Russia and China Are Losing the Global Battle for Public Opinion

Russia and China Are Losing the Global Battle for Public Opinion
Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin attend a welcome ceremony before their talks at the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia, April 21, 2023 (Sputnik photo by Alexey Maishev via AP).

The final communique of last weekend’s G-7 summit in Japan left no doubt that the West views Russia as not only a malign global player but an enemy, and considers China to be not just a competitor but a rival and potentially a threat. That is the position among the governments and leaders of the world’s richest democracies. But what about the world’s population at large?

For years, China and, to a lesser extent, Russia have been courting global opinion. Lambasting U.S. dominance, they have called for a multipolar world and worked to make one a reality. And they have decried liberal democracy as a whole and U.S. democracy in particular.

How effective has the global public relations push by the world’s two leading autocracies proved until now?

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