Chinese media on the relations between government and media - Essay Example

The impact of Chinese media commercialization on the relations between government and media and the development of China's civic society In this paper, the issue of media commercialization in China is in the center of attention. Since such a reformation within the country had direct impact on different public spheres, including governmental style, media appearance, and public awareness, this process requires clarification on each stage of its development. In this context, the paper shows how Chinese media experienced commercialization from the 1978 economic reform to the present days, when the Internet has become the most prominent media type. Thus, the analysis shows that Chinese media experienced governmental tension during all the time of its commercialization, which made them completely dependent on Chinese Communist Party (CCP). In this situation, only the Internet media has power to develop civic society within the public sphere in this country. To start with, the story of Chinese media commercialization started in 1978 and formally broke the previous subsidized propaganda epoch for local media (Zhao 1998, p. 52). However, the real situation with economic reform did not change media dramatically and government saved its authoritarian mechanism of ruling national news making. Thus, current tension in the relations between Chinese government and society have a long-term story (Spence 2013, p. 700). In fact, Shirk (2011) supports this idea by providing evidence that CCP occupied all the media (including periodic, television, radio and later the Internet) within the country after 1979 (p. 1). Precisely, the fact that right after the reform (in 1979) there still existed 69 totally controlled by the government newspapers signalizes of rather remained propaganda than new type of journalism in the country (Shirk 2011, p. 7). Even though certain magazines experienced commercialization in 1980s, they originated from “politically safe” areas, like fashion and computers (Quan and Bandurski 2011, p. 40). In practice, this tendency results in cases of silence on potentially scandalous stories about Communist Party members, as it happened with Li Zhen (Bandurski and Hala 2010, p. 142). In other words, the early period of commercialization concerned only the sphere of advertising as “the new lifeblood” (Zhao 1998, p. 54). Thus, it is relevant to state that media reform happened without radical change of relations between the government and Chinese society. In this situation, further commercialization did not change the previous control of CCP over social diversity. Actually, the rapid growth for China from 2000s was a period of not only economic development but also raising moral ambiguity (Spence 2013, p. 694). As an essential part of this trend, commercialization of media supplemented the intention of Chinese government to overcome its international competitors in all the spheres. In numbers, Chinese media industry received $40.5 billion by 2005 (Quan and Bandurski 2011, p. 38). With this money, Chinese media organizations were expected to compete with foreign media companies (Shirk 2011, p. 9). After these investments and expectations, commercial publications even started to appear differently (Shirk 2011, p. 9; Quan and Bandurski 2011, p. 44). At the same time, the party did not change its three-dimensional post-Tiananmen strategy towards media, which concentrated on destabilizing media’s potential to prevent social unrest, avoiding public leadership splits, and maintaining army’s loyalty (Shirk 2011, p. 16). In this context, doctrine of “yulun jiandu” appeared as official supervision from CPP over media (Cho 2010, p. 169). In practice, the government still has influence on choosing which media companies should receive money through specific media licensing system (Quan and Bandurski 2011, p. 43). Moreover, CCP does not allow direct business involvement in news media and makes it possible for companies to take over only content production, advertising, and salaries (Zhao 1998, p. 64-65). In short, it is relevant to conclude that the overall process of media commercialization in China appeared rather as an inevitable element of party interests than an intention to create independent public sphere. Furthermore, during the 2008 Olympics and the 2010 World Expo in Shanghai Chinese government revealed care of its international image and aimed to participate in international social and sporting norms (Spence 2013, p. 695). In this situation, backwardness of Chinese media became even clearer, after this country had appeared in the center of international attention. During Beijing Olympic Games, media space evoked certain criticism, especially in the cases of Tibetan uprising, Chengdu earthquake management, and prevalence of SARS (severe acute aspiratory syndrome) (Spence 2013, p. 696). In these cases, Chinese journalists could not provide real investigations. Actually, they could not allow any revelations concerning CCP members that would inevitably stigmatize international image of their country (Quan and Bandurski 2011, p. 44-45). As Quan and Bandurski (2011) refer to this phenomenon, these discussions revealed long-term tension between control and commercialization within Chinese media industry (p. 39). Moreover, such partial investigation style Chinese journalists commonly justify by their attention to national safety and stability above personal ambitions. Due to this, Chinese journalists use watchdog reporting mostly within the borders of one city not the overall country (Cho 2010, p. 170). However, “gold ignor” of Chinese journalists tends to reveal above all the corrupted way they use media power (Bandurski and Hala 2010, p. 123-124). Therefore, international resonance of the way Chinese media actually operate reveals severe problems in journalist style and contradictions with public interest in fair watchdog media. Finally, the growing popularity of the Internet in the context of media commercialization becomes highly important. As for the issue of digital freedom, it is evident that the country represents both popularity of informational technologies and low level of the Internet openness (Spence 2013, p. 700). In 2008, China received one of the lowest ranks in terms of both freedom of press and the Internet freedom in the list created by Freedom House (Shirk 2011, p. 2-3). In particular, Chinese government banned globally popular social platforms like Twitter, Flickr, Wikipedia, Hotmail and Facebook by “Great Farewall” in the “potentially volatile periods” (Spence 2013, p. 700). In other words, there is a direct relationship between strict censorship and ambiguous events within the country. With the clear dependence of all the local media on Chinese government, certain cases of oppositional media messages gained resonance in Chinese situation. For example, Spence (2013) discusses the case of the “Chapter 08 manifesto” that criticized Chinese government, became widely popular, and is now non-available (p. 701). As Shirk (2011) explains this phenomenon, Chinese leaders are afraid of “free-flowing information” that has power to overthrow authoritarian regimes (p. 5-6). In other words, the context of internal censorship provides the Internet with even more importance, since it can spread the news about the real situation in China (Spence 2013, p. 697). Because of this, the Internet has power to sustain “real-time interaction between media, experts, and ordinary members of society” (Quan and Bandurski 2011, p. 64). Hence, it contributes to the development of civic society within Chinese borders and tends to eliminate national government from this process. Consequently, this peculiarity makes the Internet to appear as “the most potent media threat” for Chinese government (Shirk 2011, p. 13). In sum, the paper showed that Chinese media commercialization was an essential part of the government’s intention to turn the country into global leader. After preliminary period of “politically safe” advertising commercialization, the country entered the period of investing in local media companies to make them able to compete with foreign media rivals. At the same time, Chinese media never stopped being dependent on the government. In return, it caused constant dilemma between freedom and control within the media and encouraged corruption and partial investigation as the basis of local journalists’ behavior. In the given unity of journalists and politicians, only the Internet has power to establish sustainable connections within Chinese civic society. Since CCP excluded most of the globally popular online media, local Internet platforms can become specifically Chinese source of social unionization against the merger of the government and national media. References: Bandurski, D. and Hala, M. (2010). Corruption Reporting: Mapping Li Zhen’s Rise to Power. In: Bandurski, D. and Hala, M., eds., 2010. Investigative Journalism in China. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press. Pp. 127-145. Bandurski, D. and Hala, M. (2010). Media Corruption: Cashing in on Silence. In: Bandurski, D. and Hala, M., eds., 2010. Investigative Journalism in China. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press. Pp. 109-126. Cho, L-F. (2010). The Emergence of China’s Watchdog Reporting. In: Bandurski, D. and Hala, M., eds., 2010. Investigative Journalism in China. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press. Pp. 165-173. Quan, G. and Bandurski, D. (2011). China’s Emerging Public Sphere: The Impact of Media Commercialization, Professionalism, and the Internet in an Era of Transition. In: Shirk, S., ed., 2011. Changing Media, Changing Media. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Pp. 38-76. Shirk, S. (2010). Changing Media, Changing China. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Spence, J. (2013). The Search for Modern China. Third ed. New York and London: W.W. Norton and Company. Zhao, Y. (1998) Media, Market, and Democracy in China: Between Party Line and the Bottom Line. Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press. Read More