Don't underestimated the power of soft power. Even our ancestor understand this wisdom. And yes, right now PRC is lack of soft power compared to the western country.
Now, if you read some of ancient strategy that written by one of our great strategist in the past (I forget who), there was a wisdom that said like this " To win the war, one must fight with the righteous cause." I forget who. Maybe Huang Shi Gong, or Sun Tzu.
That wisdom said that "If you fight with righteous cause, the people will side with you, but if you fight to oppose it, the people will become your enemy.
It is not about light and darkness and good or evi like in the fantasy novell. But more about the power who have more soft power in the conflict compared to the other. Yes, without the hard power, soft power will be insignificant. but think about this. With hard power, you can make the other people see you seriously. Maybe even fear to you. But if added with soft power, they will see you in an awe. Even without hard power, soft power make people smile to your country, and not vice versa.
CPC won against KMT because of the soft power. They got the support of the peasants. Just compare the two of them. Who got more hard power? CPC or KMT? But at the end CPC won because they had more support from the people compared to KMT.
And guess what is the most powerful soft power in this world? Religion. Just try to bomb the mosque Al Haram in Mecca. And you'll become the enemy of all muslim in this world. All Jew think about Israel very positively, and christian people see the western countries in an awe.
Japan anime is also a sort of soft power, although not that powerful. But with that, people think about Japan differently now compared to the past.
So what about PRC soft power now? The Mao era propaganda is already out of date now. They could strike the heart of the simple peasant of their era, but can't do anything to people from the foreign country. The current CPC propaganda maybe can strike a lot of Chinese, but they lack the power to influence the people who is not Chinese or Hua ren.
What happen to Hongkong is because you lack of the soft power that can influence those ignorant kids. And the appearance of those people who adore liberalism / democracy in your country is also the proof that you need to boost your Soft Power further.
So basically, I agree that China need to seriously upgrade their soft power further. If they have an ambitious to become the world power. Well, unless you want to be branded as the evil empire by those victims of the western soft power, then improve your soft power is the answer of that.