China under Xi Jinping has noticeably accelerated its efforts to increase its Huayu quan or discourse power, as he demands that China’s story be ‘told well’ and to ‘grasp the right to speak’. In what Beijing sees as an increasingly hostile international discursive environment, how and in what ways is China attempting to develop its discourse power? How is discourse power wielded and by whom?
In this presentation, Assistant Professor Dylan Loh draws on practice theory and examines the case of vaccine diplomacy and conceptualizes discourse power as the public and private capacities to authoritatively articulate policy positions across various international issues. Relatedly, through his case study, he identifies increased visibilities (diplomatic presence) and capabilities (diplomatic resources) as key manifestations of China’s discursive power, thus underlining the central role of diplomacy and diplomats in PRC’s discourse enterprise. In that way, this study adds to debates on China’s emergence and its effects by explicitly theorizing and pointing to the significance of discursive power.