New Report Details Ways to Counter Anti-China Scapegoating in US

Warning that "anti-China populism is providing cover for anti-democratic forces in the United States," a report published Friday outlines how campaigners can counter xenophobic scapegoating with messaging that centers legitimate voter grievances and emphasizes cooperation over confrontation.

"Ahead of the midterms, candidates who want to win should quit China-bashing, and instead talk about the root causes of these issues."

"Narratives that portray China as an exaggerated threat to the welfare and the way of life of people in the U.S. and use China as a scapegoat for social and economic problems in the U.S. are particularly alarming," the Justice Is Global report--entitled How to Counter the Politics of Scapegoating--states.

To prepare the report, 21 canvassers for Justice Is Global contacted more than 3,000 Wisconsin voters via phone banks, focusing on economic issues affecting Americans. Justice Is Global claims its canvassers, who engaged in over 600 conversations with voters, moved about half of them towards being in favor of international cooperation with China.

The canvassers "gained clear understandings of why countering China-bashing and scapegoating narratives is important":

These anti-China nationalist narratives feed an array of interconnected problems. Within the U.S., anti-China narratives are associated with a sharp rise in anti-Asian racism and the growing power of authoritarian nationalism that threatens the future of U.S. democracy. They also exacerbate U.S.-China tensions which undermine the international cooperation that is urgently needed to address climate change and other shared global challenges, and encourage militarism in the U.S., China, and many countries that are caught in between the two great powers.

"We can heal geopolitical tensions at the grassroots in a way that builds international cooperation," Justice is Global national organizer Sandy Shan said in a statement. "While it's easy for people ripped off by bad worker policies at home to map their economic anxieties onto those they deem foreign, racist scapegoating will only divide us further."

"Ahead of the midterms, candidates who want to win should quit China-bashing," she added, "and instead talk about the root causes of these issues."

The report recommends that political campaigners affirm voters' grievances and empathize with their plight when they blame China for "stealing" American jobs, while asking them if they really think they'd be better off if ties with the world's second-largest economy were severed.

The authors also encourage voters to "imagine alternative solutions and a brighter future" and to stress the imperative of cooperation over reactionary policies of confrontation.

Prayuj, one of the Justice Is Global canvassers, said in the report that "what I heard on the phone convinced me that people with wildly diverse political views generally want the same things: affordable groceries, good jobs, and a peaceful world free from the threat of nuclear war."

"People do understand that we can best meet those needs by playing a constructive, rather than destructive, role in international relations," he added. "These conversations have been an important reminder that our foreign policy can be rooted in the needs of all our citizens if we're brave enough to imagine a world of greater cooperation."