From the Sydney Morning Herald:
Today, nations that can’t effectively tell their own story risk having it told by another country, says Jed Willard, global engagement director at Harvard’s FDR Foundation, who has worked with European countries on strategies to counter disinformation.
He says politicians and the public in Australia should never engage in a debate with China about issues unrelated to Canberra’s relationship with Beijing.
“This may not be a battle of national narratives so much as a battle of framing [of issues],” he adds. “The first thing the government (and people) should do is take a step back and look at the big picture.”
Willard says the Chinese Communist Party has become “increasingly aggressive around the world” and willing to openly and forcefully “use a full spectrum of trade, investment, and public diplomacy tools to work toward long-term goals”.
In this setting, Zhao’s inflammatory tweet is not about Australia in Afghanistan, Willard says. “This is about Australian sovereignty and rules-based trade.
“Don’t engage in their frame. Send a clear message to the public at home and abroad that this is a real dispute about sovereignty, rule of law and trade, and anything else is simply a distraction.
“Australia must stick to [its] own frame and not play what-aboutism, even though the CCP is obviously sensitive about their own policies in Xinjiang.”
What-aboutism is the term for arguments in which criticism of one subject (for example, detention camps for Uighurs in Xinjiang) is countered with a “what about this?” question (in this case, allegations of Australian war crimes that are being fully investigated).
Read the full article here: https://www.smh.com.au/world/asia/grey-area-china-s-trolling-drives-home-reality-of-social-media-war-20201203-p56kcx.html