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Evolving Chinese Nationalism: Using the 2015 Military Parade as a Case

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Abstract

Nationalist discourse has long been an important apparatus in modern politics. This paper showed a sharp, yet subtle departure of the Chinese government in its current manipulation of nationalism. Instead of the hardcore revolutionary rhetoric, the new phase of nationalist discourse incorporated many elements of Confucianism to better consolidate the communist regime. Using the 2015 military parade as an example, this paper analyzed how the Chinese central government evoked sentiments and consciousness of nationalism by utilizing and interweaving Confucianism elements of family value, benevolent (Ren), propriety (Li), equilibrium, and harmony into the party-state’s official nationalist discourse. Significance of such organized endeavors in political discourse is discussed.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Communication and Information Sciences, University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, AL, 35487, USA

    Yiben Liu

  2. School of Journalism, University of Missouri, Columbia, MO, 65211, USA

    Shuhua Zhou

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  1. Yiben Liu
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Correspondence to Yiben Liu.

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Liu, Y., Zhou, S. Evolving Chinese Nationalism: Using the 2015 Military Parade as a Case. East Asia 36, 255–270 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12140-019-09314-w

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