The “Silk Road”, was originally a German word coined by von Richtofen -- “Seidenstraße” -- when it became familiar to the European public in the late 19th century. Despite its long history in Chinese storytelling that can be traced back to the Han Dynasty (206BC-AD220), or its Italian version about the glory of Marco Polo’s voyage in the Yuan Dynasty (1271-1368), most Europeans have associated with this romantically imagined “Silk Road” for no more than 150 years. And it was not always connected to China as being at the other end of the route; it included countries from Central Asia and the former Soviet republics as well.

This probably explains why before President Xi Jinping mooted the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st-Century Maritime Silk Road in 2013, there was already discussion of a “New Silk Road” in the European media sphere, where a Turkic-American alliance was placed as the center for energy, trade and development stretching from Turkey, across the Caspian Sea to Central Asia.

Probably also due to this mixed signals of a “Silk Road” with different promoters, the Chinese announcement of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) did not attract much European attention for almost three years till the first Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation held in Beijing in May 2017.

If we compare coverage of the BRI in Europe from the Factiva database, the number of news stories during the BRFIC Forum month (May 2017) were almost equal to the coverage in 2015 and 2016. Ever since then, “New Silk Road”, “One Belt One Road” and “Belt & Road Initiative” slowly became keywords linked to China’s globalization strategy in the European media narrative, offering discussions not only within the European domain, but also about China’s relationship with the United States, Russia, China’s moves and goals in Africa, as well as China’s public diplomacy in Southeast Asia and Eurasia.

Let us focus on the mainstream Western European media, where English-language news still leads (Financial Times in particular), followed by German, Spanish, Italian and French speaking news. A clear orientation about the BRI is subjected to an “infrastructure” and “bank & credits” outlook. China’s speed of building its high-speed railway network and its pragmatic approach in completing projects proved to the Europeans another economic model with “lower expense” and “higher efficiency”. Beijing’s new geo-economic map, which targets in generating in-land connectivity and economic growth for developing countries, is appreciated.

However, skepticism about “inclusiveness” of these projects as well as “sustainability” for both construction continuity and impact on the environment is also expressed at the same time. News stories about “banks & credits” among mainstream Western European media are even more cautious. Ever since the eurozone crisis in 2009, loans from Beijing are quite sensitive topics overall, despite Eastern European countries being attracted to direct Chinese investment through “16+1” framework and the BRI.

Maybe so much light was shed on “infrastructure” and “money” when it comes to the BRI as part of China’s development initiative that the romantic imagery of the ancient Silk Road which carried also led to splendid culture exchanges between old civilizations during the past centuries is fading away.

One might build roads to connect land, but the roads to connect with the hearts and minds are indeed more essential. The Marshall Plan at the end of World War II and Joseph Nye’s soft power theory since the end of Cold War helped the US become attractive to Europe, both economically and culturally, for almost seven decades.

However, this attraction began to fade after the 2008 financial crisis, and especially after the rise of protectionism, populism and anti-globalization in last few years. Europe is now at a crossroads of balancing its relations with an anti-globalization US and pro-globalization China while facing internal challenges regarding potential EU disintegration following Brexit. Slow in formulating a unified EU policy toward the BRI, a new “EU-Asia Connectivity Strategy” was signed-off last year by the EU as a rival to the Chinese initiative for engagement with Asia under “European standards”. This may not suggest an end to European countries to join the BRI and seek further cooperation, but it at least gives a sign that the EU sees the importance of Asia, but is not ready yet for China to take the lead.

What Europeans struggle the most is that they know the US but they do not understand China. And West-East differences in culture and civilization, which are “less mutable and less easily compromised and resolved than political and economic ones”, as Huntington said, did not pave the way for a better understanding of what merits the different “other” could bring to the European continent.

It has to be then the duty of European and Chinese media to fill in this information gap. For the European media, on the one hand, a wider news angle and a less judgmental conclusion should be encouraged when look at BRI. Old frames and stereotypes connect to the Marshall Plan from the European experience were set automatically in understanding BRI. Therefore, the fear of a separated Western-to-Eastern Europe divided by the “dollar credits” fuels the tension of another separation-to-come by the “yuan credits” inside the EU.

The continuous fight against the “other” is another reason adding difficulties to the acceptance of an almost-totally-different China -- language, culture, history, religion, political system, economic development model, strategic planning and worldview. The less common ground can be found by European observers, the more suspicious discussion is heated.

The mainstream European media should at least try more to sketch a bigger picture of China instead of focusing only on the practical projects or money issue related to BRI. And then, if possible, more humble efforts should be made to go beyond such framed boundaries, and really see the world from the Chinese perspective, where, no “others” actually exist while “all is under the heaven”. Thus, a balanced understanding of BRI might find a real starting point.

On the other hand, the Chinese media should instead go more specific, offering clear argumentation and reasoning about China’s plan and motivations (economically and culturally), with detailed explanations about specific projects and steps for implementation, and most importantly, with open attitude of sharing not only the success, but also failures and weak points of moving on such a massive initiative with vastly different partners.

“Actions speak louder than words” may not work with European stakeholders as they have a long tradition of practicing rhetoric for political agenda. Present more Chinese insights, offer different channels and diverse voices, and leave space for discussion are lessons Chinese news providers still need to learn and practice in providing information to the European public about the BRI.

Zhang Zhan is a research fellow and project manager at China Media Observatory, Institute of Media and Journalism, Università della Svizzera Italiana, Switzerland.

The author contributed this article to China Watch exclusively. The views expressed do not necessarily reflect those of China Watch.

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