Media and the establishment – the WTO-column

(later also at Chinabiz)
Brussels – My arrival in Europe coincided with a major political debate in this relatively new political entity: should a proposal for the new European constitution be accepted or not? The political establishment of all denominations, ruling parties and larger opposition parties, in Europe had made up their minds: Europe would be ungovernable without this new constitution after the recent extension of this young political entity to 25 countries. In two countries, France and the Netherlands, the major political parties were so confident about the issue they would even allow their people to give their vote in a referendum.
Then an amazing development occurred for those established parties: a massive and successful ‘say no’ campaign emerged, challenging that very political establishment. What I found intriguing, looking at it with Chinese glasses, was the way how the media dealt with the issue. Despite all possible differences, media in Europe and China are both part of the establishment of their societies. That works out fine as long as those establishments are not challenged in one way or another. But when the establishment is taken on, the media reaction could not be more different.
On prime-time Dutch TV political leaders and leaders of the ‘say no’ campaign issued verbal hits in every direction, in a friendly but decisive way and contributed in that way to the authority of those media in a way that would be unthinkable in China. In China media have to toe the political line, especially when the establishment is challenged in a more fundamental way. Even more, the authority of Chinese media depends on the level of their relationship with the state.

The idea that for example the anti-Japanese demonstrators would make it to Chinese TV in another capacity than that of repenting criminals would have been unthinkable. While the Chinese media have minimal leeway to offer a wider range of opinions when their leadership is divided, in most cases they act as an extension of the state, despite all the efforts of the media to professionalize, commercialize and popularize.
What defines the authority of all medium, in China and in Europe, is about one percent of its total coverage: what are they doing when the emotions get heated up?
While China has shown an exceptional performance in building up a new infrastructure, the so-called ‘software’ is still lagging. With the exception of some of the Guangdong media, toeing the official line is the standard reaction of all media in China. That is not really meant to criticize those media: I do see they often have to react in that way. But it does mean that the discussion in the society looks for other outlets, since the media are not doing that job. Traditionally Chinese would rely on the rumors they would hear from their neighbors and friends and that would define their view on the world – although it would consist often of rather unreliable gossip. Now the internet has added an amplifier to those traditional rumors that were in the past geographically constraint. In that ways the internet adds to the erosion of the old media as the official messenger.
Getting a message across has become harder for government departments, companies and upcoming non-governmental organizations, despite the much improved infrastructure providing access to media. Identifying ‘leading’ media in China, whether you want to sell an idea or toothpaste, is almost impossible. The authority of Chinese media is still defined by their relationship to the state and the wide range of upcoming media does not seem to have caused a real paradigm change. The few Guangdong papers who tried got curtailed and some of their editors jailed.
Those little steps towards editorial independence seem to be the only way forward, although it proves to be a long, tiresome way with many barriers thrown up by conservative forces within the bureaucracy.
Five years ago I suggested a colleague of Shanghai TV they should hire me or one of my foreign colleagues to help them ask more nasty questions during the very boring sessions their were broadcasting when interviewing foreign business people. “That is too early,” she said then. “And anyway, we know what nasty questions we could ask, but we are just not allowed.” That has not yet changed and STV is still a solid way to fall asleep when all other methods fail.

Fons Tuinstra

Books on Chinese media