Profile

Although contemporary China is governed under a Communist system, the Buddhist religion has been deeply ingrained in Chinese culture since it arrived in the 1^st and 2^nd Centuries. Buddhism has a largely positive image around the world and it is estimated that around 300 million Chinese (domestic and overseas) adhere to it, so the PRC government recognised its enormous leverage of influence in terms of soft power and utility as an effective foreign policy tool – particularly in relation to questions of Taiwan, Tibet and unsettled Himalayan border areas. 

“Buddhist globalisation” has helped the PRC in realising its economic ambitions, and its religious diplomacy has smoothed the way for winning economic and infrastructure projects in countries such a Myanmar, Sri Lanka, and Nepal. Taking the imperial era as a precedent, the PRC has also begun to take full advantage of Tibetan cultural connectivity to expand its influence across the Indian Himalayan belt, as well as in Mongolia and Russia. Investing heavily to project itself as the guardian and benefactor of Buddhism par excellence has helped China shape perceptions of itself as an acceptable world power with a soft image. A key element of this strategy has been the triennial World Buddhist Forums.

A synopsis of China's use of Buddhism as soft power is given in this interview by Dukascopy TV from 2014. 

Progression of the Forums

The PRC authorities convened the first World Buddhist Forum (WBF) in 2006, it was the first time that China had held an international religious conference of any kind since communist rule was established in 1949. The forums have taken place at three-year intervals since then, drawing in thousands of people from almost 50 countries worldwide. All of the WBF events have featured the strong guiding presence of the United Front Work Department (UFWD), a Chinese Communist Party (CCP) organ responsible for managing relations with influential non-Party individuals and organisations to ensure their support for CCP rule, as well as working to expand China’s influence and control overseas.

The first WBF was overseen predominantly by the state-operated Buddhist Association of China (BAC) with support from its closely interconnected Hong Kong counterpart, the Hong Kong Buddhist Association, as well as key mainland-approved figures from within Taiwan’s Buddhist circles. Beijing announced specifically that the Dalai Lama was not invited so as not to “disharmonise” the forum. In 2009, working closely with the highly political Taiwanese monk Hsing Yun and his powerful Fo Guang Shan organisation, the second WBF was co-hosted in China and Taiwan, underscoring China’s use of Buddhism in “normalising” cross-Strait relations. In 2009 and again in 2015, the WBF took place in Lingshan, a Pharaonic “Vatican for Buddhism”, in Wuxi, near Shanghai. Footage of the 2015 event and commentary by Chinese state media can be seen in the following video.

In 2012 the third WBF was held in Hong Kong, again in cooperation with the Hong Kong Buddhist Association, headed by the highly respected monk, Kok Kwong, who had devoted his entire life to the return of Hong Kong to China. Kok Kwong had been invited by Deng Xiaoping in 1984 for the signing ceremony of the Sino-British Joint Declaration, appointed a member of the Hong Kong Special Autonomous Region Basic Law Drafting Committee and later also the Preparatory Committee the final transfer of power to China.  

Holding the WBF in Hong Kong was an important move by Beijing to obtain legitimacy and the support of the global Buddhist community, and enhance the tacit recognition of the China-appointed Panchen Lama Gyaincain Norbu, who made his maiden political appearance outside the mainland. China positioned itself as the world’s “representative” of Buddhism and Buddhist countries, seeking to use this as a bloc in international affairs. An important role in the organisation of the third WBF was played by the Asia Pacific Economic Exchange Foundation (APECF), an NGO headed by the Chinese businessman and former United Front official Xiao Wunan, who at the time was also making in-roads in service of China's soft power in Lumbini, the birth place of the Buddha in Nepal.

Most recently, in 2018 the fifth WBF emphasised the “positive roles of religious people in economic and social development” and China's “Belt and Road Initiative”. The Panchen Lama, now Vice President of the BAC, opened the proceedings in a joint Han-Tibetan ceremony of a kind becoming more and more common in the domain of China's religious soft power. This can be seen in the following video.