Realists learn Chinese: how do Kazakhstanis feel about China?

Of all the five Central Asian states, Kazakhstan shows one of the most negative attitudes towards China. What is the reason for this and whether the "dislike" has any real grounds for several years now, experts have been trying to understand. The Voice of the People studied their conclusions.

Large-scale social studies on the attitude of Kazakhstanis to China and its citizens have been conducted by the Talap Research Center since 2020.

At the same time, there are also international studies and expert surveys that show that almost 30% of Kazakhstanis have negative feelings towards China. The Celestial Empire is disliked more only in Kyrgyzstan, where more than 38% of respondents expressed a negative attitude towards China.

At the same time, as Evgeny Khan, head of the sociological service of the Talap center, emphasizes, China is most often positioned in the Kazakh media as a reliable partner and initiator of joint projects. And Kazakhstan appears in Chinese media publications as a peaceful and rapidly developing country.

"At the same time, stereotypes about China persist in Kazakhstan. And to overcome these barriers, it is necessary to make certain efforts," says Evgeny Khan.

As sociologists note, even 8-10 years ago, the attitude of Kazakhstanis towards China was mostly negative.

There are several reasons - foreign, and later some Kazakh ones, wrote about the repression against Central Asians in the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, the public has an opinion that China dreams of buying vast lands in Kazakhstan for agriculture. Gradually, the attitude towards China became more and more positive, reaching equality between positive and negative opinions in 2019. Then the barometer of feelings of Kazakhstanis fell again due to the coronavirus pandemic. But after the events of 2022, Kazakhstanis suddenly realized that of the two neighbors, the southern one is nicer than the northern one.

"In 2022, China began to replace Russia on the foreign policy map of Kazakhstan. The stable 20-30% lag in positive attitude towards China from Russia disappeared in one year and for the first time since 2016, China has become better perceived in Kazakhstan than the Russian Federation," the study notes.

However, the negative attitude towards China among many Kazakhstanis is due to distrust not only of the Chinese.

"The youth of Central Asia, who studied in China, highly appreciates its economic achievements, infrastructure and technological innovations. Typical fears of the Chinese threat are unusual for them. At the same time, they continue to perceive China as a civilizational "Other" whose development model does not suit their countries and are afraid of excessive economic dependence on China. But it is interesting that these concerns are no longer related to China itself, but to distrust of its own government," notes Yevgeny Khan.

In general, as follows from opinion polls, the positive attitude towards China in Kazakhstan is increasing from East to West.

It is also noteworthy that every year there are more and more points on which Kazakhstanis change their attitude towards China from negative to positive.

"In Kazakhstan, a more positive view is typical for the self-employed, people with high incomes and Christians. The negative attitude is greater among the poor, highly educated and elderly citizens. In Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan, on the contrary, the highly educated population perceives the PRC more positively. In Kyrgyzstan, this is also typical for men and high-income groups. In all three countries, older people have a more negative attitude towards China than young people. Adherence to Islam has not shown a significant relationship with the level of approval, while Christians have a stable positive relationship," the authors of the study note.

At the same time, the number of people recognizing China's great geopolitical influence is growing from year to year. And slowly, but surely, the number of respondents who want to learn a little more about China is increasing.

For example, over the past two years, more than half of the respondents have answered in the affirmative to the question of whether they would like to learn Chinese.

Once upon a time, there was a popular joke that optimists learn English, pessimists learn Chinese, and realists learn a Kalashnikov assault rifle.

Obviously, the world is changing. And now realists are starting to learn Chinese. Because the growing influence of China on all countries of the world, especially neighboring ones, can no longer be ignored.

At the same time, as experts emphasize, the fears of Kazakhstanis have not gone away, the most important of them is the fear of losing land.

"In 2022-2023, there was a rationalization of perception. These fears were temporarily pushed aside against the background of the changes to which it was necessary to adapt," concludes Yevgeny Khan.