China  Dream  Propaganda  Art:  Creating  the  Cult  of  Xi  JinpingBrian  Hart

Wake  Forest  UniversityAbstract

Since the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has used publicly displayed propaganda art as a means of maintainingpower. During the early years of the PRC, propaganda posters played a large role in establishing a cult of personality around Mao Zedong. In addition to posters similar tothose of earlier periods, today’s propaganda art competes in a media-­saturated world by using new mediums such as television, newspapers, and the Internet. Today’spropaganda art exists almost exclusively as part of President Xi Jinping’s “China Dream” (中国梦) campaign. The China Dream, which Xi coined in 2013, is a nebulousconcept that shares many of the materialistic components of the “American Dream,” but more importantly emphasizes the return of China as a nation with wealth and power(富强). China Dream art deviates significantly from Maoist Era posters by heavily incorporating ancient Confucian concepts and images. The art focuses not on communistvalues, but on moralistic ones drawn from the teachings of Confucius. I argue that China Dream art is being used not only to create a new source of legitimacy for theCommunist Party, but also to establish a cult of personality around President Xi Jinping.

Methods

Select  cities

• Need  variation  in  population  sizes• Historical  and  cultural  variation• Qufu  provided  a  uniquely  small  and  rural  city  with  a  unique  cultural  and  historical  significance  as  the  hometown  of  Confucius

Select  locations  within  cities

• Universities,  tourist  attractions,  residential  areas,  and  public  transportation

•Modes  of  transportation:  on  trains,  subways,  and  taxis

Select  mediums

• Posters  and  billboards• Newspapers  and  magazines• TV  and  online  commercials

Results

• Considerable presence  of  posters  and  billboards  on  streets,  but  not  in  subway  stations

• Greatest  number of  newspaper  advertisementsShenzhen

• Some  posters  found,  but  generally  clustered in  peripheral  areas,  not  in  central  business  and  tourist  district

• Some  presence  of  very  large  posters  in  subway stationsShanghai

• Large  presence  of  posters,  particularly  in  subway  stations  and around  Nanjing  University

• No presence  in  newspapersNanjing

•By far  the  greatest  presence  of  posters  and  billboards  on  streets,  but  not  in  subway  stations•Limited  presence  in  newspapers

Beijing

• Very little  presence  of  posters,  except  for  a  few  large  posters  near  the  train  station

• China  Dream  commercials  on  TV  screens  at  tourist  sitesQufu

“Filial  piety,  the  blood  of  Chinese  people”  Located  in  Shanghai  

乐善好施 :  “Be  given  to  doing  charitable  work”Located  in  a  Nanjing  Metro  Station

Funded  by  a  Richter  FellowshipSupported  by  Professor  Qiong Zhang  of  the  

History  Department    

Conclusions• Several factors  determine  the  prevalence  and  expression  of  the  propaganda  art:• A  city’s  population  size• A  city’s  distinctive  economic  and  political  characteristics

• There  are  striking  similarities  between  some  China  Dream  posters  and  the  posters  of  the  Mao  era.

• The  propaganda  art  has  expanded  outside  of  traditional  mediums  by  infiltrating  the  internet,  music,  and  television

• The  CCP  has  turned  to  Confucian  concepts  and  imagery  as  a  means  of  creating  a  new  source  of  legitimacy

• Key  claims  about  the  effects  of  the  propaganda  art:• Because  Xi  Jinping popularized  the  concept  of  the  China  Dream  and  made  it  the  central  focus  of  the  CCP’s  propaganda  campaign,  the  concept  itself  has  become  culturally  associated  with  and  fixated  on  Xi  Jinping himself.

• This  association  of  the  China  Dream  with  Xi  Jinping has  created  a  cult  of  of  personality  around  him  that  is  similar  to  that  of  Mao.  This  has  made  him  into  an  extremely  powerful  and  idealized  figure,