Documenting China’s Borderlands – Episode 10: The Gravity of the Center - China’s Civilizational Aspirations in the Borderlands

From the National Bureau of Asian Research, an Asia Insight miniseries exploring the geostrategic significance of China’s borderlands, led by Nadège Rolland, Distinguished Fellow for China Studies at NBR.

Episode Ten: The Gravity of the Center - China’s Civilizational Aspirations in the Borderlands

This final episode explores ways China uses cultural endeavors to pull its Borderlands neighbors into its orbit. Positioning China’s civilization as the core of the historical Silk Roads, promoting state-backed Nanhai Buddhism, or owning entire collections of historical records, require massive financial and human resources. These examples illustrate the crucial importance for Beijing of what otherwise appears as an amorphous, intangible domain. To what end?

With Ondřej Klimeš (Czech Academy of Sciences), Amish Raj Mulmi (independent editor and writer), Ryoko Nakano (Kanazawa University), and Dylan Plung (University of Washington).

Materials cited or referenced in the recording

• Alison Kaufman, “China’s Discourse of ‘Civilization’: Visions of Past, Present, and Future,” Open Forum, February 19, 2018, https://theasanforum.org/chinas-discourse-of-civilization-visions-of-past-present-and-future/.
• Edward Lemon and Bradley Jardine, “Digging up the Past to Justify the Present: China’s Archeological Diplomacy in Central Asia,” Borderlands, March 18, 2026, https://strategicspace.nbr.org/digging-up-the-past-to-justify-the-present-chinas-archaeological-diplomacy-in-central-asia/.
• Amish Raj Mulmi, All Roads Lead North: China, Nepal and the Contest for the Himalayas (London: Hurst, 2021).

Glossary of Chinese terms used in the recording

• Wenming 文明civilization, civility
• Tifa 提法coded political formulations that signal ideological guidelines
• Neiwai tongchou 内外统筹internal-external coordination

Additional Recommended Readings

• Ondřej Klimeš, “China’s Cultural Soft Power: The Central Concept in the Early Xi Jinping Years (2012-2017), Acta Universitatis Carolinae Philologica 4, 2017.
• Miguel Martin, “Global Religion and the United Front: The Case of Mongolia,” Jamestown China Brief 18(12), July 10, 2018, https://jamestown.org/global-religion-and-the-united-front-the-case-of-mongolia/.
• Ryoko Nakano, “A Geocultural Power Competition in UNESCO’s Silk Road Project: China’s Initiatives and the Responses from Japan and South Korea,” Journal of Current Chinese Affairs 52(2), August 2023.
• Dylan J. Plung, “Japan’s WWII Anniversary Strategy and China’s Memory Politics,” The Diplomat, June 28, 2025.