Construction Of National Soft Power

British historian, Arnold Tombee has predicted that the 21th Century will be the Century of Chinese in the year of 1975. It is clear that his prediction has actualized accurately according to the quick development of China in the past 30 years. Nevertheless, it does not mean that there will be no obstacle in the way of China's further development. First, China is facing the pressure of industrial transformation from the concurrent manufacture-centered development model to a better one. Second, China's quick rising makes the West worry that their advantages shall be overtaken and thus incapable to lead the world. Third, China's quick economic development has led to its Westernization, which brings negative (about the) impact to its traditional culture. Forth, China has to reiterate its principle of "Rising in Peace" and "Development with Harmony" to the international society in order to avoid any possible conflict (because of misunderstanding).China's future development greatly relies on its national proposal and national image. National proposal is the root of national development and the guide of national resources. National image is the picture that a nation wishes to display to the international society and also the basis for international society to interpret and interact with the nation. National proposal is superior to national image and enjoys the power to direct national development. However, motivation and actualization of both national proposal and national image rely on the capacity of national strength.National strength is the solid foundation of national development; it is an abstract concept and a combination of all visible and invisible elements that one can think of about a nation. Apart from the complexity of elements, resources allocation and the use of national strength need to pay close attention as well. In general, the more national strength being used reasonably and accurately, the more its power enhances, and thus being able to bring good reputation and achievements to the nation at the same time. Otherwise, the nation may win the battle but lose the war or, in some cases, lose both. Therefore, the use of strength should be pondered in strategic way.Strategy is science, mindset, art and philosophy; it requests the leader to create maximum reward (achievements) by using minimum resources in the shortest time feasible. Strategy originates from military terminology, means to defeat the other by allocating minimum resources. Along with the change of politic proposal and the diversification of national development, the meaning and application of strategy has been expended to other spheres. But the basic idea is still to reach certain achievements by using forces. To better manage the use of forces, strategy has to be planned under the instruction of national proposal, thus avoid the conflict and the offset to each other. Force is the basis for strategic planning, so understanding the nature of forces is the primary task of strategic planning. Traditionally, forces were further divided into political, economic, military, diplomatic, scientific, and technological forces and the use of forces was evolved from the angle of "competition" and therefore, victory of one side is often built on the failure (loss) of the other. This "zero sum" concept is exactly the cause to rise disputes to the international community, as well as the reason that no nation can maintain (last) its prosperity for good in human history.At the time, when most attention was placed on the competition in economic, military and diplomatic spheres, Joseph Nye, a professor at Harvard University, proposed the concept of "soft power", he divided national forces into two aspects, "hard power" and "soft power". In short, hard "power" is the force that can conquest other nations; it is the force to "intimidate" and "conquest"; "soft power" on the other hand, is the force that can "persuade" and "assimilate", it is the force to "convince" and to "align". Apparently, Joseph Nye has provided a brand new concept to explore the meaning and use of national forces.Soft power is based on the forces to persuade and to assimilate, which heavily depends on frequent and effective communication activities. However, in the past, most attention was placed on the side of hard power, communications, at most, was set as a tool to motivate predefined tasks and mostly the attention was only on the use of mass media. At the time the (importance of) soft power becomes increasingly important, and communication becomes more diversified and complex, exploring the issue of national soft power from different aspects of communication has made this study topic profound.The significance of communications for national soft power build up is not only to deliver information and, most importantly is to trigger interaction, exchange opinions with other countries, and build friendship and support to one another, under the recognized status between countries. Therefore, construction of national soft power should consider two aspects: "national proposal and communication purpose " and " national image build-up". In terms of image build up, apart from mass communication, we should also take consideration of national behavior, such as, national leaders, social elites, public figures, the quality and performance of citizens etc., tourism industry, meeting, exhibition industry, culture and creative industry should also be included, in order to gain a broader view for strategic thinking.