers in each of the twenty years covered. The closer to the zero line, the more neutral the coverage, i.e. there are a similar number of positive and negative articles. Points above the zero line indicate a predominance of positive articles and the inverse below the line. There is variation in tone over time rather than a linear trend towards more negative coverage. There are broad similarities in tone between Australian and New Zealand coverage, with the exception of 2008, when the net tone diverged. Australian coverage tends to be more negative than in New Zealand, although on average there is a preponderance of negative articles in both countries.3

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One potential reason for the comparatively negative Australian coverage is the dominant ownership status of Rupert Murdoch’s News Limited.

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We next separated each article into eight broad issue areas (geopolitics, environment, sociocultural, law and order, migration, economy, diplomacy and aid). Chart 2 shows the focus of articles in each country aggregated across the whole document set. Comparing the proportion of total articles allows us to compare the salience of the eight issue areas despite a substantial discrepancy in the number of articles. There are clear consistencies in coverage across New Zealand and Australian newspapers, with around one third of articles focusing on diplomacy, and just over a quarter of articles focusing on geopolitical issues. 14% of the New Zealand and Australian articles in our sample focused on the economic implications of China’s involvement in the South Pacific, with a little over 10% of articles focusing on Chinese aid. The similarity in coverage is distinct, and with one or two exceptions, consistent over time. One clear exception is the divergence in coverage following the most recent coup in Fiji and China’s marked increase in aid thereafter, which received more substantial attention in Australia. Although the aid issue was roughly of equal salience in New Zealand and Australian newspapers over time, the tone of coverage on this (and other) issues diverged substantially. 11

The net tone of coverage of each of these issues is shown in Chart 3. The zero line indicates neutral coverage, positive numbers above zero indicate a predominance of positive articles and vice versa. There are strong differences in the tone of coverage depending on the issue being covered. The geopolitical aspects of China’s expanding role in the South Pacific receive strongly negative coverage, particularly in Australia. China’s diplomatic activities have also received negative coverage, although less so since Ma Yin-jeou called for a diplomatic truce (waijiao xiubing) and suspension of PRC-ROC competition for recognition. Coverage is not uniformly negative across all topics, with a plurality of positive articles on China’s economic and socio-cultural activities in the South Pacific.

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Representing China in the South Pacific Close and multiple readings of the full set of articles enabled us to establish a range of recurrent themes and frames in both countries’ newspaper coverage of China in the South Pacific. As we will discuss below, there are major differences in the way that China and Australia/New Zealand are represented, and in the treatment of Chinese and local Pacific populations. China is frequently represented as a giant and opportunistic predator which is aggressively scouring the island Pacific, using adjectives such as ‘ravenous’, ‘prowling’ and ‘exploitative’. At the same time, China is emotionally detached and disengaged from the region, acting in ways which are described as ‘indifferent’, ‘stealthy’ and ‘cunning’. There is increasing acceptance of and respect for the drive that the Chinese economy is bringing to the entire Asia-Pacific region, but it is often tempered by veiled references to questionable economic practices. Currency manipulation, violation of market rules, lack of quality assurance and inferior standards feature prominently. The social consequences of economic growth in China such as income inequalities, human rights issues, poor labour conditions, environmental degradation etc. are reported to be increasingly exported overseas. Against this 13

portrayal, the benign character of Australia, New Zealand and the west in general, stands in contradistinction. Here, the values of democracy, accountability, good governance and benign paternalism come to the fore, juxtaposed with China’s instrumental self-interest. Concerns about Chinese practices at home and abroad are not invalid, but in some commentaries it is clear that these concerns are exacerbated simply by the circumstance that China is different. The same commentaries tend to enumerate points of difference that portray China in negative terms, as it contravenes norms associated with human rights, democratic values and notions of fair play. Further differences, such as China’s atheist, communist and ultracompetitiveness, are shown to disrupt traditional Pacific island norms and traditions. ‘The Chinese’ are frequently treated as an homogenous bloc. Acknowledgement of the diversity of actors in the region, for instance differentiating between state or private actors, those pursuing legal or nefarious pursuits etc., is largely limited to unfavourable comparisons of multi-generation settlers (laoqiao) with new migrants (xinqiao). While the former are generally seen as being ‘alright’, one could get the impression that the latter group consists more of drug barons, snakeheads and prostitutes than it does legitimate entrepreneurs, students and tourists. Like the Chinese, island Pacific actors are also mostly undifferentiated. The small number of islanders that feature in the articles are predominantly elites, particularly opportunistic, or merely corrupt, politicians. Coverage of how China’s expanding role is effecting island populations is limited to human interest stories that are used to illustrate the negative consequences of illegal migration, poor working conditions, over-fishing and so on. This framing is largely consistent with prior research on China in Africa discussed above, and at the outset, it suggests that established powers react in similar ways to China’s expansion into their sphere of influence. One feature of this discourse is the notion that the activities of western governments and companies are constrained by ethical and moral norms that aren’t shared by their Chinese 14

counterparts. This gives rise, in our document set, to the image of what the Sydney Morning Herald described as a ‘totalitarian super-bogey’ [65] exploiting the political and economic weaknesses of island states without care or constraint. Freed from the ethical ties that bind Australia and New Zealand, China is described as ‘seizing chance in turmoil’ [66], ‘exploiting the situation’ [58], ‘buying influence and favours’ [62], and the like. In some cases there is an implied moral connection or natural affiliation between China and the corrupt and undemocratic island elites in a position to capitalize on China’s indiscriminate and self-serving interests. The ‘communist giant’s’ [59] lack of democratic credentials was heavily referenced in coverage of China’s ‘remarkable warmth towards the latest unelected Fijian government’ [64]. Typically, this was juxtaposed with Australia and New Zealand’s attempts to promote accountability, transparency and good governance through its conditional aid programmes [e.g. 9] Although many articles note positive effects arising from of China’s economic activities in the region, economic actors are often portrayed as uniquely calculated, opportunistic and uncaring. Few recent articles claim that economic cooperation is exclusively benefiting China, but many promote the stereotype that China dumps inferior products on the region while exploiting its natural resources [13]. Furthermore, Chinese economic actors, unlike their western counterparts, are censured for being motivated by greed. Many articles imply that Chinese investments do little for local economies, with the state actively encouraging companies to drive a hard bargain and Chinese contractors to employ cheap labour from China. Where island economies have benefited from employment opportunities, it is with the caveat that local workers are penalized by safety breaches and mistreatment by Chinese foremen. Such is China’s disregard for liberal economic norms and indifference to human and labour rights that it seeks, as asserted in one article, to ‘pay overtime with tinned fish rather than cash’[65]. The implied level of China’s self-interest and 15

self-absorption gives rise to descriptions of bathetic manifestations of disregard for local conditions. One such example is the toilet cubicles in the Justice Ministry building in Rarotonga, ‘designed for Chinese bodies, islanders don't fit’ [21]. Infrastructure projects are one of China’s preferred modes of aid because they are tangible and impressive, but they can also become symbolic of less noble achievements. Incommodious restrooms aside, the Pacific is reportedly littered with incongruous Chinese white elephants, the preferred conduit of aid-for-favours. The internal security situation of Pacific island nations is endangered by Chinese criminals. This may sound sensational in the absence of greater empirical evidence, but numerous articles describe, at length, the machinations of an ‘ethnic Chinese crime web’, ‘Chinese mafia’ and assorted organised crime syndicates and gangs [61]. Reports of murders, prostitution rackets, drug and human smuggling, illegal immigration, money laundering, passport fraud and other nefarious activities are plentiful. There is little differentiation of Chinese actors, nor any concrete numbers, in most reports. Instead, the Chinese in general are held responsible for rising levels of crime and ethnic tensions. Chinese individuals who are law-abiding, or themselves victims of crime syndicates, do not feature often. Numerous reports imply that the real burden of Chinese crime, drug trafficking, prostitution and illegal migration in the region will have to be shouldered by Australia and New Zealand. It is these two nations whose peacekeepers have to pick up the pieces following ethnic riots, in which ethnically Chinese are usually the victim. And it is Australian and New Zealand whose coastguard and border controls face the expensive battle against the flow of narcotics, laundered money, forged documents, counterfeit goods and illegal immigrants [61]. In other words, because China is not a regular stakeholder that plays by the rules, the Chinese authorities do not take responsibility for the degenerate activities of some of its citizens. By contrast, responsible and dependable, Australia and New Zealand are left to clean up messes 16

created by ‘the Chinese’ in the South Pacific [65]. Others express the reasonable position that ‘if China is serious about promoting a harmonious world and being a responsible international actor, it cannot rely on everyone else to do all the heavy lifting’ [3]. According to many commentaries it is inconceivable that China will become a responsible actor in the region, that its otherness is insurmountable: ‘They have different norms. They do not value human life. They are so different from us on so many different levels’ [21]. That such an actor could enter Australia and New Zealand’s sphere is seen to highlight these countries’ failure to act and influence the region decisively. International interest in the Pacific Islands receded with the Cold War, turning the region into a ‘staging post for aggressive larger nations’ [63]. Furthermore, this reticence continues, so that ‘the most worrying development is that for every back-step we take, China strides forward’ [4]. At the heart of many articles there is a sense of regret and loss. Although the islands’ colonial past is infrequently mentioned, many images are unabashedly exotic, such as intrigues going down in ‘the darkly lit kava bars of Vanuatu’s capital, Port Vila’ [58]. There is a sense that ‘the Pacific has always been our backyard and a friendly place that we’ve used for restful holidays to get away from it all’ [15]. Due to short sightedness and indecision, this comfortable regional dynamic has become threatened by China, whose ‘insidiousness and corruption of the very political ethos we hold dear and which we helped cultivate in our region seems to threaten attachment to democratic principles and the respect for human rights that underpins them’ [65]. Bluntly, one commentator stated that ‘I don’t think we want to have a country [China] with that sort of society having a big influence in our part of the world’ [21]. Although several articles reference the care and affection with which islands have been treated by Australia and New Zealand, the often one-dimensional portrayal of islanders suggests that regret over the loss of privilege is as least as strong as concern for the islands 17

themselves. The island actors mentioned in the newspapers are invariably elites, frequently depicted as villains or fools, sometimes concurrently, and lacking in morals and political credibility. Some stories centre on ‘rampant corruption’ [59], others liberally invoke ‘totalitarian rulers’ [65] and ‘dodgy’ and ‘insignificant pariah regimes’ [1, 3] of the South Pacific. Island elites and Chinese officials flashing their ‘fat chequebooks’ [62], lavishing local dignitaries with ‘over-the-top hospitality’ [2] and ‘no-strings’ aid [7], are apparently a match made in heaven. The islands’ leaders readily embrace this ‘risky game’ [46] and are pandering to Beijing like ‘loyal subjects’ [2]. In contrast to China’s ‘pecuniary inducements’ [48] to ‘crooked leaders’ [8], Australia and New Zealand do not tolerate corruption or undemocratic behaviour. Instead, they continue to demand good governance in return for aid. Island leaders might not always appreciate this ‘tough-love approach’, but they have to ‘consider growing up’ rather than responding with ‘tantrums’ and general ‘childishness’ [25]. The established powers maintain their principled support for the islands despite being keenly aware that China is ‘always ready to prey on’ any fallings out [47]. But, since it is impossible to compete financially with the Chinese superpower it is necessary to fall back ‘on demonstrable goodwill, contact and genuine assistance […] Australia does care for its neighbours’ [15]. It is does not escape commentators that in a zero sum game with the ruthless Chinese, sentiment is not the weapon of choice. Facing up to the feeling of impotence, one commentator sought solace in anachronistic banalities: ‘Folk who are increasingly concerned at China’s economic and migratory imperialism know that there is a fundamental truth in Kipling’s immortal words: East is East and West is West, and never the twain shall meet’ [49]. Conclusion In many areas of the world China’s increasing economic power is being translated into political influence. Through this process the comfortable status of established powers is being 18

challenged. One of the most salient examples is China’s expanding role in Africa, which has given rise to negative and often misleading representations in western accounts. Constructions of China’s role in Africa reveal much about the attitudes of post-colonial European powers, towards China, Africa and their own role. Our analysis of the framing of China’s expanding role in the South Pacific in Australian and New Zealand newspapers is similarly revealing. China’s role has been constructed using multiple frames, which establish China as unequivocally different. In some cases, China and the homogenized Chinese people are represented as operating in an alien moral universe. Unbound by the same ethical constraints as liberal democratic nations, China is seen as the cause of numerous ills affecting the island Pacific and unlikely to contribute to their solution. This criticism may be justified in many cases, but the portrayal of some failings attributed to ‘the Chinese’ as uniquely invidious is, at best, naïve. China’s expanding role raises complex issues for the Pacific islands and heavily invested stakeholders like Australia and New Zealand, whose concerns are understandable. In the absence of carefully thought out and sensitively executed programmes, China’s economic and political influence has the potential to upset fragile political, economic, social and environmental equilibria in the South Pacific. The PRC’s track record across the globe does not inspire much confidence on this, but we argue that the inevitable increase in contact between China and established stakeholders around the world requires a more differentiated response than currently prevails.

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