China’s Image in the Asia-Pacific Region
In the report Views of China and Xi Are Improving Globally by the Pew Research Center, Laura Silver, Jonathan Schulman, Laura Clancy, and William Miner discuss the changing perception of China based on their survey involving 37 countries. Below is an excerpt of their results on China’s perception among the Asia-Pacific region.
People in the Asia-Pacific region have both the most positive and most negative opinions of China. For example, 90% of Pakistanis have a favorable view of China, while 88% of Japanese have an unfavorable view.
These opinions tend to diverge along economic lines. People in middle-income Asia-Pacific countries – including Indonesia, Malaysia, Pakistan and Thailand – tend to have confidence in Chinese President Xi Jinping and to think the Chinese government respects the personal freedoms of its people, while the opposite is true in wealthier Australia, Japan and South Korea. Read more on views of China in high- and middle-income countries.
As part of this regional look at China, drawn from a larger survey of 37 countriesconducted this spring, we also asked people for their views on potential territorial conflicts, as well as on which country in the world is their top ally and top threat. Here, too, we find that opinions differ sharply across the region.
