Does Beijing’s new US envoy signal an end to ‘wolf warrior’ diplomacy era?

History of tension Chinese authorities refused in September to renew the press credentials for at least five reporters for US news organisations based in China. Journalists from the Wall Street Journal, CNN, Bloomberg and Getty Images who had attempted to renew their press cards were told they could not because of US measures against Chinese journalists in the US, according to statements and people familiar with the matter. The Foreign Correspondents’ Club of China said the move put the journalists at “constant threat of expulsion”.

China’s appointment of a new ambassador to the US has shone a light on the ongoing debate among analysts about how Beijing communicates with its biggest competitor, the future of its “wolf warrior” diplomacy and how Xi Jinping’s call to “tell a good China story” may work in practice.

Qin Gang, who is one of Xi Jinping’s most trusted senior diplomats, struck a conciliatory tone on arrival in Washington DC last week, saying he would “endeavour to bring [bilateral] relations back on track”.

The debate over the “wolf warrior” style – under which he said, as the Chinese ambassador to Sweden on Swedish public radio in 2019, “we treat our friends with fine wine, but for our enemies we have shotguns” – comes amid a burst of positive publicity that delighted Beijing’s officials: the foreign coverage of the herd of 15 wandering Asian elephants in southern China.

The odyssey of the travelling elephants came as western media were questioning the effectiveness of Beijing’s strident “wolf warrior” diplomacy. Foreign journalists have complained about the intensifying government pressure over their work in China. In the past 18 months at least a dozen US journalists have been expelled in a tit-for-tat with Washington . Last month, as severe flooding hit the central province of Henan, correspondents from international outlets – including the BBC, Los Angeles Times, Deutsche Welle, Al Jazeera, CNN, Agence France-Presse and Associated Press – reported harassment.

Mixed messages have been sent from Beijing on how it should present itself abroad. In seeming contradiction to his diplomats’ approach, Xi told officials in June that it was important to present a “credible, lovable and respectable” China. In other words, soft power was needed.

“There is a very real feeling [in Beijing] that China doesn’t get the respect that its leaders think they deserve for the Chinese rejuvenation story. There is a desire to stop others dominating the discussion of China,” said Shaun Breslin, a China expert at the University of Warwick.

In the weeks since Xi’s comments, officials have begun a nationwide call for ideas on how to tell a good story about China. Critics, however, say without changing some of Beijing’s controversial policies, these efforts are only superficial.

In a recent thinktank seminar in Beijing, Chinese experts articulated their concerns over what they describe as Beijing “mirroring internal propaganda in external propaganda”. Chu Yin of the University of International Relations in Beijing said the “impetuousness” of the internet era could often make attempts to promote a positive image of China backfire.

Breslin is wary. “It’s really hard to get people to focus on what you want them to focus on. Issues like Xinjiang and Hong Kong create an overarching background that frames the way that people look at China. And we haven’t heard the end of the pandemic in China yet, either,” he said. “What you do can be much more important than what you say.”