The Sister City Frameworks and China’s Public Mateusz Chatys Diplomacy in the Time of the COVID-19 Pandemic

The paper looks at the important subject of the sister city frameworks as part of China’s public diplomacy at the time of the COVID-19 pandemic (post-2020). The first part presents the concept of public diplomacy, with special focus on the role of provincial and municipal governments in China. Relations between the local Chinese governments and other local governments are seen as “having less political color” and, according to Chinese scholars, are more effective in transmitting the national image and discursive power in the P.R.C. The second part elaborates on the situation during the COVID-19 pandemic and argues that local governments in China have been using the Health Silk Road and Digital Silk Road as a vehicle of China’s public diplomacy. This section also includes a detailed analysis of the Chinese government’s plans and actions taken by the central authorities. After a general analysis, the authors present Sichuan and Guangdong provinces’ actions as a case study. The first case study examines Sichuan and Chengdu’s efforts to promote the Health Silk Road through the “mask of diplomacy,” in the second, the authors discuss actions undertaken by Guangdong province and the city of Guangzhou as part of the Digital Silk Road.