China-Backed Confucius Institute Rebrands to Avoid Scrutiny: CCP propaganda programs change name but not the content of their influence operations

The China-backed Confucius Institute is rebranding to avoid public scrutiny into its work disseminating propaganda to thousands of American students.

United States government oversight and faculty pushback have curtailed the influence of the Confucius Institute, which has dwindled from 103 college branches in 2017 to just 51 today. But the propaganda program is not going away without a fight. Experts say that after host institutions shutter Confucius Institutes, some of the programs continue to operate by adopting new names.

The rebranding has allowed the Beijing-backed influence program to continue to shape the education of students from kindergartners to college students. According to a new report by the American Security Institute, more than 100 "Confucius classrooms" that cater to the K-12 system are now rebranded as the Asia Society Chinese Language Partner Network.

"Confucius Institutes are trying to repackage themselves—same old wine, brand new bottle," Will Coggin, managing director of the American Security Institute, told the Washington Free Beacon.

The persistence of the Confucius Institute in the U.S. education system speaks to how difficult it is to convince American schools to sever ties with Chinese entities. Hanban, the Chinese Ministry of Education-backed group that runs the Confucius Institute, has spent more than $100 million to support the institutes in U.S. universities. Many universities fear that ending ties with the Confucius Institute will cause funding shortfalls and program cuts.

But U.S. officials say the Chinese money is not worth the strings attached to it. A bipartisan Senate report found that the Confucius Institute curtails academic freedom because the Chinese government controls "nearly every aspect" of the program in the United States. The report said Beijing requires instructors to follow Chinese laws and bars them from discussing topics deemed sensitive by the Chinese Communist Party, such as the Tibet issue.

The CIs are a complex story. Having done a good amount of scholarly (published) research on this, I found no evidence of any CI engaging in indoctrination. They exist to encourage students in America and elsewhere to study Mandarin and learn more about Chinese history and culture.

CIs filled a vacuum in our education system. Since JFK nearly every US president stressed the importance of Mandarin as a critical language for American students to learn. The effort to do so picked up steam in the early to mid 2000s, but was then set back for two key reasons. First, as the deep state right began to fear increased “people to people” US-China relations. And second, as forces on the academic left discerned that CIs would not provide them with grant money. It’s no surprise that America’s most left leaning institutions were among the first to sever their CI associations.

Regardless of US-China political relations and regardless of Chinese internal policies (often misrepresented by western media), I believe the CIs - once revered in the US - have been the target of smokey fake news.

I remain a strong Trump supporter and the Chinese government (as all governments) deserve legitimate criticism. But in truth, the attacks against the CIs are mostly propaganda.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.