Peer-reviewed Articles:
Angel M. Villegas-Cruz. 2025. “Communicating State Repression to the International Community: A Case Study of How China Frames Its Policies in Xinjiang Online.” Foreign Policy Analysis 21(1). https://doi.org/10.1093/fpa/orae028.
Abstract
Regimes and their proxies seek to legitimize overt state repression abroad to avoid economic and reputational costs. Yet, few scholars have studied the international dimension of repression image management. I examine how countries communicate their repressive actions to the international community depending on the audience. Framing repression as a legitimate response to a credible threat (threat strategy) is more likely when communicating with countries facing higher levels of domestic threat. But due to in-group favoritism, when addressing in-group audiences of the repressed, governments are more likely to frame repression as necessary to protect the repressed (benevolent rule strategy). To test these claims, I collect 82,011 tweets about activities in Xinjiang published by eighty-eight Chinese diplomatic accounts from 2014 to 2020. The results suggest that regimes change their repression image management strategies depending on the audience. Chinese government accounts in countries with higher levels of domestic conflict are more likely to use the threat strategy than those in countries with lower levels of conflict, while those in countries with a similar in-group to Xinjiang (Muslim countries) are more likely to use the benevolent rule strategy than those in out-group states. This expands our understanding of the communication strategies of human rights-abusing regimes.Angel M. Villegas-Cruz. 2024. “Online infrastructure and social media metrics: A quantitative analysis of African diplomatic strategies via social media.” South African Journal of International Affairs 31(3), 353–378. https://doi.org/10.1080/10220461.2024.2436389.
Abstract
The use of social media in public diplomacy is a recognised tool to shape public opinion and to serve political interests around the world. African ministries of foreign affairs (MFAs) have embraced this digital revolution. This article traces the emergence of African digital diplomacy by exploring, inter alia, its online infrastructure, presence and followers, as well as the factors that determine usage of social media on the continent. Employing cross-platform and cross-country comparisons, the article analyses an original dataset of digital diplomacy posts from all African MFAs active on social media. Findings reveal that African MFAs were, as of late 2023, more active on X (previously Twitter) despite having a larger presence on Facebook. The key determinants of African digital diplomacy were found to be a large population, English as an official language, democratic governance, and widespread internet access. This research has implications for diplomatic communications in Africa and beyond.Angel M. Villegas-Cruz. 2024. “Nation Branding and Covid-19: An Empirical Investigation of Self-Reports of Medical Donations in Chinese Digital Diplomacy.” Journal of East Asian Studies, 1-26. https://doi.org/10.1017/jea.2024.13.
Abstract
This research examines how Beijing uses social media to publicize donations and engage in nation branding as it responds to the global backlash sparked by Covid-19. It argues that self-reports of medical donations aim to enhance China’s national brand, leading to an expectation that reports about donations will primarily target countries more severely affected by the virus. To test its claims, the research analyzes over 55,000 tweets published by Chinese diplomatic missions. The results—controlled for Chinese donation exports—show a positive and significant relationship between self-reports of medical donations and the host’s spread of Covid-19. In contrast, donations are not correlated with political or economic allies. A comparison of government (CCP, ministries, etc.) and non-government donors (immigrants, firms, etc.) shows that only donations by the latter are positively correlated with the spread of the virus. This research advances our knowledge of Chinese diplomats’ online political behavior.Angel M. Villegas-Cruz, María Montemayor de Teresa, Antonio Alejo, and Astrid de la Torre Lüderitz. 2024. “Public Diplomacy en Español: An Analysis of Spanish-language Public Diplomacy Scholarship.” Journal of Public Diplomacy 4(1), 25–50. https://doi.org/10.23045/JPD.2024.4.1.003.
Abstract
Public diplomacy scholarship typically centers on English-language works, yet significant research on public diplomacy and related topics, like soft power, is emerging in other languages. This study uses computational text analysis to examine Spanish-language peer-reviewed articles on public diplomacy from 2001 to 2023. The findings reveal interesting patterns in Spanish-language public diplomacy scholarship, including theoretical focuses, geographic areas of study, and gendered citation patterns. Spanish-language public diplomacy scholarship is largely dominated by scholars from Spain. Mexico, however, stands out as the most frequently studied geographic area, followed by Spain, the United States, and, to a lesser extent, Colombia and Argentina. The results underscore a strong focus on concepts like image, communication, and public opinion, reflecting crucial concerns in the foreign policy of Spanish-speaking countries. Finally, the findings reveal a gender imbalance, with men comprising the majority of authors, and a statistical analysis indicates that works by women receive fewer citations than those by men. This essay is a first step in understanding key trends and gendered patterns in public diplomacy, aligning with a broader movement striving to decolonize academic literature and prioritize the publication of articles focusing on under-represented people and geographic areas within the field.Angel M. Villegas-Cruz. 2024. “The Effect of Economic Ties on Digital Diplomacy: A Sentiment Analysis of the Twitter Accounts of Chinese Diplomatic Missions.” The Hague Journal of Diplomacy, 656-690. https://doi.org/10.1163/1871191x-bja10194.
Abstract
The article examines how economic ties between host and guest countries affect the emotional valence in the social media content published by digital diplomats. Strong economic ties will lead digital diplomats to adopt a positive tone because such ties raise the potential costs of verbal aggressiveness online. A positive emotional valence on social media also serves to cultivate good public perceptions of the guest and its economic activities. To evaluate these claims, the article analyses 53,601 original tweets published by 88 Chinese diplomatic missions on Twitter from 2014 to 2020. It finds that economic ties have a strong positive effect on the tone adopted by digital diplomats. As the host’s trade dependence on China increases, Chinese diplomatic missions are more likely to adopt a positive tone on Twitter, especially when talking about politics and business. This research contributes to the study of how countries use social media to conduct diplomacy.Kevin Munger, Angel M. Villegas-Cruz, Jorge Gallego, and Mateo Vásquez-Cortés. 2024. “‘Reenviado Muchas Veces’: How WhatsApp Users in Mexico and Colombia Understand Political Information.” Political Communication 41(5), 719–742. https://doi.org/10.1080/10584609.2024.2326130.
Abstract
Digital literacy affects how people use the internet. However, we argue that the concept of “digital literacy” cannot usefully be applied to all internet users; there is simply too much heterogeneity across devices, platforms, and social contexts. We conduct surveys in Mexico and Colombia to understand how these people use the internet. We find that WhatsApp is by far the dominant platform across all sectors of society. In contrast to evidence from the US, we find that education is a better predictor of two measures of digital literacy than is age. We then conduct a survey experiment to test how people understand news shared on WhatsApp. We find that the inclusion of a link to source material increases respondents’ trust in a message shared on WhatsApp, but that the platform-supplied note that a message has been shared many times has no such effect.Angel M. Villegas-Cruz. 2014. “El discurso de la Iglesia Protestante en torno a la Segunda Guerra Mundial en la Revista Puerto Rico Evangélico, 1940-1945” [The representation of World War II in the inter-denominational magazine, Puerto Rico Evangelico, 1940-1945]. Revista [IN]Genios 1 (1): 1-11.
Abstract
El objetivo de este estudio es examinar la representación de la Iglesia Protestante sobre la Segunda Guerra Mundial a través de la revista, Puerto Rico Evangélico , entre los años 1940 a 1945. Este trabajo sostiene que la revista adopta una postura a favor de la participación de Estados Unidos y Puerto Rico en el conflicto bélico. El análisis fue desarrollado a partir de las teorías de representación y análisis de discurso del antropólogo social, Jack Goody, y el sociólogo, Stuart Hall. Toda la colección de la revista se encuentra en el Seminario Evangélico de Puerto Rico en Río Piedras.Editor-reviewed Publications:
Lucas Winter, Jason Warner, and Angel M. Villegas-Cruz. 2024. “Instruments of Chinese Military Influence in Argentina.” M-DIME Project. U.S. Army Foreign Military Studies Office.
Lucas Winter, Jason Warner, and Angel M. Villegas-Cruz. 2024. “Instruments of Russian Military Influence in Argentina.” M-DIME Project. U.S. Army Foreign Military Studies Office.
Angel M. Villegas-Cruz, “Male, U.S. Full History Professor, and China scholar: The recipe to get published in The Journal of Asian Studies, 2000-2020,” criticalasianstudies.org Commentary Board, November 15, 2022, https://doi.org/10.52698/KSEJ3511.
Book Reviews:
Angel M. Villegas-Cruz. 2024. “China and Its Small Neighbors: The Political Economy of Asymmetry, Vulnerability, and Hedging by Sung Chull Kim.” Pacific Affairs 97 (3).
Angel M. Villegas-Cruz. 2019. “读楼项飞《中国与拉美国家相互依赖模式研究》” [A Study of Sino-Latin American Interdependency Models by Lou Xiangfei]. Journal of BNU Public Administration 7.
Unpublished Works:
Boliang Zhu, Aubrey Waddick, Yilang Feng, and Angel M. Villegas-Cruz. “Firms Caught in Crossfire: International Stakes and Domestic Politics in Corporate Positioning on De-Globalization.”
Abstract
There has been a rise of protectionism and a move toward de-globalization across the globe. It is puzzling why businesses have not been more vocal opponents of protectionist policies. We examine U.S. firms’ public position taking in the U.S.-China trade war. After collecting a comprehensive dataset of firms’ public positions on the trade war, we show only 1.73 percent of large and very large U.S. firms have openly voiced opposition. One the one hand, we find larger and more productive firms, multinationals, and those more integrated in global supply chains are significantly more likely to openly oppose the imposition of tariffs. On the other hand, firms located in Republican districts are significantly less likely to do so. Our study is among the first to document firms’ positioning in a high-profile trade war. We demonstrate a critical role of domestic politics in silencing firms’ public opposition, which has important implications for globalization.Boliang Zhu, Angel M. Villegas-Cruz, and Aubrey Waddick. “Liberalization for Sale: The Politics of Tariff Exclusions.”
Abstract
We propose and test an argument of liberalization for sale, akin to “protection for sale” (Grossman and Helpman 1994). In a new world where protectionism is the status quo, trade liberalization becomes a highly valuable private benefit, and it is targetable to specific constituents for political gains. Empirically, we examine the tariff exclusion process in the high-profile U.S.-China trade war. We build a novel data set of firms’ tariff exclusion requests and exemptions for the universe of large and very large U.S. firms. We show that firms’ decisions of submitting tariff exclusion requests are both economically and politically motivated. Yet, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative’s tariff exclusion process is highly politicized and its decision of granting a tariff exclusion is primarily politically driven. Tariff exclusions are used to shore up political support in pivotal swing districts and to reward firms that are politically connected to the president’s co-partisans.Angel M. Villegas-Cruz. “Who Is Writing and What Are They writing About? Text Analysis and Publication Patterns in The Journal of Asian Studies, 2000-2020.”