Pluralistic Geopolitical Imaginaries about Chinese Development in Global South Media: Topic Model and Fantasy Theme Analysis

Chinese modernization, as a novel practice transcending Western-centric developmental paradigms, demands theoretical articulation of its international communication mechanisms and cognitive landscapes. Grounded in the fantasy theme analysis framework, this study constructs a multi-language corpus (2012–2024) covering Chinese, French, Spanish, Arabic, Thai, and Vietnamese media from the Global South. Through the topic model LDA-Word2Vec, it deciphers the fantasy themes of Chinese modernization across four developmental phases. The findings reveal both cognitive divergences and convergences among different regional groups, collectively exhibiting a spiral evolutionary trajectory characterized by "economic narrative dominance → institutional narrative deepening → civilizational narrative emergence." While media in the Global South generally adopt neutral stances, the persistent influence of Western media’s hegemonic stances continues to shape narratives in these regions. To address this, the international communication of Chinese modernization must move beyond a unidirectional "experience export" approach. It should construct a discursive framework centered on a "developmental community of shared destiny", to dismantle Western discursive containment.