麻豆淫院

Anthony Albanese's to showed the enduring power of China's .

China has been , sometimes for , since the 1940s. The term "panda diplomacy" became widespread when China gifted two pandas to the United States on .

In a published in The Pacific Review, we explain the importance of panda diplomacy for the Chinese state. This importance persists during times of high political tension between China and other countries that host pandas, such as the United States. And it persists despite about it .

No other animal can match the giant panda's combination of and . The global popularity of pandas is a rare source of for China, inspiring and .

But the flipside of cuteness is vulnerability. Pandas are seen as "national treasures" in China, and nationalist are about the practice of entrusting them to foreign powers. This is where Chinese popular nationalism has been at odds with the official nationalism of Chinese foreign policy.

In our article, we explore these issues by looking at the Chinese government's response to the death of a panda in an American zoo. And we examine how the panda came to be such an emotionally charged and politically powerful symbol in the first place.

The Memphis Zoo controversy

In February 2023, the 25-year-old giant panda Lele in Memphis Zoo, shortly before he was due to return to China at the end of his 20-year loan. His female companion, Yaya, soon after.

Yaya had suffered from a skin condition for many years, and in 2020 American animal rights groups In Defense of Animals and Panda Voices of the pandas appearing dirty and emaciated, with missing fur.

These photos generated that the pandas were being fed substandard bamboo and contaminated water. Much of the outrage and concern, expressed across millions of social media posts, was couched in nationalist terms.

One Weibo user commented: "Our national treasure panda begging for food while kneeling is the same as us 1.4 billion Chinese people begging for food while kneeling!"

Another complained: "Pandas are claimed to be national treasures, but they are more like princesses in diplomatic marriages. In the face of national interests, whether a panda is doing well or dying is fundamentally unimportant."

Many called for the .

The Chinese government responds

The Memphis Zoo controversy happened at one of the in the recent history of relations between the US and China.

Former president Joe Biden had just that had spent weeks in American airspace. Planned diplomatic talks had been canceled, and both sides were accusing each other of infringing their sovereignty.

Under these circumstances, we might expect the Chinese government to exploit popular nationalist outrage directed at the United States. Instead, its response to the death and illness of the Memphis pandas was measured and conciliatory.

Following Lele's death and just before Yaya's return, the pandas had received

"Good care from the zoo and great affection from the American people [鈥�]. China stands ready to continue to work with cooperation partners including the US to play our part in protecting endangered species."

Chinese zoological authorities Lele and Yaya's conditions were normal for pandas "in the geriatric phase of their lives." They declared that Memphis Zoo's care of the pandas was "excellent."

The hawkish state-owned newspaper Global Times ran editorials the Americans, even while acknowledging nationalist concerns. It would where a panda died a few months later. Other newspapers ran stories about the broader benefits to China of panda diplomacy.

How the panda became a symbol with many meanings

Both the online nationalist outrage and the calming state response to the Memphis controversy show the emotional weight and political importance of pandas in China.

How did they get to be so important? that pandas were virtually absent from Chinese art, literature and culture until the 20th century.

In historical terms, the panda is an unusual political symbol. Many national animal symbols are chosen for their ferocity, such as , eagles, and the that long symbolized Imperial China.

Pandas, on the other hand, are loved for their roundness, innocence and clumsiness. If a dragon can be seen as a nation's protective parent, a panda is more like its vulnerable child.

The fact that wild pandas are only found in China deepens this attachment, much as it does for or .

Our search for mentions of xiongmao (panda) in China's People's Daily newspaper shows a developing consciousness of pandas as a rare national animal from the 1950s onwards. This was accelerated in the 1970s by the of , and the widespread commercialization of panda images.

In 1983, the wild panda population in Sichuan was by the flowering and death of bamboo plants. This led to the through donations and volunteering.

This incident enshrined the language of pandas as "national treasures." It also elevated the panda as a global icon of wildlife conservation. Today, conservation research is China's for sending pandas abroad.

The 21st century panda has many layers of accumulated symbolism. It is a symbol of China, a symbol of international friendship, a symbol of global environmental consciousness, and a symbol of the universal .

These symbolic layers have generated complex and contradictory political emotions around pandas in China.

In 2023 there was widespread speculation that pandas would not be returning to the and because of their poor relationships with China. That speculation turned out to be .

But the question of whether "national treasure" pandas should be diplomats will remain a difficult one in a world defined by both environmental and human vulnerability.

This article is republished from under a Creative Commons license. Read the .