Rethinking China’s global ‘propaganda’ blitz

China’s global communication activities are mainly perceived as sinister propaganda to mislead international audiences, and related discussions exemplify Western unease about China’s global communication efforts. While not trivializing these efforts, this article objects to some of the assessments and argues in favour of a critical but open-minded engagement with China’s global communication activities. Such an approach should pay attention to potential audiences and should closely scrutinize the real-life circumstances of China’s communicative practices and put them into perspective for its audiences. The article highlights these aspects by analysing the screening of a video in New York City’s Times Square in Summer 2016 and one version of the China Daily supplement, China Watch.