China is perceived by an increasing number of foreign people as a global power as a result of the country's wider participation in international affairs with growing confidence and global influence in 2015, according to a Global Times survey of respondents from 20 countries.
Nearly 70 percent of foreign respondents agreed that China is already a global power, 4.7 percentage points higher than in 2014, according to a survey by the Global Times Global Poll Center about China's image and its global influence this year.
The survey also shows some 72 percent of foreign respondents believe China has the economic strength of a global power, far more than those who believe in China's military power and political power - both around 30 percent.
The survey was conducted among 20,811 respondents from 20 countries across six continents. This included Chinese respondents and those from the US, Russia, Japan, the UK, Australia, France, Brazil and South Africa, from October 13 to November 25.
China has seen greater and more substantial achievements in 2015, such as the progress of the "Belt and Road" initiative and the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, said Hu Yishan, a senior researcher at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore and a former political secretary to the Malaysian prime minister.
This progress has contributed a lot to the growth of the world economy and probably a wider recognition of China as a great power, Hu noted.
However, there is a huge gap between Chinese people and foreigners in seeing China as a global power - only 27.9 percent of Chinese respondents said yes, the survey shows.
Limited perception
The image of China as perceived by foreigners is limited, Zhu Jiejin, an associate professor at the Center for BRICS Studies of Fudan University, told the Global Times, adding that many people naturally regard China as a great power with media reports labeling the country as the "second-biggest economy in the world" and "biggest trade partner of over 120 countries."
"Chinese people have a better perspective of the country's problems since they live there," Zhu said.
He added that a more precise identification of China is a "developing great power," a power with wider participation in global affairs such as the Paris COP21 climate change summit and the G20 summit, and also a country facing poverty and imbalanced and unsustainable development.
It's also noteworthy that China is gaining more attention for its economic as well as military power. And that means more responsibilities for China to shoulder, Hu said.
The most significant change to China's image was "confident," chosen by 26 percent of foreign respondents, followed by "collaborative" and "tough."
A series of diplomatic moves such as President Xi Jinping's visit to the US and many European countries, together with achievements such as the inclusion of the yuan to the IMF's Special Drawing Rights, all show China's image as "confident," Hu said.
Some 73 percent of Japanese respondents regard the country's diplomatic and political ties with China as "bad," followed by Vietnamese respondents at 42 percent. But in general, some 60 percent of all foreign respondents regard their countries' ties with China as "good" or "very good."
It is understandable that people from those two countries are worried about the rise of China, with an eye on the territorial disputes and competitive relations, Pang Zhongying, dean of the School of Global Studies at the Guangzhou-based Sun Yat-Sen University, told the Global Times.
The top three impressions of Chinese people from foreign respondents are that they are thrifty, family-focused, and polite.
Pang said that Chinese who could travel or study abroad are normally those with a good education and a higher salary, and the majority of whom are very polite.
