Media of the People's Republic of China
Encyclopedia
Media of the People's Republic of China (alternatively Media of China, Chinese Media) primarily consists of television, newspapers, radio, and magazines. Since 2000, the Internet has also emerged as an important communications medium.
Since the founding of the People's Republic in 1949 and until the 1980s, almost all media in China were state-run. Independent media only began to emerge at the onset of economic reforms, although state-run media outlets such as Xinhua, CCTV
, and People's Daily
continue to hold significant market share. Independent media that operate within the PRC (excluding Hong Kong and Macao
, which have separate media regulatory bodies) are no longer required to strictly follow journalistic guidelines set by the government. However, regulatory agencies, such as the General Administration of Press and Publication
(GAPP) and the State Administration of Radio, Film, and Television
(SARFT), continue to set strict regulations on subjects considered taboo by the government, including but not limited to the legitimacy of the Communist Party, government policies in Tibet and Xinjiang, pornography, and the banned spiritual group Falun Gong
.
In spite of heavy government monitoring, however, Chinese media has become increasingly commercialized, with growing competition, diversified content, and an increase in investigative reporting. Areas such as sports, finance, and an increasingly lucrative entertainment industry face little regulation from the government. Media controls were most relaxed during the 1980s under Deng Xiaoping, until they were tightened in the aftermath of the 1989 Tiananmen Square Protests. They were relaxed again under Jiang Zemin
in the late 1990s, but the growing influence of the Internet and its potential to encourage dissent led to heavier regulations again under the government of Hu Jintao
. Reporters Without Borders
consistently ranks China very poorly on media freedoms in their annual releases of the Press Freedom Index
, calling the Chinese government as having "the sorry distinction of leading the world in repression of the Internet". For 2010, China ranked 168 out of 178 nations.
, and the largest media organizations (namely CCTV
, the People's Daily
, and Xinhua
) are agencies of the Party-State. Media taboo
s include topics such as the legitimacy of the Communist Party of China
, the governance of Tibet
, and Falun Gong
. Within those restrictions there is a diversity of the media and fairly open discussion of social issues and policy options within the parameters set by the Party.
The diversity in mainland Chinese media is partly because most state media
outlets are no longer heavily subsidized by the government, and are expected to pay for themselves through commercial advertising. They can no longer merely serve as mouthpieces of the government, but also need to attract advertising through programming that people find attractive. While the government issuse directive
s defining what can be published, it does not prevent, and in fact encourages outlets to compete for viewers and advertising. Financial incentives are also used to control journalists' behavior.
Government control of information can be ineffective in other ways. Despite government restrictions, much information is gathered either at the local level or from foreign sources and passed on through personal conversations and text messaging. The withdrawal of government media subsidies has caused many newspapers (including some owned by the Communist Party) in tabloid
s to take bold editorial stands critical of the government, as the necessity to attract readers and avoid bankruptcy has been a more pressing fear than government repression
.
In addition, the traditional means of media control have proven extremely ineffective against newer forms of communication, most notably text messaging.
Although the government can and does use laws against state secret
s to censor
press
reports about social and political conditions, these laws have not prevented the press from all discussion of Chinese social issues. As a result even papers which are nominally owned by the Communist Party are sometimes very bold at reporting social issues. However both commercial pressures and government restrictions have tended to cause newspapers to focus on lurid scandal
s often involving local officials who have relatively little political cover, and Chinese newspapers tend to lack depth in analysis of political events, as this tends to be more politically sensitive.
Among social issues first reported in the press of mainland China include the AIDS epidemic in Henan
province, the unsafe state of mines in mainland China. In addition, the SARS
coverup was first revealed by a fax to CCTV which was forwarded to Western news media.
report in 2003, there are about 35 TVs for every 100 people. Roughly a billion Chinese have access to television. Similarly, in 1965 there were 12 television and 93 radio stations in mainland China; today there are approximately 700 conventional television stations—plus about 3,000 cable
channels
—and 1,000 radio stations.
Television broadcasting is controlled by China Central Television
(CCTV), which, with its 16 program channels, is the country's only national network. CCTV, which employs about 10,000 people and has an annual income of ¥1,120mln yuan (2004,=$138mln), falls under the dual supervision of the Propaganda Department, responsible ultimately for media content, and the State Administration of Radio, Film, and Television
, which oversees operations. A Vice Minister in the latter ministry serves as chairman of CCTV. The network's principal directors and other officers are appointed by the State. So are the top officials at local conventional television stations in mainland China—nearly all of which are restricted to broadcasting within their own province or municipality—that receive CCTV broadcasts.
CCTV produces its own news broadcasts three times a day and is the country's most powerful and prolific television program producer. It also has a monopoly on purchases of programming from overseas. All local stations are required to carry CCTV's 7 pm main news broadcast; an internal CCTV survey indicates that nearly 500 million people countrywide regularly watch this program.
Even if CCTV is the most powerful network of mainland China, it has only about 30% of audience share all over the national territory. The fact shows how the Chinese viewers are biased in favour of local TV programs, that are more likely to represent the differences of an audience that is the largest in the world, more than the national or even international programs, that can hardly attend the needs of such a wide public.
Since September 1, 2006, the Chinese government has banned foreign-produced animation between the hours of 5:00 to 8:00 pm on state-run television to protect struggling Chinese animation studios that have been affected by the popularity of such cartoons.
The number of newspapers in mainland China has increased from 42—virtually all Communist Party papers—in 1968 to 382 in 1980 and more than 2,200 today. By one official estimate, there are now more than 7,000 magazines and journals in the country. The number of copies of daily and weekly newspapers and magazines in circulation grew fourfold between the mid-1960s and the mid-to-late 1980s, reaching 310 million by 1987. (2)
These figures, moreover, underreport actual circulation, because many publishers use their own distribution networks rather than official dissemination channels and also deliberately understate figures to avoid taxes. (3) In addition, some 25,000 printing houses and hundreds of individual bookstores produce and sell nonofficial material—mostly romance literature
and pornography but also political and intellectual
journals.
China has many newspapers but the front runners are all State-run: the People's Daily
, Beijing Daily, Guangming Daily
and the Liberation Daily. The two major news agencies in China are Xinhua News Agency and the China News Service. Xinhua was given power to censor and edit the news of the foreign agencies in 2007. Some saw the power of Xinhua as making the press freedom weak and it allowed Xinhua to control the news market fully.
Much of the information collected by the Chinese mainstream media is published in neican
s (internal, limited circulation report
s prepared for the high-ranking government officials), not in the public outlets.
's death in 1976 and the subsequent emergence of Deng Xiaoping
(who died in February 1997) as the country's paramount leader, an overall climate of economic and social reform in mainland China has been reflected in media content.
A prime example of the liberalisation has been the party's flagship newspaper, People's Daily, which had been rigidly controlled under Mao, used against his enemies, and copied verbatim by every other newspaper in the country during the Cultural Revolution
. This leading daily was reformed and enlivened in the late 1970s and early-to-middle 1980s by then editor-in-chief Hu Jiwei. Hu expanded the paper's size and coverage, encouraged public criticism through letters to the editor, called for promulgation of a press law to spell out journalists' rights, and introduced a sprightlier writing style.
Nevertheless, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) reported that China "continues to be the world's leading jailer of journalists," with 42 imprisoned journalists at the end of 2004, and accuses private companies, both foreign and domestic, of having been complacent toward or complicit with government censorship. Also, in their Worldwide Press Freedom Index 2007 , Reporters Without Borders
ranked China 163rd (or 7th from bottom) in terms of press freedom. Freedom House
issued a report in 2006 claiming that the Internet is still closely monitored by the state, with access to websites and publications critical of the government being restricted, as well as foreign satellite television and radio broadcasts being censored.
In preparation of the 17th National Party Congress
in 2007, new restrictions were placed on all sectors of the press, Internet-users, bloggers, website managers, foreign journalist, more than 30 of which have been arrested since the start of the year. In addition, a thousand discussion forums and websites have been shut down, and "a score of dissidents" have been imprisoned since July 2007.
In efforts to stem growing unrest in China, the propaganda chief of the State Council, Hua Qing, announced in the People's Daily
that the government was drafting a new press law that would lessen government involvement in the news media. In the editorial, CPC General secretary, President Hu Jintao was said to have visited the People's Daily offices and said that large scale public incidents should be "accurately, objectively and uniformly reported, with no tardiness, deception, incompleteness or distortion". Recent reports by Chinese media indicate a gradual release from party control. For example, the detention of anti-government petitioners placed in mental institutions was reported in a state newspaper, later criticised in an editoral by the English language China Daily
. Scholars and journalists believe that such reports are a small sign of opening up in the media.
, freedom of the press
, and universal human rights. They also have reported on a myriad of previously untouched social and lifestyle subjects. The only inviolable restrictions appear to be an unwritten ban on challenges to the party's right to rule and to the legitimacy and decision-making authority of top party leaders.
in mainland China allows a much freer exchange of views than other media formats. In effect, talk radio has shifted the paradigm
from authorities addressing the people to people addressing the authorities.
Chinese journalists in Hong Kong on occasion have written politically controversial articles for mainland intellectual journals without encountering problems. Such opportunities have abounded because of the range of publications on the Chinese mainland
and because party officials there are too busy with weightier matters to review such journals systematically.
, have been important reasons for the dramatic expansion of the media and the diversification of coverage.
and systems of belief; growing Chinese popular skepticism
toward authority; increased contact with the West; greater competition in the media market; ebbing government resources; improved professional training for journalists; and new communication technologies.
s and has made it harder for the authorities to penalize the media for publishing material that is not strictly consistent with Marxist theory. Although Marxism remains the official doctrine
of the PRC, the de-emphasis of ideology has strengthened the media's hand in two fundamental ways: it has helped undercut government efforts to indoctrinate the public and micromanage the content of political and social reporting in the media, and it has opened the door for the media to pursue capitalist marketing practices that respond to customer wants and bring increasing financial independence from the State.
Other practices that are emerging in mainland China, such as decision making
based on verifiable data and stronger quality controls on information, also have helped dilute the impact of ideology. In a change driven by the dual need for scientists to have reliable data with which to work and for the business sector to use in making investment and commercial decisions, the State Statistical Board since the mid-1980s has gained increased power to acquire and disseminate data for media and business use, reducing or eliminating the hither to common practice in which each sector used "its own" data.
(often indirect and carefully couched) of the State and slowly diluting the legitimacy of the party . This rise in skepticism is reported by informed observers to be occurring all across East Asia. Such observers point to increased publicity given to cases of official corruption, malfeasance
, and ineptness—along with broader declines in social values such as civility and respect—as at least partly responsible for greater media and popular doubts about elected and appointed officials as compared to the past. At the same time, public skepticism of authority can and often does include skepticism toward the media themselves. Journalists, like individuals in other sectors of the mainland Chinese society, are far less willing than in the past to submit blindly to authority. Journalists were active participants in the 1989 demonstrations that culminated in the events at Tiananmen Square
. The Tiananmen episode made it all but impossible to reconcile the growing desire of mainland Chinese journalists for control over their own profession with the party's interest in not letting that happen. There have even been occasional acts of open, outright defiance of the party, though these acts remain rare.
, freedom of speech
, and political pluralism . This phenomenon
is consistent with trends elsewhere in East Asia, where principles such as freedom of expression and legal guarantees of individual rights are playing a growing role. Perhaps most interestingly, many mainland Chinese journalists trained or educated in the West appear to have an outlook that is much closer to Western ideals of media freedom than to the attitudes of other Chinese, although a gap persists between mainland China and the West in professionalism and in grasping the principles of objective journalism.
Virtually all foreign reporters in mainland China operate under restrictions that are considerably more severe than in most Asian countries. One result is that Western media influence on mainland Chinese media organizations as a whole is generally limited. Nonetheless, the contacts that do occur are having an impact on individual mainland Chinese journalists, according to people interviewed for this study. In particular, one observer noted that younger reporters who have measurable, if cautious, contact with the West generally show minimal trust in official sources of information, are inclined to discount propaganda, and are determined to be comprehensive in their reporting.
Since the founding of the People's Republic in 1949 and until the 1980s, almost all media in China were state-run. Independent media only began to emerge at the onset of economic reforms, although state-run media outlets such as Xinhua, CCTV
China Central Television
China Central Television or Chinese Central Television, commonly abbreviated as CCTV, is the major state television broadcaster in mainland China. CCTV has a network of 19 channels broadcasting different programmes and is accessible to more than one billion viewers...
, and People's Daily
People's Daily
The People's Daily is a daily newspaper in the People's Republic of China. The paper is an organ of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China , published worldwide with a circulation of 3 to 4 million. In addition to its main Chinese-language edition, it has editions in English,...
continue to hold significant market share. Independent media that operate within the PRC (excluding Hong Kong and Macao
Mação
Mação is a municipality in Portugal with a total area of 400.0 km² and a total population of 7,763 inhabitants.The municipality is composed of eight parishes, and is located in the Santarém District....
, which have separate media regulatory bodies) are no longer required to strictly follow journalistic guidelines set by the government. However, regulatory agencies, such as the General Administration of Press and Publication
General Administration of Press and Publication
General Administration of Press and Publication is the administrative agency responsible for regulating and distribution news, print and Internet publications in China. This include granting publication licenses for periodicals and books...
(GAPP) and the State Administration of Radio, Film, and Television
State Administration of Radio, Film, and Television
The State Administration of Radio, Film, and Television is an executive branch under the State Council of the People's Republic of China...
(SARFT), continue to set strict regulations on subjects considered taboo by the government, including but not limited to the legitimacy of the Communist Party, government policies in Tibet and Xinjiang, pornography, and the banned spiritual group Falun Gong
Falun Gong
Falun Gong is a spiritual discipline first introduced in China in 1992 by its founder, Li Hongzhi, through public lectures. It combines the practice of meditation and slow-moving qigong exercises with the moral philosophy...
.
In spite of heavy government monitoring, however, Chinese media has become increasingly commercialized, with growing competition, diversified content, and an increase in investigative reporting. Areas such as sports, finance, and an increasingly lucrative entertainment industry face little regulation from the government. Media controls were most relaxed during the 1980s under Deng Xiaoping, until they were tightened in the aftermath of the 1989 Tiananmen Square Protests. They were relaxed again under Jiang Zemin
Jiang Zemin
Jiang Zemin is a former Chinese politician, who served as General Secretary of the Communist Party of China from 1989 to 2002, as President of the People's Republic of China from 1993 to 2003, and as Chairman of the Central Military Commission from 1989 to 2005...
in the late 1990s, but the growing influence of the Internet and its potential to encourage dissent led to heavier regulations again under the government of Hu Jintao
Hu Jintao
Hu Jintao is the current Paramount Leader of the People's Republic of China. He has held the titles of General Secretary of the Communist Party of China since 2002, President of the People's Republic of China since 2003, and Chairman of the Central Military Commission since 2004, succeeding Jiang...
. Reporters Without Borders
Reporters Without Borders
Reporters Without Borders is a France-based international non-governmental organization that advocates freedom of the press. It was founded in 1985, by Robert Ménard, Rony Brauman and the journalist Jean-Claude Guillebaud. Jean-François Julliard has served as Secretary General since 2008...
consistently ranks China very poorly on media freedoms in their annual releases of the Press Freedom Index
Press Freedom Index
The Press Freedom Index is an annual ranking of countries compiled and published by Reporters Without Borders based upon the organization's assessment of their press freedom records. Small countries, such as Andorra, are excluded from this report...
, calling the Chinese government as having "the sorry distinction of leading the world in repression of the Internet". For 2010, China ranked 168 out of 178 nations.
History
The government is heavily involved in the media in the PRCPeople's Republic of China
China , officially the People's Republic of China , is the most populous country in the world, with over 1.3 billion citizens. Located in East Asia, the country covers approximately 9.6 million square kilometres...
, and the largest media organizations (namely CCTV
China Central Television
China Central Television or Chinese Central Television, commonly abbreviated as CCTV, is the major state television broadcaster in mainland China. CCTV has a network of 19 channels broadcasting different programmes and is accessible to more than one billion viewers...
, the People's Daily
People's Daily
The People's Daily is a daily newspaper in the People's Republic of China. The paper is an organ of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China , published worldwide with a circulation of 3 to 4 million. In addition to its main Chinese-language edition, it has editions in English,...
, and Xinhua
Xinhua News Agency
The Xinhua News Agency is the official press agency of the government of the People's Republic of China and the biggest center for collecting information and press conferences in the PRC. It is the largest news agency in the PRC, ahead of the China News Service...
) are agencies of the Party-State. Media taboo
Taboo
A taboo is a strong social prohibition relating to any area of human activity or social custom that is sacred and or forbidden based on moral judgment, religious beliefs and or scientific consensus. Breaking the taboo is usually considered objectionable or abhorrent by society...
s include topics such as the legitimacy of the Communist Party of China
Communist Party of China
The Communist Party of China , also known as the Chinese Communist Party , is the founding and ruling political party of the People's Republic of China...
, the governance of Tibet
Tibet
Tibet is a plateau region in Asia, north-east of the Himalayas. It is the traditional homeland of the Tibetan people as well as some other ethnic groups such as Monpas, Qiang, and Lhobas, and is now also inhabited by considerable numbers of Han and Hui people...
, and Falun Gong
Falun Gong
Falun Gong is a spiritual discipline first introduced in China in 1992 by its founder, Li Hongzhi, through public lectures. It combines the practice of meditation and slow-moving qigong exercises with the moral philosophy...
. Within those restrictions there is a diversity of the media and fairly open discussion of social issues and policy options within the parameters set by the Party.
The diversity in mainland Chinese media is partly because most state media
State media
State media or state-owned media is media for mass communication which is ultimately controlled and/or funded by the state. These news outlets may be the sole media outlet or may exist in competition with privately-controlled media.-Overview:...
outlets are no longer heavily subsidized by the government, and are expected to pay for themselves through commercial advertising. They can no longer merely serve as mouthpieces of the government, but also need to attract advertising through programming that people find attractive. While the government issuse directive
Directive
Directive may refer to:* Directive , a legislative act of the European Union* Directive , a highly-acclaimed poem by Robert Frost...
s defining what can be published, it does not prevent, and in fact encourages outlets to compete for viewers and advertising. Financial incentives are also used to control journalists' behavior.
Government control of information can be ineffective in other ways. Despite government restrictions, much information is gathered either at the local level or from foreign sources and passed on through personal conversations and text messaging. The withdrawal of government media subsidies has caused many newspapers (including some owned by the Communist Party) in tabloid
Chinese tabloid
Chinese tabloid refers to a newspaper format that became extremely popular in the People's Republic of China in the mid-1990s. Like tabloids in the rest of the world, they focus on sensationalism and scandal, but in the context of media in China this has the effect of challenging government limits...
s to take bold editorial stands critical of the government, as the necessity to attract readers and avoid bankruptcy has been a more pressing fear than government repression
Political repression
Political repression is the persecution of an individual or group for political reasons, particularly for the purpose of restricting or preventing their ability to take political life of society....
.
In addition, the traditional means of media control have proven extremely ineffective against newer forms of communication, most notably text messaging.
Although the government can and does use laws against state secret
State Secret
State Secret is a 1950 British drama film directed by Sidney Gilliat and starring Douglas Fairbanks Jr., Jack Hawkins, Glynis Johns and Herbert Lom. It was released in the United States under the title The Great Manhunt.-Cast:...
s to censor
Censorship
thumb|[[Book burning]] following the [[1973 Chilean coup d'état|1973 coup]] that installed the [[Military government of Chile |Pinochet regime]] in Chile...
press
News
News is the communication of selected information on current events which is presented by print, broadcast, Internet, or word of mouth to a third party or mass audience.- Etymology :...
reports about social and political conditions, these laws have not prevented the press from all discussion of Chinese social issues. As a result even papers which are nominally owned by the Communist Party are sometimes very bold at reporting social issues. However both commercial pressures and government restrictions have tended to cause newspapers to focus on lurid scandal
Scandal
A scandal is a widely publicized allegation or set of allegations that damages the reputation of an institution, individual or creed...
s often involving local officials who have relatively little political cover, and Chinese newspapers tend to lack depth in analysis of political events, as this tends to be more politically sensitive.
Among social issues first reported in the press of mainland China include the AIDS epidemic in Henan
Henan
Henan , is a province of the People's Republic of China, located in the central part of the country. Its one-character abbreviation is "豫" , named after Yuzhou , a Han Dynasty state that included parts of Henan...
province, the unsafe state of mines in mainland China. In addition, the SARS
Severe acute respiratory syndrome
Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome is a respiratory disease in humans which is caused by the SARS coronavirus . Between November 2002 and July 2003 an outbreak of SARS in Hong Kong nearly became a pandemic, with 8,422 cases and 916 deaths worldwide according to the WHO...
coverup was first revealed by a fax to CCTV which was forwarded to Western news media.
Television
In 1978, the PRC had less than one television receiver per 100 people, and fewer than ten million Chinese had access to a television set. According to a World BankWorld Bank
The World Bank is an international financial institution that provides loans to developing countries for capital programmes.The World Bank's official goal is the reduction of poverty...
report in 2003, there are about 35 TVs for every 100 people. Roughly a billion Chinese have access to television. Similarly, in 1965 there were 12 television and 93 radio stations in mainland China; today there are approximately 700 conventional television stations—plus about 3,000 cable
Cable television
Cable television is a system of providing television programs to consumers via radio frequency signals transmitted to televisions through coaxial cables or digital light pulses through fixed optical fibers located on the subscriber's property, much like the over-the-air method used in traditional...
channels
Channel (communications)
In telecommunications and computer networking, a communication channel, or channel, refers either to a physical transmission medium such as a wire, or to a logical connection over a multiplexed medium such as a radio channel...
—and 1,000 radio stations.
Television broadcasting is controlled by China Central Television
China Central Television
China Central Television or Chinese Central Television, commonly abbreviated as CCTV, is the major state television broadcaster in mainland China. CCTV has a network of 19 channels broadcasting different programmes and is accessible to more than one billion viewers...
(CCTV), which, with its 16 program channels, is the country's only national network. CCTV, which employs about 10,000 people and has an annual income of ¥1,120mln yuan (2004,=$138mln), falls under the dual supervision of the Propaganda Department, responsible ultimately for media content, and the State Administration of Radio, Film, and Television
State Administration of Radio, Film, and Television
The State Administration of Radio, Film, and Television is an executive branch under the State Council of the People's Republic of China...
, which oversees operations. A Vice Minister in the latter ministry serves as chairman of CCTV. The network's principal directors and other officers are appointed by the State. So are the top officials at local conventional television stations in mainland China—nearly all of which are restricted to broadcasting within their own province or municipality—that receive CCTV broadcasts.
CCTV produces its own news broadcasts three times a day and is the country's most powerful and prolific television program producer. It also has a monopoly on purchases of programming from overseas. All local stations are required to carry CCTV's 7 pm main news broadcast; an internal CCTV survey indicates that nearly 500 million people countrywide regularly watch this program.
Even if CCTV is the most powerful network of mainland China, it has only about 30% of audience share all over the national territory. The fact shows how the Chinese viewers are biased in favour of local TV programs, that are more likely to represent the differences of an audience that is the largest in the world, more than the national or even international programs, that can hardly attend the needs of such a wide public.
Since September 1, 2006, the Chinese government has banned foreign-produced animation between the hours of 5:00 to 8:00 pm on state-run television to protect struggling Chinese animation studios that have been affected by the popularity of such cartoons.
Newspapers and journals
These figures, moreover, underreport actual circulation, because many publishers use their own distribution networks rather than official dissemination channels and also deliberately understate figures to avoid taxes. (3) In addition, some 25,000 printing houses and hundreds of individual bookstores produce and sell nonofficial material—mostly romance literature
Romance novel
The romance novel is a literary genre developed in Western culture, mainly in English-speaking countries. Novels in this genre place their primary focus on the relationship and romantic love between two people, and must have an "emotionally satisfying and optimistic ending." Through the late...
and pornography but also political and intellectual
Intellectual
An intellectual is a person who uses intelligence and critical or analytical reasoning in either a professional or a personal capacity.- Terminology and endeavours :"Intellectual" can denote four types of persons:...
journals.
China has many newspapers but the front runners are all State-run: the People's Daily
People's Daily
The People's Daily is a daily newspaper in the People's Republic of China. The paper is an organ of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China , published worldwide with a circulation of 3 to 4 million. In addition to its main Chinese-language edition, it has editions in English,...
, Beijing Daily, Guangming Daily
Guangming Daily (China)
The Guangming Daily was launched on June 16, 1949 by the China Democratic League, and is a nationwide comprehensive newspaper based in Beijing. Its sponsorship was shifted to various democratic parties in China and the China Federation of Industry and Commerce in 1953...
and the Liberation Daily. The two major news agencies in China are Xinhua News Agency and the China News Service. Xinhua was given power to censor and edit the news of the foreign agencies in 2007. Some saw the power of Xinhua as making the press freedom weak and it allowed Xinhua to control the news market fully.
Much of the information collected by the Chinese mainstream media is published in neican
Neican
Neican , lit. internal reference reports or internal reference materials) are internal, limited circulation reports prepared for the high-ranking Chinese government officials....
s (internal, limited circulation report
Report
A report is a textual work made with the specific intention of relaying information or recounting certain events in a widely presentable form....
s prepared for the high-ranking government officials), not in the public outlets.
Regulators
The media and communications industry in mainland China is administered by various government agencies and regulators. The principal mechanism for forcing media organizations to comply with CCP wishes is the vertically organized nomenklatura system of cadre appointments, and includes those in charge of the media industry.- State Administration of Radio, Film, and TelevisionState Administration of Radio, Film, and TelevisionThe State Administration of Radio, Film, and Television is an executive branch under the State Council of the People's Republic of China...
– administers and overseer the administration of state-owned enterprises involved in the radio, television and broadcasting industry.
- Ministry of Industry and Information Technology – administers the physical communications infrastructure and the Internet service providers.
- General Administration of Press and PublicationGeneral Administration of Press and PublicationGeneral Administration of Press and Publication is the administrative agency responsible for regulating and distribution news, print and Internet publications in China. This include granting publication licenses for periodicals and books...
– administers the newspaper, periodical, video and audio media and news industry.
- Ministry of Public SecurityMinistry of Public SecurityMinistry of Public Security can refer to:* Ministry of Public Security of Burundi* Ministry of Public Security of the People's Republic of China* Ministry of Public Security of Costa Rica* Ministry of Public Security of Israel...
's Cyber Police force – agency for regulating online content and investigation of Internet fraud, scams and pornography.
Media reform
The media in mainland China also are becoming more autonomous and more diverse. Since Mao ZedongMao Zedong
Mao Zedong, also transliterated as Mao Tse-tung , and commonly referred to as Chairman Mao , was a Chinese Communist revolutionary, guerrilla warfare strategist, Marxist political philosopher, and leader of the Chinese Revolution...
's death in 1976 and the subsequent emergence of Deng Xiaoping
Deng Xiaoping
Deng Xiaoping was a Chinese politician, statesman, and diplomat. As leader of the Communist Party of China, Deng was a reformer who led China towards a market economy...
(who died in February 1997) as the country's paramount leader, an overall climate of economic and social reform in mainland China has been reflected in media content.
A prime example of the liberalisation has been the party's flagship newspaper, People's Daily, which had been rigidly controlled under Mao, used against his enemies, and copied verbatim by every other newspaper in the country during the Cultural Revolution
Cultural Revolution
The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, commonly known as the Cultural Revolution , was a socio-political movement that took place in the People's Republic of China from 1966 through 1976...
. This leading daily was reformed and enlivened in the late 1970s and early-to-middle 1980s by then editor-in-chief Hu Jiwei. Hu expanded the paper's size and coverage, encouraged public criticism through letters to the editor, called for promulgation of a press law to spell out journalists' rights, and introduced a sprightlier writing style.
Nevertheless, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) reported that China "continues to be the world's leading jailer of journalists," with 42 imprisoned journalists at the end of 2004, and accuses private companies, both foreign and domestic, of having been complacent toward or complicit with government censorship. Also, in their Worldwide Press Freedom Index 2007 , Reporters Without Borders
Reporters Without Borders
Reporters Without Borders is a France-based international non-governmental organization that advocates freedom of the press. It was founded in 1985, by Robert Ménard, Rony Brauman and the journalist Jean-Claude Guillebaud. Jean-François Julliard has served as Secretary General since 2008...
ranked China 163rd (or 7th from bottom) in terms of press freedom. Freedom House
Freedom House
Freedom House is an international non-governmental organization based in Washington, D.C. that conducts research and advocacy on democracy, political freedom and human rights...
issued a report in 2006 claiming that the Internet is still closely monitored by the state, with access to websites and publications critical of the government being restricted, as well as foreign satellite television and radio broadcasts being censored.
In preparation of the 17th National Party Congress
17th National Congress of the Communist Party of China
The 17th National Congress of the Communist Party of China was held in Beijing, China, at the Great Hall of the People from 15 to 21 October 2007. The Congress marked significant shift in the political direction of the country as CPC General Secretary Hu Jintao solidified his position of leadership...
in 2007, new restrictions were placed on all sectors of the press, Internet-users, bloggers, website managers, foreign journalist, more than 30 of which have been arrested since the start of the year. In addition, a thousand discussion forums and websites have been shut down, and "a score of dissidents" have been imprisoned since July 2007.
In efforts to stem growing unrest in China, the propaganda chief of the State Council, Hua Qing, announced in the People's Daily
People's Daily
The People's Daily is a daily newspaper in the People's Republic of China. The paper is an organ of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China , published worldwide with a circulation of 3 to 4 million. In addition to its main Chinese-language edition, it has editions in English,...
that the government was drafting a new press law that would lessen government involvement in the news media. In the editorial, CPC General secretary, President Hu Jintao was said to have visited the People's Daily offices and said that large scale public incidents should be "accurately, objectively and uniformly reported, with no tardiness, deception, incompleteness or distortion". Recent reports by Chinese media indicate a gradual release from party control. For example, the detention of anti-government petitioners placed in mental institutions was reported in a state newspaper, later criticised in an editoral by the English language China Daily
China Daily
The China Daily is an English language daily newspaper published in the People's Republic of China.- Overview :China Daily was established in June 1981 and has the widest print circulation of any English-language newspaper in the country...
. Scholars and journalists believe that such reports are a small sign of opening up in the media.
Diversified content
The media's growing autonomy has been reflected in their increasingly diversified content. Since the late 1970s, despite periodic reversals, media in mainland China have frequently criticized party cadres and have published debates on such fundamental issues as the rule of lawRule of law
The rule of law, sometimes called supremacy of law, is a legal maxim that says that governmental decisions should be made by applying known principles or laws with minimal discretion in their application...
, freedom of the press
Freedom of the press
Freedom of the press or freedom of the media is the freedom of communication and expression through vehicles including various electronic media and published materials...
, and universal human rights. They also have reported on a myriad of previously untouched social and lifestyle subjects. The only inviolable restrictions appear to be an unwritten ban on challenges to the party's right to rule and to the legitimacy and decision-making authority of top party leaders.
Talk radio
Talk radioTalk radio
Talk radio is a radio format containing discussion about topical issues. Most shows are regularly hosted by a single individual, and often feature interviews with a number of different guests. Talk radio typically includes an element of listener participation, usually by broadcasting live...
in mainland China allows a much freer exchange of views than other media formats. In effect, talk radio has shifted the paradigm
Paradigm
The word paradigm has been used in science to describe distinct concepts. It comes from Greek "παράδειγμα" , "pattern, example, sample" from the verb "παραδείκνυμι" , "exhibit, represent, expose" and that from "παρά" , "beside, beyond" + "δείκνυμι" , "to show, to point out".The original Greek...
from authorities addressing the people to people addressing the authorities.
Magazines and journals
Magazines and journals published in mainland China also have become much less inhibited in their coverage. These publications appear to enjoy more freedom than newspapers, which in turn have more leeway than radio (other than talk radio) and television. Magazines now print internal police reports on jailings of religious leaders and other dissidents. The State is unwilling to shut down such publications because it worries about public reaction, is anxious to avoid drawing more popular attention to the magazines, and knows that its own resources are already stretched thin.Chinese journalists in Hong Kong on occasion have written politically controversial articles for mainland intellectual journals without encountering problems. Such opportunities have abounded because of the range of publications on the Chinese mainland
Mainland China
Mainland China, the Chinese mainland or simply the mainland, is a geopolitical term that refers to the area under the jurisdiction of the People's Republic of China . According to the Taipei-based Mainland Affairs Council, the term excludes the PRC Special Administrative Regions of Hong Kong and...
and because party officials there are too busy with weightier matters to review such journals systematically.
Greater prosperity and literacy
Mainland China's rapid economic development, as well as educational advances leading to greater literacyLiteracy
Literacy has traditionally been described as the ability to read for knowledge, write coherently and think critically about printed material.Literacy represents the lifelong, intellectual process of gaining meaning from print...
, have been important reasons for the dramatic expansion of the media and the diversification of coverage.
- Per capita gross domestic product, as measured in 1990 yuan, has increased fourfold since 1980. Rising disposable incomes have freed many Chinese from worrying about the basics of survival and provided them the wherewithal to purchase more television sets, newspaper and magazine subscriptions, and, more recently, satellite dishSatellite dishA satellite dish is a dish-shaped type of parabolic antenna designed to receive microwaves from communications satellites, which transmit data transmissions or broadcasts, such as satellite television.-Principle of operation:...
es and computers.
- Rising literacy rates have produced tens of millions of additional readers in the past decade, creating ever-expanding markets for the print media. According to UN statistics, Mainland China's adult literacy rate rose from 65.5 percent in 1982 to 81.5 percent in 1995.
Ideological and political trends
Other overarching factors that are helping to make the mainland Chinese media more autonomous and diverse include a general decline in the influence of political ideologiesIdeology
An ideology is a set of ideas that constitutes one's goals, expectations, and actions. An ideology can be thought of as a comprehensive vision, as a way of looking at things , as in common sense and several philosophical tendencies , or a set of ideas proposed by the dominant class of a society to...
and systems of belief; growing Chinese popular skepticism
Skepticism
Skepticism has many definitions, but generally refers to any questioning attitude towards knowledge, facts, or opinions/beliefs stated as facts, or doubt regarding claims that are taken for granted elsewhere...
toward authority; increased contact with the West; greater competition in the media market; ebbing government resources; improved professional training for journalists; and new communication technologies.
Weakening of ideological shackles
The waning influence of Marxist-Leninist-Maoist thought has weakened the State's ability to use the media to shape public attitudeAttitude (psychology)
An attitude is a hypothetical construct that represents an individual's degree of like or dislike for something. Attitudes are generally positive or negative views of a person, place, thing, or event— this is often referred to as the attitude object...
s and has made it harder for the authorities to penalize the media for publishing material that is not strictly consistent with Marxist theory. Although Marxism remains the official doctrine
Doctrine
Doctrine is a codification of beliefs or a body of teachings or instructions, taught principles or positions, as the body of teachings in a branch of knowledge or belief system...
of the PRC, the de-emphasis of ideology has strengthened the media's hand in two fundamental ways: it has helped undercut government efforts to indoctrinate the public and micromanage the content of political and social reporting in the media, and it has opened the door for the media to pursue capitalist marketing practices that respond to customer wants and bring increasing financial independence from the State.
Other practices that are emerging in mainland China, such as decision making
Decision making
Decision making can be regarded as the mental processes resulting in the selection of a course of action among several alternative scenarios. Every decision making process produces a final choice. The output can be an action or an opinion of choice.- Overview :Human performance in decision terms...
based on verifiable data and stronger quality controls on information, also have helped dilute the impact of ideology. In a change driven by the dual need for scientists to have reliable data with which to work and for the business sector to use in making investment and commercial decisions, the State Statistical Board since the mid-1980s has gained increased power to acquire and disseminate data for media and business use, reducing or eliminating the hither to common practice in which each sector used "its own" data.
Skepticism toward authority
Although difficult to quantify, growing skepticism toward authority in mainland China appears to be spurring public support for media criticismCriticism
Criticism is the judgement of the merits and faults of the work or actions of an individual or group by another . To criticize does not necessarily imply to find fault, but the word is often taken to mean the simple expression of an objection against prejudice, or a disapproval.Another meaning of...
(often indirect and carefully couched) of the State and slowly diluting the legitimacy of the party . This rise in skepticism is reported by informed observers to be occurring all across East Asia. Such observers point to increased publicity given to cases of official corruption, malfeasance
Malfeasance
The expressions misfeasance and nonfeasance, and occasionally malfeasance, are used in English law with reference to the discharge of public obligations existing by common law, custom or statute.-Definition and relevant rules of law:...
, and ineptness—along with broader declines in social values such as civility and respect—as at least partly responsible for greater media and popular doubts about elected and appointed officials as compared to the past. At the same time, public skepticism of authority can and often does include skepticism toward the media themselves. Journalists, like individuals in other sectors of the mainland Chinese society, are far less willing than in the past to submit blindly to authority. Journalists were active participants in the 1989 demonstrations that culminated in the events at Tiananmen Square
Tiananmen Square protests of 1989
The Tiananmen Square protests of 1989, also known as the June Fourth Incident in Chinese , were a series of demonstrations in and near Tiananmen Square in Beijing in the People's Republic of China beginning on 15 April 1989...
. The Tiananmen episode made it all but impossible to reconcile the growing desire of mainland Chinese journalists for control over their own profession with the party's interest in not letting that happen. There have even been occasional acts of open, outright defiance of the party, though these acts remain rare.
Contact with the West
Closer and more varied contact with the West appears to be increasingly influencing educated urban opinion in mainland China on concepts such as a free pressFreedom of the press
Freedom of the press or freedom of the media is the freedom of communication and expression through vehicles including various electronic media and published materials...
, freedom of speech
Freedom of speech
Freedom of speech is the freedom to speak freely without censorship. The term freedom of expression is sometimes used synonymously, but includes any act of seeking, receiving and imparting information or ideas, regardless of the medium used...
, and political pluralism . This phenomenon
Phenomenon
A phenomenon , plural phenomena, is any observable occurrence. Phenomena are often, but not always, understood as 'appearances' or 'experiences'...
is consistent with trends elsewhere in East Asia, where principles such as freedom of expression and legal guarantees of individual rights are playing a growing role. Perhaps most interestingly, many mainland Chinese journalists trained or educated in the West appear to have an outlook that is much closer to Western ideals of media freedom than to the attitudes of other Chinese, although a gap persists between mainland China and the West in professionalism and in grasping the principles of objective journalism.
Virtually all foreign reporters in mainland China operate under restrictions that are considerably more severe than in most Asian countries. One result is that Western media influence on mainland Chinese media organizations as a whole is generally limited. Nonetheless, the contacts that do occur are having an impact on individual mainland Chinese journalists, according to people interviewed for this study. In particular, one observer noted that younger reporters who have measurable, if cautious, contact with the West generally show minimal trust in official sources of information, are inclined to discount propaganda, and are determined to be comprehensive in their reporting.
Market competition
Intense competition for the media market is among the most important factors behind the emergence of more diverse and autonomous media in China. As indicated earlier in this study, efforts by the Chinese media to respond to an increasingly demanding print and broadcast market have created an expanding spectrum of media products ranging from serious news journalism to purely entertainment stories. Monetary rewards for meeting such demands continue to grow, resulting in greater financial autonomy for the growing numbers of Chinese media firms that win sizable market shares. As a result, these companies are able to hire and retain more and better journalists, further boosting their capacity to compete. Commercialization thus has been a major liberating force for the media in China. The regimeRegime
The word regime refers to a set of conditions, most often of a political nature.-Politics:...
is far less able than before to wield financial leverage over the media, which have increasingly become self-supporting through advertising revenues and circulation. According to one estimate, advertising in all media forms increased 35-fold between 1981 and 1992. Print ad revenues jumped ten times between 1990 and 1995—from 1.5 billion yuan to 15 billion yuan.
Television revenues also are growing dramatically: they totaled about $2 billion in 1995 and are expected to rise above $6 billion by 2005. In 1995, China Central Television earned nearly $150 million in advertising revenue, covering almost 90 percent of its total costs. In the past, radio and television tended to run well behind the print press in their news coverage. More recently, television has come under market pressure to be as timely, informative, and responsive as the print media.
Competition from outside mainland China has further impelled domestic media organizations to become more diverse, assertive, and skeptical of official authority. For example, in order to compete against Hong Kong radio stations that could be heard in Guangdong Province
Guangdong
Guangdong is a province on the South China Sea coast of the People's Republic of China. The province was previously often written with the alternative English name Kwangtung Province...
, Guangdong radio managers created Pearl River Economic Radio (PRER) in 1986. PRER, copying Hong Kong radio's approach, began to emphasize daily life, entertainment, "celebrity" deejay
Deejay
A deejay is a reggae or dancehall musician who sings and toasts to an instrumental riddim .Deejays are not to be confused with disc jockeys from other music genres like hip-hop, where they select and play music. Dancehall/reggae DJs who select riddims to play are called selectors...
s, and caller phone-in segments, while eliminating ideological, preachy formats that included little information beyond what was provided by government sources. By 1987, PRER had obtained 55 percent of the Guangdong market; previously, Hong Kong radio stations had held 90 percent of this market. Local party cadre in southern China reportedly are unhappy about PRER, mainly because some of the station's commentators, as well as its talk radio programs, highlight party failures and the misdeeds of individual party members in the region.
The top national Chinese Communist Party papers (People's Daily, Guangming Daily, and Economic Daily)—which mostly feature party speeches, announcements, propaganda, and policy viewpoints—are steadily losing circulation and much-sought advertising revenues to evening municipal papers that have far more diverse content. For example, People's Daily's circulation fell from 3.1 million copies a day in 1990 to 2.2 million in 1995; the paper's 1994 advertising revenues were down as well. Moreover, its subscriptions consist overwhelmingly of mandatory ones by party and government organizations. Similarly, the Liberation Army Daily has become almost entirely dependent on State subsidies. Its circulation has fallen from 1.7 million in 1981 to fewer than 500,000 at present.
By contrast, the circulation of the Xinmin Evening News, operated by the Shanghai Municipal Government, has risen from 1.3 million to 1.7 million over the same time period. The Guangzhou Daily, owned by the Guangzhou Municipal Government, doubled its circulation in six years to 600,000 in 1994, and its ad revenues also were up.
Improvements in personnel
The media also have attracted and are retaining more competent people than before. Journalism is widely seen as a more promising career field than in the past, while government work has lost much of its allure as other opportunities open up. At the same time, the explosion of business and entrepreneurial opportunities in recent years has complicated efforts by both the media and the government to attract good people. Journalism and government both face stiff competition from the relatively high salaries and profits available in the business sector. But the rising popularity and profitability of metropolitanMetropolitan area
The term metropolitan area refers to a region consisting of a densely populated urban core and its less-populated surrounding territories, sharing industry, infrastructure, and housing. A metropolitan area usually encompasses multiple jurisdictions and municipalities: neighborhoods, townships,...
evening newspapers offer the prospect that higher quality, better paid jobs in journalism will expand in the years ahead.
Improved training, more education, and higher professional standards are bolstering the skills and confidence of journalists across East Asia, better positioning media organizations to gain positions of influence in their societies. Although mainland Chinese journalists only recently have begun to participate in these opportunities, there is some evidence that such training is having an effect. Many of the young mainland Chinese journalists being trained at US and other universities and professional programs in the West have been characterized by their trainers as "smart," "aware," and devoted to the profession.
Beginning in the 1980s, it became necessary in most cases for reporters to have a college education, and often a university degree, to get good jobs with the top party newspapers. The highly profitable evening papers, sponsored in the main by municipal governments, usually also require a college education.
Cable television
Residents of the Chinese mainland now receive more than 20 outside television channels by satelliteSatellite
In the context of spaceflight, a satellite is an object which has been placed into orbit by human endeavour. Such objects are sometimes called artificial satellites to distinguish them from natural satellites such as the Moon....
, including Chinese-language services of CNN, Star TV, and the United States Information Agency. In the southern province of Guangdong, 97 percent of the households have television sets, and all—except those in a few parts of the city of Guangzhou, where reception is poor—have access to Hong Kong television through cable networks. Some local stations even intercept the signals and insert their own commercials. Beijing is unable to effectively monitor, let alone control, the illicit cable operators who have sprung up since the early 1990s. As of 1995, about 1,000 of the 3,000 cable stations in mainland China, linked to perhaps 50 million homes, were unlicensed.
Satellite dishes
The administration of satellite receivers falls under the jurisdiction of the State Administration for Radio, Film, and Television, which stipulates that foreign satellite televisions channels may only be received at high-end hotels and the homes and workplaces of foreigners. Foreign satellite televisions channels may seek approval to broadcast, but must be "friendly toward China." Foreign television news channels are, in principle, ineligible for distribution in China.Home satellite dishes are officially proscribed. Black market satellite dishes are nonetheless prolific, numbering well into the tens of millions. Chinese authorities engage in regular crackdowns to confiscate and dismantle illicit dishes, expressing concerns both over the potential for copyright infringements and over their ability receive "reactionary propaganda."
Internet
Widening Chinese use of the Internet is also undercutting government efforts to control the flow of information. According to CNNIC's 22nd Statistical Survey Report on the Internet Development in ChinaInternet in the People's Republic of China
The first connection of the mainland of the People's Republic of China with the Internet was established on between ICA Beijing and Karlsruhe University in Germany, under the leadership of Prof. Werner Zorn and Prof. Wang Yunfeng. Since then the Internet in China has grown to host the largest base...
, more than 250 million people in mainland China now have Internet access.
Since the beginning of 1996, the State has suspended all new applications from Internet service providers seeking to commence operations in the PRC; moved to put all existing Internet services under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications, the Ministry of Electronics Industry, and the State Education Commission; and attempted—without much success—to establish firewalls, limit the contents of home pages, and block access to certain Internet sites through routing
Routing
Routing is the process of selecting paths in a network along which to send network traffic. Routing is performed for many kinds of networks, including the telephone network , electronic data networks , and transportation networks...
filters. Although much of the Internet access in China is subjugate to the so-called "Great Firewall of China", which blacklists certain websites and even blocks chat sessions, it has proven relatively ineffective: there are logistical problems with a firewall over such a large network, and in most instances its effects can be negated with a simple proxy
Proxy server
In computer networks, a proxy server is a server that acts as an intermediary for requests from clients seeking resources from other servers. A client connects to the proxy server, requesting some service, such as a file, connection, web page, or other resource available from a different server...
. Government officials are worried that, as the number of Chinese homes with telephone lines grows from the present level of less than 4%, the State will become totally unable to monitor Internet access at residences.
Weakening of party controls
Over the last decade, the ways in which the Chinese Communist Party does its business—especially the introduction of reformReform movement
A reform movement is a kind of social movement that aims to make gradual change, or change in certain aspects of society, rather than rapid or fundamental changes...
s aimed at decentralizing power—have spurred greater media autonomy in several ways:
- The growth of "peripheral"—local and some regional—media. This trend has decentralized and dampened party oversight. In general, the farther reporters and media organizations are from Beijing and important provincial capitals, the greater their leeway.
- A shift toward administrative and legal regulation of the media and away from more fluid and personal oversight. Party efforts to rely on regulations rather than whim to try to control the media—as evidenced by the dozens of directives set forth when the State Press and Publications Administration was created in 1987, and by new regulations in 1990 and 1994—probably were intended to tighten party control, making it a matter of law rather than personal relationships. In fact, however, these regulations came at a time when official resources were being stretched more thinly and individual officials were becoming less willing—and less able—to enforce regulations.
- Vicissitudes of media acceptability. Since the early 1990s, the types of media coverage deemed acceptable by the regime have risen sharply. Growing uncertainties about what is allowable and what is out of bounds sometimes work in the media's favor. Often, however, these uncertainties encourage greater self-censorship among Chinese journalists and work to the benefit of the party's media control apparatus.
Provincial broadcasters increasingly are trying to identify subjects on which the party will allow them more autonomy. Recent demands—unmet thus far—by such broadcasters include seeking authority to carry international news, to contract out television and radio programming to nongovernment organizations, and to explore possibilities for quasi-private media ownership.
As State resources have become stretched more thinly, the media have found it far easier than before to print and broadcast material that falls within vaguely defined grey areas, though again, this uncertainty can also work to the advantage of the party. Officials are too few, too busy, and often too incompetent to be able to micromanage the media as in the past. Prior to the 1990s, it was common for party and government officials to participate in the actual drafting of newspaper editorials. Now, for the most part, these officials merely discuss editorial policies with newspaper managers.
In the past, prime-time news on Chinese Central Television was routinely examined, prior to airing, by the Ministry of Radio, Film, and Television. Since 1994, however, the Ministry has ceased to prescreen CCTV news programs; now the programs are examined after they have aired. The diversity and quantity of material, moreover, have compelled officials to prioritize their reviews of broadcasts; the 7:00 pm news broadcasts, for instance, receive far more attention from the authorities than does the midnight news. In another manifestation of weakening government controls, recently launched news programs such as CCTV's Focal Report and Beijing Television's Express News include moderate criticisms of the party and government and explore some controversial public topics in an effort to make programs relevant to—and more popular with—viewers.
Evidently recognizing the limits on their ability to maintain tight control over an industry that has been expanding rapidly, party leaders during the last decade have publicly acknowledged the need to establish priorities. In particular, they have spoken of the high priority attached to maintaining control over the "big media"—national party papers and central and provincial TV and radio stations.
Many PRC officials appear anxious to avoid confronting the media because they are afraid they will be accused of transgressions in newspapers, in magazines, or on television or radio. As media autonomy has expanded, print and broadcast organs have tried to flex their independence, albeit cautiously, in their coverage of State activities. Such coverage often focuses on specific government officials suspected of illegal actions and corruption.
Although the media's leverage stems mostly from officials' worries that rival insider
Insider
An insider is a member of any group of people of limited number and generally restricted access. The term is used in the context of secret, privileged, hidden or otherwise esoteric information or knowledge: an insider is a "member of the gang" and as such knows things only people in the gang...
s will use such publicity against them, it also appears to reflect growing respect within Chinese officialdom for the emerging influence of public opinion. A case in point is the Beijing Youth Daily. This paper has been punished for criticizing government actions and policies, but the authorities have stopped short of shutting it down.
Party resistance to media autonomy
Although the trend in mainland China clearly is toward greater media autonomy and diversity and away from government control and intimidation, crosscurrents of resistance persist. Powerful domestic institutions like the Central Propaganda Department and the State Administration of Radio, Film, and TelevisionState Administration of Radio, Film, and Television
The State Administration of Radio, Film, and Television is an executive branch under the State Council of the People's Republic of China...
still constrain efforts by the media to become more autonomous and politically diverse.
Efforts to reinforce party controls
Beijing still tries to compel the media to report favorably on government activities and to limit negative coverage of official policies and actions. Neither the PRC ConstitutionConstitution of the People's Republic of China
The Constitution of the People's Republic of China is the highest law within the People's Republic of China. The current version was adopted by the 5th National People's Congress on December 4, 1982 with further revisions in 1988, 1993, 1999, and 2004. Three previous state constitutions—those of...
—promulgated in 1982—nor the Communist Party-directed judiciary provides the media with meaningful legal protection from the State. Although Article 35 of the Constitution guarantees the citizens the rights of free speech, press, and assembly, in reality citizens do not have such rights. The authorities in Beijing continue to give precedence to the principles enunciated in the Constitution's preamble—including upholding Marxist-Leninist-Maoist thought and the party's leadership role.
The lack of an independent judiciary
Judiciary
The judiciary is the system of courts that interprets and applies the law in the name of the state. The judiciary also provides a mechanism for the resolution of disputes...
further hamstrings efforts by the media to mount court challenges against restrictions on media activities. The party appoints judges, and the position of the courts is merely equal to—not above—that of the bureaucracy
Bureaucracy
A bureaucracy is an organization of non-elected officials of a governmental or organization who implement the rules, laws, and functions of their institution, and are occasionally characterized by officialism and red tape.-Weberian bureaucracy:...
. Media outrage over nationally publicized criminal cases can also bring pressure on members of the judiciary to act in ways that might be contrary to their initial desires and to the best interests of the defendants.
The government uses a variety of approaches to retain some control over the media:
- It requires that newspapers be registered and attached to a government ministry, institute, research facility, labor group, or other State-sanctioned organization. Entrepreneurs cannot establish newspapers or magazines under their own names, although they reportedly have had some success in setting up research institutes and then creating publications attached to those bodies.
- It still occasionally jailPrisonA prison is a place in which people are physically confined and, usually, deprived of a range of personal freedoms. Imprisonment or incarceration is a legal penalty that may be imposed by the state for the commission of a crime...
s or fines journalists for unfavorable reporting. - It imposes other punishments when it deems that criticism has gone too far. For example, it shut down the magazine Future and Development in 1993 for publishing two articles calling for greater democracy in mainland China, and it forced the firing of the Beijing Youth Daily's editor for aggressively covering misdeeds and acts of poor judgment by party cadre.
- It continues to make clear that criticism of certain fundamental policies—such as those on PRC sovereigntySovereigntySovereignty is the quality of having supreme, independent authority over a geographic area, such as a territory. It can be found in a power to rule and make law that rests on a political fact for which no purely legal explanation can be provided...
over territories under Republic of ChinaRepublic of ChinaThe Republic of China , commonly known as Taiwan , is a unitary sovereign state located in East Asia. Originally based in mainland China, the Republic of China currently governs the island of Taiwan , which forms over 99% of its current territory, as well as Penghu, Kinmen, Matsu and other minor...
administration and TibetTibetTibet is a plateau region in Asia, north-east of the Himalayas. It is the traditional homeland of the Tibetan people as well as some other ethnic groups such as Monpas, Qiang, and Lhobas, and is now also inhabited by considerable numbers of Han and Hui people...
and on Hong Kong's future in the wake of the transfer of Hong Kong sovereignty on July 1, 1997 —are off limits. - It has set up numerous official journalists' associations—the largest is the All-China Journalist Federation, with more than 400,000 members—so that no single organization can develop major autonomous power.
- It holds weekly meetings with top newspaper editors to direct them as to what news items they want focused upon and which stories they want to go unreported. The controversial closure of the Freezing PointFreezing PointFreezing Point is a news journal in the People's Republic of China which has been the subject of controversy over its criticism of Communist Party officials and the sympathetic ear it lent to a Chinese historian who had criticized official history textbooks...
journal was generally unreported in mainland China due to government orders. - It has maintained a system of uncertainty surrounding the boundaries of acceptable reporting, encouraging self-censorship. One media researcher has written that "it is the very arbitrariness of this control regime that cows most journalists into more conservative coverage."
The government also exploits a longstanding hierarchical relationship among Chinese print and broadcast entities in seeking to maintain some control over the media. It appoints the leaders of the most powerful media institutions, and then uses these organizations to try to dominate the rest of the media countrywide.
Mainland China's media network
XinhuaXinhua News Agency
The Xinhua News Agency is the official press agency of the government of the People's Republic of China and the biggest center for collecting information and press conferences in the PRC. It is the largest news agency in the PRC, ahead of the China News Service...
(the New China News Agency) and People's Daily, the two most important print media, have status as separate government ministries; their directors sit on the party's Central Committee. Just below, hierarchically, are the two national newspapers under the control of the Propaganda Department – the Guangming Daily
Guangming Daily (China)
The Guangming Daily was launched on June 16, 1949 by the China Democratic League, and is a nationwide comprehensive newspaper based in Beijing. Its sponsorship was shifted to various democratic parties in China and the China Federation of Industry and Commerce in 1953...
and the English-language China Daily. These entities have the rank of vice ministries, as does the State Council-controlled Economic Daily. The National Propaganda Department appoints publishers, chief editors, and other key officials of the above-mentioned newspapers—plus a few others—while provincial and local party leaders make similar appointments for party papers in their jurisdictions.
In many ways, Xinhua is the fuel propelling mainland China's print media. Perhaps unique in the world because of its role, size, and reach, Xinhua reports directly to the party's Propaganda Department; employs more than 10,000 people—as compared to about 1,300 for the UK's Reuters, for example; has 107 bureaus worldwide both collecting information on other countries and dispensing information about mainland China; and maintains 31 bureaus in China—one for each province plus a military bureau. In as much as most of the newspapers in mainland China cannot afford to station correspondents abroad—or even in every province in mainland China—they rely on Xinhua feeds to fill their pages. People's Daily, for example, uses Xinhua material for approximately 25 percent of its stories.(b) Xinhua is a publisher as well as a news agency—it owns more than 20 newspapers and a dozen magazines, and it prints in Chinese, English, and four other languages.
Like other government entities, Xinhua is feeling the pinch of reduced State financial subsidies. Beijing has been cutting funding to the news agency by an average of seven percent per year over the past three years, and State funds currently cover only about 40 percent of Xinhua's costs. As a result, the agency is raising revenues through involvement in public relations, construction, and information service businesses.
In the past, Xinhua was able to attract the top young journalists emerging from the universities or otherwise newly entering the field, but it can no longer do so as easily because of the appeal and resources of other newspapers and periodicals and the greater glamour of television and radio jobs. For example, midlevel reporters for the Xinmin Evening News often are given an apartment, whereas at Xinhua and People's Daily this benefit is reserved for the most senior journalists.
Like many other media organizations, Xinhua struggled to find the "right line" to use in covering the Tiananmen Square events of April–June 1989. Although more cautious than People's Daily in its treatment of sensitive topics during that period—such as how to commemorate reformist Communist Party leader Hu Yaobang
Hu Yaobang
Hu Yaobang was a leader of the People's Republic of China who served as both Chairman and Party General Secretary. Hu joined the Chinese Communist Party in the 1930s, and rose to prominence as a comrade of Deng Xiaoping...
's April 1989 death, the then ongoing demonstrations
Demonstration (people)
A demonstration or street protest is action by a mass group or collection of groups of people in favor of a political or other cause; it normally consists of walking in a mass march formation and either beginning with or meeting at a designated endpoint, or rally, to hear speakers.Actions such as...
in Beijing and elsewhere, and basic questions of press freedom and individual rights—Xinhua gave some favorable coverage to demonstrators and intellectuals who were questioning top party leaders. Even so, many Xinhua reporters were angry with top editors for not going far enough and for suppressing stories about the Tiananmen Square crackdown. For several days after the violence on June 4, almost no one at Xinhua did any work, and journalists demonstrated inside the Agency's Beijing compound.
The role of the PRC internal media
The mainland Chinese media's internal publication system, in which certain journals are published exclusively for government and party officials, provides information and analysis not generally available to the public. The State values these internal reports because they contain much of mainland China's most sensitive, controversial, and high-quality investigative journalism.Xinhua and many other media organizations produce reports for the "internal" journals (neican
Neican
Neican , lit. internal reference reports or internal reference materials) are internal, limited circulation reports prepared for the high-ranking Chinese government officials....
s). Informed observers note that journalists generally like to write for the internal publications—typically, only the most senior or most capable print and broadcast reporters are given such opportunities—because they can write less polemical and more comprehensive stories without having to omit unwelcome details as is commonly done in the print media directed to the general public. A Chinese historian has claimed, as an example of such self-censorship
Self-censorship
Self-censorship is the act of censoring or classifying one's own work , out of fear of, or deference to, the sensibilities of others, without overt pressure from any specific party or institution of authority...
, that only a minority of China's population are aware 30 million people starved to death in the early 1960s, because the Party has never allowed the subject to be openly explored in the media. At the time, one of the Top Secret information channels through which news of what was really happening reached a select readership of high-level decision-makers was the Ministry of Public Security's Public Security Work Bulletin
Public Security Work Bulletin
Public Security Work Bulletin was a highly classified serial produced by the Ministry of Public Security of the People’s Republic of China during the disastrous Great Leap Forward, 1958-1961....
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The PRC internal media
PRC internal media
The Chinese internal document system protects officials in the People's Republic of China from being blinded by their own elaborate system of censorship....
publication system follows a strict hierarchical pattern designed to facilitate party control. A publication called Reference Information (Cankao Ziliao)—which includes translated articles from abroad as well as news and commentary by senior Xinhua reporters—is delivered by Xinhua personnel, rather than by the national mail system, to officials at the working level and above. A three-to-ten-page report called Internal Reference (Neibu Cankao) is distributed to officials at the ministerial level and higher. The most highly classified Xinhua internal reports, known as "redhead reference" (Hong Tou Cankao) reports, are issued occasionally to the top dozen or so party and government officials.
He Qinglian
He Qinglian
He Qinglian is a Chinese author and economist, most prominently known for her critical view of Chinese society and media controls in China.-Biography:...
documents in chapter four of Media Control in China, There are many grades and types of internal documents [neibu wenjian 内部文件]. Many are restricted to a certain level of official – such as county level, provincial level or down to a certain level of official in a ministry. Some Chinese journalists, including Xinhua correspondents in foreign countries, write for both the mass media and the internal media. The level of classification is tied to the administrative levels of Party and government in China. The higher the administrative level of the issuing office, generally the more secret the document is. In local government the issuing grades are province [sheng 省], region (or city directly subordinate to a province) [diqu 地区or shengzhixiashi 省直辖市] and county [xian 县]; grades within government organs are ministry [bu 部], bureau [ju 局] and office [chu 处]; in the military corps ([jun 军], division [shi 师], and regiment [tuan 团]. The most authoritative documents are drafted by the Central Committee to convey instructions from CCP leaders. Documents with Chinese Communist Party Central Committee Document [Zhonggong Zhongyang Wenjian 中共中央文件] at the top in red letters are the most authoritative.
There are signs the PRC internal media publication system is breaking down as more information becomes widely available in mainland China. A Hong Kong-based political journal circulated on the Chinese mainland has questioned the need for such a system in light of mainland China's modern telecommunications and expanding contacts with the outside world. Internal publications are becoming less exclusive; some are now being sold illegally on the street and are increasingly available to anyone with money.
Some of the internal publications have changed substantially in an effort to avoid becoming obsolete. For example, the publication News Front—started in 1957 as a weekly tool for the Communist Party to instruct journalists on what to write—no longer was limited to that function when it reappeared after the Cultural Revolution. It continued to change gradually and is now a monthly publication that serves as a professional rather than political guide for journalists.
Hong Kong
Despite the diverse and independent press which has previously existed, and the assurances of one country, two systemsOne country, two systems
"One country, two systems" is an idea originally proposed by Deng Xiaoping, then Paramount Leader of the People's Republic of China , for the reunification of China during the early 1980s...
, apprehensions have grown among Hong Kong journalists, since Hong Kong returned to PRC sovereignty in July, 1997, that Beijing would curtail their freedom to write articles on mainland China not to its liking. At the launch of a joint report published by the Hong Kong Journalists Association and Article 19 in July 2001, the Chairman of the Association said: "More and more newspapers self-censor themselves because they are controlled by either a businessman with close ties to Beijing, or part of a large enterprise, which has financial interests over the border."
Overseas Chinese press
In 2001 the Jamestown Foundation reported that China was buying into Chinese-language media in the U.S., offering free content, and leveraging advertising dollars—all to manipulate coverage.External links
- Finding News About China – includes list of links for current media information about China
- media.cn – News digest from media.cn
- The Chinese Media: More Autonomous and Diverse – Much of the information here seems to be a summary of this monograph
- Mass Media Control in Contemporary China – Freedom House article on how the Chinese government controls mass media in China
- "Information Control and Self-Censorship in the PRC and the Spread of SARS" – by a report from the U.S. Congressional-Executive Commission on China
- Internet Filtering in China in 2004–2005: A Country Study – from the Open Net Initiative http://www.opennetinitiative.net/
- China Media Project a website that generates research on China's media development
- danwei.org – a blog about Chinese media and advertising
- Pacific Epoch – an English News site covering China's Media industry, updated daily
- The Peking Duck – a blog about Chinese politics and media by a former news reporter
- EastSouthNorthWest – Hong Kong blogger Roland Soong translates and comments on PRC mass media, often comparing PRC and western media reporting on important PRC domestic developments.
- Media Control in China —
- Media Control in China revised 2006 Chinese language edition publication notice
- Discussion by professor Richard Baum on the shifts in Chinese media.