Luban Workshop Boosts China-Thailand Humanities Exchange

Research Under the Belt and Road Initiative

Yaowen Ge

School of International Relations, Tianjin Foreign Studies University, Tianjin, 300270, China

Keywords: Thailand, Luban Workshop, People-to-People Exchanges, Belt and Road Initiative.

Abstract: China-Thailand Luban Workshop, as a “small and beautiful” project in the construction of the Belt and Road,

follows the basic principles of friendly cooperation, equality and mutual benefit, which further promotes the

multifaceted cooperation between the two countries' economy and education. However, the research on peo-

ple-to-people exchange in China-Thailand Luban Workshop is still insufficient, and there is even a certain

academic gap. The exploration of the path of people-to-people exchange programs in China-Thailand Luban

Workshop is also not sufficient. Based on this background, this paper further defines humanistic communica-

tion in the context of constructivism. It also proposes a new path to promote the construction of people-to-

people exchanges in China-Thailand Luban Workshop —— “Learning Together, Working Together, Living

Together”. This approach provides practical new ideas for realizing heart-to-heart communication between

China and Thailand, building a pattern of mutual trust and win-win structure, and realizing a community with

a shared future of mankind.

1 INTRODUCTION

The world is in the midst of a major change not seen

in a century. In response to this trend of world

multipolarity and the general background of weak

global economic recovery, China has put forward the

initiative of building the Belt and Road Initiative. As

one of China's fundamental national policies to open

up to the outside world, the Belt and Road initiative

is dedicated to building and strengthening

connectivity partnerships in countries along the Asia-

Europe-Africa continent and nearby oceans.

However, in the process of further promoting the

construction of the Belt and Road, all kinds of

contradictions and problems are gradually revealed.

Against this background, China has put forward the

idea that the key to state-to-state relations lies in close

bonds between peoples. In order to improve all-round

cooperation in various fields among the countries

along the Belt and Road, it is necessary to strengthen

friendly exchanges among the peoples of the various

countries and to enhance mutual understanding, so as

to lay a solid foundation of public opinion, public

sentiment and society for further regional cooperation

(Xi, 2013). Therefore, the construction of the Belt and

Road not only relies on the benefits offered by the

economic and trade cooperation among countries, but

also cannot be separated from the people-to-people

exchanges to provide assistance.

China-Thailand Luban Workshop is a new mode

of international cooperation based on the image of

Luban as a “national-level master artisans”, following

the basic principles of equal co-operation and

integration of industry and education and the concept

of global governance of “common cause, common

development and sharing”, and cooperating with

vocational education institutions in Thailand to carry

out vocational education and technical training, and

to share China's excellent vocational education

achievements and vocational culture. As a

representative case of the Belt and Road people-to-

people exchange, the goal is to strengthen vocational

technology cooperation and vocational culture

exchange through the vocational education of

vocational colleges and universities in the two

countries. To enhance national identity, promote

heart-to-heart communication between China and

Thailand, serve the sustainable development of the

regional economy and society, and promote the

building of a community with a shared future of

mankind. Therefore, as an important brand for the

internationalization of vocational education in China,

China-Thailand Luban Workshop provides an

excellent opportunity to practice the model of

“economic cooperation+people-to-people exchanges”.

402

Ge, Y.

Luban Workshop Boosts China-Thailand Humanities Exchange Research under the Belt and Road Initiative.

DOI: 10.5220/0013997400004912

Paper published under CC license (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)

In Proceedings of the 1st International Conference on Innovative Education and Social Development (IESD 2025), pages 402-407

ISBN: 978-989-758-779-5

However, existing research and practice on

people-to-people exchanges between the China-

Thailand Luban Workshop is still insufficient, and the

meaning of people-to-people exchanges has not yet

become a very precise concept even in the Chinese

context. For example, the English translation of《关

于加强和改进中外人文交流工作的若干意见》is

China to Improve People-to-people Exchanges with

Foreign Countries. When the Chinese Foreign

Minister met with a delegation from the National

Committee on American Foreign Policy, he proposed

to “promote people-to-people exchanges”, in which

people-to-people exchanges were translated as

“cultural and people-to-people exchange”. In Chinese

academia, the definition of people-to-people

exchanges or in the analysis of the path of people-to-

people exchanges, also often falls into the trap of

focusing only on cultural exchanges. Based on this

research background and practical context, this paper

will discuss the construction of the China-Thailand

Luban Work-shop Humanities Exchange Program in

order to provide new ideas and paths for promoting

humanities exchange and cooperation between the

two countries.

2 MEANING OF HUMAN

EXCHANGE

In Chinese, “人文(humanity)” should literally and

connotatively include “ 人 (person)” and “ 文

(culture)”, and the combination of the two can be

regarded as a people-oriented culture. “People-

oriented” is in itself the essential requirement of the

word “人文(humanity)” from the beginning to the

end, and is a human value worthy of promotion

(Zhuang, 2017). Communities and nations are made

of people. Interaction between people constitutes

society, and interaction between States constitutes the

international community——in other words, it is “the

interaction of actors that leads to the formation of

social structures”, which is a typical constructivist

explanation in international relations theory (Qin

Yaqing,2001). Although constructivism also

emphasizes the influence of “culture”, it is also based

on human agency, sociality and practice.

There are numerous examples of the practice of

“communication” in Chinese social relations.

Chinese exchanges or transactions are largely based

on and facilitated by a relational quality, and

relationships are the manifestation of this quality

permeating social practices. So this Chinese

relationship is a way of subliminally reciprocating

and providing access to goods and services that would

otherwise be difficult to obtain. The nature of this

relationship has been the result of a typical long-term

“people-to-people exchange”.

Therefore, this paper argues that people-to-people

exchanges is in fact a methodology of constructivism,

which is a kind of people-oriented, spontaneous,

daily, extensive communication and interaction

behavior, and “people are close to each other, heart to

heart” as the ultimate goal.

3 MOTIVATION FOR THE

CONSTRUCTION OF THE

CHINA-THAILAND LUBAN

WORKSHOP

In the construction of the Belt and Road Initiative,

China has relied on international cooperation among

vocational colleges and universities to establish the

Luban Workshop. On the basis of foreign education

and technical exchanges of vocational colleges and

universities, through the international cooperation

model of Luban Workshop, China and the countries

where the projects are located carry out academic

education, technical training and teacher training to

serve the economic and social development of the

countries along the routes. At the same time, China

also encourages students from vocational colleges

and universities of different countries to participate in

the National Vocational Colleges and Universities

Skills Competition held in Tianjin to showcase,

exchange and further strengthen the friendship among

young students.

The China-Thailand Luban Workshop, as the first

Luban Workshop, closely follows the requirements of

Thailand's industry and China's Belt and Road

construction. Supported by high-quality educational

resources of Tianjin Bohai College's mechatronics

technology, Internet of Things technology, CNC

machine tool technology, new energy automobile

technology, and Tianjin Railway College's (High-

speed Railway) rolling stock overhauling technology

and (High-speed Railway) railway signaling

automatic control. It is a carrier of technical skill

training organizations based on deepening school-

enterprise cooperation and using the Engineering

Practice Innovation Program (EPIP) as the teaching

model, sharing China's high-quality vocational

education and vocational technology with Thailand

(Lv et al, 2023).

The motivation for the construction of the China-

Thailand Luban Workshop is twofold. The first

Luban Workshop Boosts China-Thailand Humanities Exchange Research under the Belt and Road Initiative

403

reason is that Thailand has repeatedly reaffirmed its

traditional hedging strategy as the strategic rivalry

between the U.S. and China in Southeast Asia

continues to escalate. However, judging from the

trend of trilateral relations between China and the

United States, Thailand's strategic center of gravity

has clearly shifted in the direction of friendship with

China. In the medium to long term, in order to prevent

Thailand's “non-neutral” hedge reversal, it is

necessary to further strengthen the foundation of

China-Thailand strategic cooperation in terms of

geographic connectivity, industrial integration, and

people-to-people communication (Zhou, 2022).

Therefore, China has gradually begun fruitful

cooperation with Thailand in many fields, including

politics, economy and trade, culture, science and

education, further strengthening the friendly relations

between the two countries; The second reason is that,

from the point of view of vocational education,

China's long history of importing advanced foreign

vocational concepts and educational models has

shown the phenomenon of focusing on “importing”

rather than “exporting”. So it makes our vocational

education not in line with our status and image in the

international community. The construction of the

China-Thailand Luban Workshop is a kind of attempt

for vocational education to go out.

4 STATUS OF THE

CHINA-THAILAND LUBAN

WORKSHOP HUMANITIES

EXCHANGE PROGRAM

Heart-to-heart communication is the social

foundation of national exchanges, which can lay a

solid public opinion foundation for deepening China-

Thailand all-round cooperation (Zhao, 2019). The

fundamental way to realize Heart-to-heart

communication is through people-to-people ex-

changes. In order to further promote people-to-people

exchange, China-Thailand Luban Work-shop has

built practice bases for international students,

overseas expansion bases for teachers and students of

vocational colleges and universities, and so on. In

addition, events such as “Tianjin Bohai Week” and

“Thai University Week” were organized under the

theme of “Celebration”. It aims to create a new

platform for international exchange between Chinese

and Thai colleges, and to create a new pattern of

international exchange work between the two

colleges.

The most distinctive feature is the International

Students Practice Base, which is an intern-ship and

practice base for overseas students and teachers and a

cultural experience base. The internship practice base

aims to give full play to the resource advantages of

the college, cultivate interntionalized, comprehensive

Table 1: Categories of China-Thailand Luban Workshop Humanities Exchange Program Exhibition Area.

Name of Exhibition Area Functions of the exhibition area

Banmo Culture and

Craftsmanship Exhibition

Area

The main purpose of the project is to publicize the culture of Banmo and to promote

the spirit of traditional Chinese craftsmanship. It organizes the “Silk Road Flower

Rain-Impression of Lu Ban” cultural and artistic performance. At the same time, you

can experience the ladder, ink bucket, planer, saw, lock and key, mill, assault and

grinding machine invented by Luban, and have 3D experience of mortise and tenon

structure through the interactive intelligent tablet.

Red Triangle Cultural

Exhibition Area

It mainly carries out the propaganda of Chinese modern chemical culture-Red Triangle

brand culture, so that foreign students can perceive the glorious deeds of Fan Xudong,

the founder of China's national chemical industry, and Hou Deping, a Chinese scientist

and a pioneer of the chemical industry, and achieve the purpose of promoting China's

modern artisanal spirit.

729 Interactive Area It is divided into “729” cultural experience, product display and sales area, and sports

training and competition area, aiming to promote the physical and mental health

industr

into the cam

us and carr

forward the national ball culture.

National Calligraphy and

Painting Experience

Exhibition Area

Mainly for the display of Chinese calligraphy and painting,can provide the experience

of calligraphy and painting creation.

Chinese Traditional

Opera Culture Exhibition

Area and Chinese Folk

Culture Exhibition Area

Chinese Traditional Opera Culture Display Area and Chinese Folk Culture Display

Area: displaying Chinese musical instruments such as guzheng, pipa, quick board,

displaying Chinese opera costumes, which can provide an experience of playing

musical instruments, face painting, etc., displaying Chinese traditional folk sports

equipment (such as shuttlecock, air bamboos), ancient Chinese weapons, etc.

IESD 2025 - International Conference on Innovative Education and Social Development

404

and practical talents, and provide a good plat-form for

Thai students in Tianjin. Its main form is to provide

international students with opportunities to

experience and learn industrial processes through

various practical training bases, training centers, and

training rooms. The cultural experience base, on the

other hand, focuses on mainly reflecting the

characteristics of Chinese cultural diversity, and has

constructed several cultural display areas as shown in

Table 1.

These China-Thailand Luban Workshop people-

to-people exchange programs for the in-depth

implementation of the “Study in China Program” and

the “Outline of China's Medium- and Long-Term

Educational Reform and Development Plan” have

indeed contributed to the cultivation of local technical

and skilled talents who are familiar with Chinese

technology, understanding of Chinese craftsmanship,

and cognizant of Chinese products in the cooperating

countries.

5 CHALLENGES AND

DILEMMAS OF

CHINA-THAILAND LUBAN

WORKSHOP HUMANITIES

EXCHANGE PROGRAMS

Programs similar to those mentioned above abound at

numerous official events within China. These projects

built under the traditional view of people-to-people

exchanges will have a direct impact on the breadth

and depth of people-to-people exchanges between

China and Thailand. The reason for this is nothing

other than the fact that they have all gotten into a bit of

a rut.

5.1 Over-Emphasis on One-Way, Even

Indoctrinating and Ostentatious

“Communication”

True humanistic communication requires two or more

people to engage in a shared dialogue, to further

recognize their commonalities and to develop respect

for their differences, and the process is a two-way

street. The one-way “communication” may neglect to

understand the other country's value preferences, core

concerns, and cultural identity. The display areas of

China-Thailand Luban Workshop, such as Lumo

Culture and Craftsmanship, Red Triangle Culture and

Labor Education Base, are the embodiment of this

one-way nature. This kind of display rather than

interactive exchange-based “communication”, has

the effect of the “go out”, but ultimately difficult to

“go into”. It may even fall into the trap of the “China

threat theory”.

5.2 Too Much Focus on “Cultural”

Exchanges

Although the exchange of culture has an indelible role

in promoting people-to-people exchange, the youth of

China and Thailand together only exchange culture,

but also high-end Chinese fine culture, without the

exchange of daily study and work, is ultimately

superficial, the pursuit of form, lively for a moment,

cannot be in-depth exchange. Apart from bringing a

bit of exotic freshness to foreigners, it does not serve

to model, share, and resonate with values and issues

of public interest (Zhuang, 2017).

5.3 Too Much Reliance on Direct

Official Coordination and

Sponsorship

In the field of people-to-people exchanges between

the China-Thailand Luban Work-shop, there are

many actors other than the government and its

affiliated schools, such as cooperating companies,

media, non-governmental organizations and even

ordinary people. Civilian and non-governmental

actors, because of their unofficial attributes, are often

more flexible and diverse in their communication

methods than governments, and are more likely to be

accepted and well received by Thai students, and have

a more lasting and far-reaching impact on the

governments and populations of other countries

(Payne, 2009). Therefore, if the actors keep insisting

on the government, “public sentiment” will

eventually become “government sentiment”.

However, the state can still act as a macro-controller

and policy maker to ensure that the international train

of people-to-people exchanges will not go astray

through forward-looking analysis.

In addition to domestic ideological factors, the

differences in national political systems and the

disruptions of international affairs have also had a

significant impact on the development and promotion

of people-to-people exchanges with China and

Thailand. However, in recent years, Thailand has

demonstrated a range of “non-neutral” positions in

the strategic competition in Southeast Asia between

China and the United States, and has gradually shown

a tendency to be pro-China. A Thai scholar described

it intuitively as “Today, Miss Siam (Thailand) is

ready to leave ‘Uncle Sam’ (the United States) and

Luban Workshop Boosts China-Thailand Humanities Exchange Research under the Belt and Road Initiative

405

join the ‘Brother’ (China) in Beijing!”. However,

with the rapid rise of China and its active role in many

regional initiatives, ASEAN members, including

Thailand, continue to show concern and suspicion. To

a certain extent, they see China as a potential threat,

and thus vigorously resist the export and exchange of

Chinese culture and higher education. The closure of

a large number of Confucius Institutes around the

world in recent times is a reflection of the Western

political and academic elites' high level of vigilance

against the export of China's cultural soft power (Cui,

Wen, 2022). Thus, Thailand's traditional diplomatic

concept of “balance of power” is deeply rooted.

Thailand does not want to be overly dependent on

China or even turn to China, nor does it want China's

influence in the region to grow too quickly. Because

of this concern about the strategic intent of the Belt

and Road Initiative and its own interests, Thailand

will remain on the “wait and see” side of the Belt and

Road Initiative for a long time to come. Therefore, in

this competitive international environment, it is

difficult for China to quickly increase the recognition

of the Belt and Road Initiative and Chinese values in

Thailand in the short term. In addition to bilateral

relations, some extra-territorial Powers of the Belt

and Road Initiative will strategically and policy-wise

hedge against the Belt and Road Initiative out of their

own Asia-Pacific interests. At the same time, they

also use the Western media to create “neo-colonialist”

public opinion and spread the idea of preventing

China's “sharp power”. Therefore, the interference of

these extraterritorial powers and Western media will

also greatly influence the judgment of Thai youth,

thus inhibiting the effectiveness of the Belt and Road

people-to-people exchanges.

6 A NEW PATH OF

PEOPLE-TO-PEOPLE

EXCHANGES BETWEEN

CHINA-THAILAND LUBAN

WORKSHOP

Under the framework of the Belt and Road, economic

and trade cooperation and people-to-people

exchanges are complementary and inseparable. The

process of business and economic cooperation is

essentially an exchange between people. When

people interact for the first time, they complete a

“social act” by sending and interpreting signals to

each other and then responding to them, and the

process of creating inter-subjective meaning begins.

Subsequently, the parties proceeded further in the

same manner. The first social act creates expectations

about each other's future behavior: possibly wrong

and certainly tentative, but still expectations. Based

on this tentative perception, the self makes a new

gesture (Alexander, 1992). Through this interaction

over and over again, there will be a continuous

increase in each other's shared knowledge base. If

repeated long enough, these “shared knowledge”

behaviors create relatively stable concepts of self and

others. Similarly, China-Thailand Luban Workshop,

as an international program of industry-education

integration and school-enterprise cooperation. It is

also characterized by a long and gradual process of

mutual cognition and is based on non-politicized and

secular cooperative exchanges. In addition to this, in

order to further promote this people-to-people,

people-centered exchange and to strengthen the

friendship between the youth of the two countries in

the China-Thailand Luban Workshop. What

government need is to raise the level of transnational

culture and tolerance, not just to promote

multiculturalism (Li et al, 2023).

The author believes that the best way to solve

those challenges and dilemmas is to “Learn together,

work together, live together”. Unlike the short-term

approach, this path is more focused on relying on the

Chinese youth in the workshops to build a good image

and friendly gestures in the wide range of daily

transnational interactions, and to share and build good

things together. Because communication seems to

work best among peers, it is not inhibited by

hierarchy. The teacher-student relationship can be an

obstacle when teachers need to ask students for

advice (Nicholas, 2022). The establishment of the

School of Chinese at the Shanghai International

Studies University is a typical example. The institute

provides a good platform for “Chinese and foreign

students to interact”. Kelil, a Moroccan student

majoring in Chinese International Education at

Shanghai International Studies University, said in an

interview, “As an international student, having the

opportunity to be able to take classes together with

Chinese students helps us a lot, and there are some

things you might still want to go and communicate

and discuss with a Chinese classmate.”

Surely the people-to-people exchange program of

Luban Workshop is highly purposeful as an

innovative national program. As far as the country is

concerned, the promotion of “people-to-people

exchanges” is aimed at utilizing “soft power” to

create a “good image of China”. But a good image

cannot be won by those historical, static images

alone, but by the qualities and attitudes of the Chinese

people and the humanistic landscape that is alive and

IESD 2025 - International Conference on Innovative Education and Social Development

406

well in our society today. Hence, there is a need to

change the traditional model of “people-to-people

exchange”. This implies more of a “people-to-

people” model. The government should not only send

Chinese language teachers, but also provide a display

area for traditional culture, and disseminate the

international brand of “Luban Workshop” locally.

Also, Thai students should be encouraged to “study

together” with Chinese students and Thai teachers

with Chinese teachers, and Thai students should be

encouraged to “work together” with young Chinese

employees in internship positions in related fields.

This approach is conducive to the promotion of

“organic docking” between Chinese civil society and

Thai students, and even Thai civil society, and truly

strengthens the social soil of inter-country relations.

This paper argues that “learning and working

together” is the best form of “people-to-people”

interaction. This approach is more grounded than the

exchanges generated by hours of arts and cultural

exhibitions or a day-long forum. Only by studying

and working together for a long period of time is it

possible and necessary to get to know each other on

all fronts, thus creating an atmosphere of teamwork

and understanding and tolerance of each other's

differences (Zhuang, 2017).

7 CONCLUSION

The ancient Chinese book, Zhou Yi, states that “in the

observation of human relations, something of great

value is gained that changes and forms a new world

order”. Because of their common interests and

emotional concerns, people in different countries

aspire to “people-to-people” interaction in a certain

“common social space”. In this long-term interaction,

people will continue to develop common perceptions

and eventually form a universal common value

system of “living together”, thus creating new social

constructs. When people reach a certain number of

common ideas, a new world order is formed.

Therefore, “living together” is the ultimate form of

“learning and working together”, and a manifestation

of the “community with a shared future of mankind”.

As a “small and beautiful” project of the Belt and

Road construction, the China-Thailand Luban

Workshop has the prerequisites of “economic

cooperation+people-to-people exchanges” and

“living together”. In other words, China-Thailand

Luban Workshop, as a “transnational common social

space”, already has many attributes similar to

“society”, such as mutual help, sharing and common

negotiation, and it has more and more common

interests, norms and concepts. All in all, today's

trends continue to present more opportunities than

challenges. As one of the three pillars of the Belt and

Road construction, the function of people-to-people

exchanges is to truly realize “heart-to-heart

communication”, and the purpose is to build an

international pattern of mutual trust and win-win

situation, so as to realize a community with shared

future of mankind. In the future, Chinese academics

need to further think about the difficulties faced by

the China-Thailand Luban Workshop in the process

of people-to-people exchange, and find a practical

and feasible way to push forward the construction

process of the Belt and Road, so that the Belt and

Road Initiative will go steadily and reach a far-

reaching goal.

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