People-to-people Diplomacy towards South Asia: Status-quo,Problems and Countermeasures

Certain effects have been achieved in the China-South Asia people-to-people diplomacy,demonstrated by increasingly active events,better environment for development,a big leap in economic and trade cooperation,further openingup of the people-to-people and cultural exchanges and growing importance of the academic and think-tank dialogues.Still,inadequacies of people-to-people diplomacy towards South Asia remain,manifested by unbalanced exchange pattern and rather weak social influence awaits further enhancement.In order to make up the inadequacies,the authors contend that the following measures need to be adopted:1)to fully play the government’s role and break the existing bottleneck in people-to-people diplomacy;2)to list media exchange and study-abroad program as key areas of the agenda;3)to give a trial of conducting people-to-people diplomacy in cases of Bhutan and Maldives,exploring comparative advantages to official diplomacy.These proposals may vary,however,the aim to expand the optimal reach of China-South Asia people-to-people diplomacy with creative forms,leaves unchanged.In China’s overall diplomatic agenda,South Asia owns quadri-categories,which are major powers,neighboring and developing countries and multilateral regions.Undoubtedly,South Asia is entitled to status and importance because of these characteristics,covering 8 sovereignty countries of great differences,namely India,Pakistan,Nepal and Maldives etc.Throughout history,China and South Asia have witnessed long-standing cultural exchanges,gradual deepening of economic and social contacts,closer intimacy among peoples’interactions and prosperous development of public diplomacy.Despite of all these,problems remain unsolved that need further consideration and solution in response.