China’s World Media Summit, which opens today at the Great Hall of the People, a center and symbol of political power in Beijing, will purportedly address a whole range of development issues facing media worldwide. Chinese organizers have touted the event as “the media Olympics,” proudly attributing this baffling catchphrase to “a veteran CNN journalist.”

While the high jumpers and heavy lifters of the global media scene flex their muscles in Beijing, the nature of the forum itself should raise questions for the rest of us about China’s role as a rising global power, and particularly about its tactics and ambitions in shaping international dialogue on such core issues as press freedom and information access.

Accept it at face value and the World Media Summit has precious little to do with either press freedom or professional journalism. It’s all about business, right?

Sure. Just look at the summit’s invitation letter, which states plainly that the session will “focus on how world media will face up to the challenges and opportunities of the digital era and cash in on network technologies.”

We can expect touchy issues like press freedom to remain remote during the two-day session (despite calls by NGOs like Human Rights Watch for harder language).

The only item on the official agenda relating somewhat directly to these questions involves “shaping the future of newsrooms and journalists.” That is an ambitious proposition, to be sure. But the idea of it happening during a session of media fat cats in the Great Hall of the People, on Xinhua News Agency’s dime, is a real stomach turner.

We are told we can even expect touchier international business and trade issues to be sidelined at the event.

Liu Jiawen, head of the foreign affairs department at Xinhua News Agency, told The Hollywood Reporter recently that an August 12 World Trade Organization decision concerning greater access to China’s media market by overseas news organizations would probably not come up at the summit. Why? Because, he said, the forum was “for media organizations, not government.”

And right there is the deception we must peel aside to see this summit for what it really is. Why is no one pointing this out? More than 130 media organizations are reportedly attending the summit today. Perhaps one or two could join me in highlighting the clear hypocrisy being perpetrated here.

This global summit — with phone, fax and headquarters right inside the CCP’s official Xinhua News Agency — describes itself in its official literature as “a non-governmental, non-profit, high-level media conference regularly hosted in turn by world media organizations in the countries of their headquarters.”
But Xinhua News Agency is one of the paramount official mouthpieces of the Communist Party of China, and it receives direct support from the party, so it is much more than a mere “media organization.” Xinhua News Agency chief Li Congjun (李从军), the chief visible figure behind the summit’s creation, is a member of China’s central party committee, and was also deputy chief of China’s Central Propaganda Department for more than six years before he took on the top Xinhua job.

Exactly how “non-government” can we suppose this summit is?

We could knuckle under to this deception and argue that, strictly speaking, Li Congjun, as a senior party leader, is not a member of China’s government. Sure. But by the same reasoning we could submit that the Chinese Communist Party is the world’s largest NGO.

These facts are obvious, so much so that I’m embarrassed to have to point them out. This “summit” may be dressed up as a platform for professional, “non-government” exchange — but it is really a naked ploy by the CCP to enhance China’s global influence over media agendas.

Everyone can see that, right?

These media representatives flocking in from all over the world, resting and feeding on the central government’s good graces (see “FUND”), may behave as though they are attending a conference. But this is really something else; it is an audience at court.

Everyone, from the bosses of the global media giants on down to the Iranian delegation, is hoping to curry favors by their presence. The panel presentations are just window dressing.

China has also, appropriating the language of state-to-state relations, described this as a “high-level media conference.” We can understand a great deal about the World Media Summit simply by parsing that interesting choice of vocabulary.

What does this mean? “High-level”? It means that Beijing understands and approaches core questions about the future of our media as matters principally for a global bureaucratic elite. The chief purpose of this meeting — aside from dollars and cents — is to establish China’s position within that global elite.
China has even conferred titles on the world’s media mandarins. Li Congjun, the Xinhua president and former high-level propaganda leader, is Executive Chairman of the summit’s “Secretariat,” while News Corporation CEO Rupert Murdoch and other “high-level” leaders of “media giants” join the shortlist of “co-chairpersons.”

In fact, the whole idea for the World Media Summit was cooked up, according to the folks at Xinhua, during informal meetings with global media bosses during last year’s Beijing Olympics:

During the Olympic Games in Beijing in 2008, Xinhua President Li Congjun held a series of talks with the Chairman and CEO of News Corporation Rupert Murdoch, AP President Tom Curley, Reuters News Editor-in-Chief David Schlesinger, Kyodo News President Satoshi Ishikawa, and BBC Director General Mark Thompson. They discussed the challenges world media organizations are facing in the digital and multimedia era. They exchanged views on increasing exchanges and enhancing cooperation in a win-win context, and reached a consensus on sponsoring the World Media Summit (WMS) at the right time.

These men decided — either consulting amongst themselves, or bowing to the decisions of Xinhua (or the CCP) — that they would comprise the World Media Summit’s governing body:

WMS Secretariat is composed of representatives of world media giants, including AP, BBC, CNN, Google, ITAR TASS, Kyodo, News Corporation, Reuters and Xinhua. The secretariat is engaged in coordination, drafting the conference program and handling administrative matters concerning the summit. Members of the secretariat meet and discuss relevant issues whenever it is needed, in which they report the latest developments and finalize arrangements for the WMS. Major issues regarding the WMS will be decided based on collective consultation of members of the secretariat.

This is beginning to look familiar, don’t you think? A self-appointed group of elites making decisions through consultation among themselves.

Perhaps we should dispense with the court metaphor altogether. The World Media Summit has a politburo. The reference to “high-level” participation in the summit is one of the best illustrations of the CCP’s arrogant vision of our media future — despite its “non-government” pretense — as principally a matter for senior level “consultation” among “media giants”, and not something for broader participation.
And what is perhaps most interesting here is the extreme gap between the myth underpinning the CCP’s push to enhance its influence over global public opinion — the idea that Western media conglomerates have destroyed global media diversity and that China must come to the rescue — and China’s vision as realized for this summit.

Back in August, a critical piece of theory in the official CCP journal Qiushi righteously declared that “monopoly is the natural enemy of freedom.” It attacked the West for its greedy monopolization of news and information resources, and called for the creation of “a free and fair international news and information order.”

But China doesn’t want to destroy the current “news and information order.” It wants to re-draw its borders and take a larger chunk of the territory for itself.

That is why the World Media Summit itself is listed as a critical strategic measure for strengthening Xinhua News Agency’s global influence in an article Li Congjun himself wrote for the official magazine China Journalist back in February of this year.

In a section on the current state of media worldwide and Xinhua’s “core work” for 2009, Li writes:

Faced with new circumstances, new tasks and new demands, we must further strengthen our recognition of the hardships facing us, our responsibilities and our sense of mission, thoroughly applying the spirit of the 17th National Congress and the Third Plenary Session of the 17th Party Committee, raising high the great banner of socialism with Chinese characteristics. With Deng Xiaoping Theory and the Three Represents as our guide, we must thoroughly implement the project of scientific development and thoroughly implement General Secretary Hu Jintao’s practical instructions on ideological work [What we’ve called at CMP “Control 2.0”] . . . [We must] uphold the principles of correct guidance of public opinion [READ: media propaganda controls] and the “Three Closenesses” [READ: media commercial development] . . .

Objective 8 on Xinhua’s master plan in this section is “accelerating the strategy of ‘going out’ (走出去), strengthening Chinese news reports directed to the outside and reports on international news, strengthening our strategic positioning overseas, perfecting mechanisms for outside dialogue and cooperation, steadily enhancing the international transmission capacity (国际传播能力) of Xinhua News Agency.”

But if you thought this was simply about Xinhua as a “non-government” “media organization” trying to expand its global market share:

According to the central committee’s strategic demand for “strengthening outside propaganda/publicity” (大外宣), we must work hard to get our own voice out at the first moment from the actual scene for important news and sudden-breaking incidents . . . constantly enhancing the affinity, attractiveness and infectiveness of Chinese news reports to the outside world, actively seizing the initiative and our right to have a say in international public opinion channeling, working to create an objective and amicable international public opinion environment.

Part of this strategy is to bring off the first World Media Summit with flying colors. And Li leads us to understand that this too arises from a specific directive from the central committee of the CCP:

[We must] actively seek out new horizons, new mechanisms, new channels and new methods in the area of outside dialogue and cooperation, particularly, as by the demands of central party leaders, successfully organizing the first meeting of the World Media Summit, building a platform for dialogue among first-rate international media (国际一流媒体), further raising the capacity of Xinhua News Agency to make its voice heard in the international news and information sector.

On the issue of China’s stand on media integration and loss of diversity, I invite readers of Chinese to turn also to this article, which reminds us that the creation of News Corporation-style media conglomerates has been a major priority of China’s leadership. And that as deputy propaganda chief, World Media Summit Executive Chairman Li Congjun was a major driving force.

Illustrating just how elitist and centralized China’s vision of the World Media Summit is, only two new media organizations are reportedly attending. We know that one is Google. But that level of representation is absolutely mind-boggling considering that “the integration of the traditional and emerging media” is given as a core topic of discussion and concern.

Transparency is another issue. On this, the summit’s opening day, we still have not seen a full list of participants or their media organizations in either Chinese or English. Whose preference was that, I wonder. The organizers at Xinhua, or jittery participants concerned about bad PR?

But this post has left me breathless . . .

Let me come to a swift conclusion by urging participants at the World Media Summit to live it up at the expense of Xinhua News Agency. Please tell Li Congjun I said hello.

And remember, the CCP’s central committee planned your lavish menu.

FURTHER READING:
2004 speech to ministers in which Xinhua President Li Congyun mentions the need to be on guard against “hostile forces”

By Qian Gang and David Bandurski — This has been a delicate year for China’s leaders, who must cross a veritable minefield of sensitive anniversaries. There was the 90th anniversary of the May Fourth Movement, the 50th anniversary of the Lushan Conference, the 20th anniversary of June Fourth. And of course we have, just around the corner, the 60th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China.
China is now in the midst of preparations for a National Day celebration that should by any standard be extravagant. Although the English-language Global Times managed to say in a single breath this week that “the ‘warm but frugal and cost-effective’ celebration” would include a “grand military parade and a mass pageant featuring 200,000 people.”
Meanwhile, the propaganda war for people’s hearts and minds has long been under way.

[ABOVE: “National unity” is one of the five “main themes” for National Day coverage. Screenshot of coverage at Global Times. A quick show of hands: how many think this photo is real?]

Media in China may view the National Day celebrations as a golden opportunity to cash in and enhance their commercial reach and influence. But China’s leadership views this event as an internal affair of paramount political importance, and as a key strategic front along which to tighten news controls.
It was way back last spring that China’s Central Propaganda Department conveyed its overall position on reporting of the 60th anniversary: “Shout throughout the whole of society the main themes of the goodness of the CCP, the goodness of socialism, the goodness of opening and reform, the goodness of our great motherland, and the goodness of our various ethnic groups.”
These five points, which are referred to as the “five goods,” essentially define the permissible scope of 60th anniversary coverage.
The term “main theme,” or zhǔxuánlǜ, is specific to public opinion controls (舆论控制) in China. The “main theme” refers to the general orientation and message the authorities expect news media to reflect.
So, to sum up, the crucial motifs for news reporting on the 60th anniversary are:

1. The leading position of the Chinese Communist Party
2. The strength of the socialist system
3. The importance of opening and reform
4. Patriotism
5. National unity

The demands the authorities have placed on reporting this year are essentially no different from those we saw for the anniversary ten years ago. But despite an overriding emphasis on Jiang Zemin’s policy of “guidance of public opinion” then, 1999 was a year of relative vitality for China’s media.
At the time, CMP Director Qian Gang was managing editor of the more freewheeling newspaper Southern Weekend, which on National Day that year ran a front-page editorial calling for political reform. “From a Society of Subjects to a Civil Society,” it was called (从臣民社会到公民社会), and it argued that rule by the people “is the stamp of a civil society” and “the moral foundation of the legitimacy of our government.”
In 2009, statements like this already seem unimaginable.

[ABOVE: Screenshot of a People’s Daily Online page, “I love you, China,” devoted to National Day.]

In June 2008, Hu Jintao introduced his new policy for handling news and information, which placed a strong emphasis on the notion of “public opinion channeling.” This is all about state media taking the initiative in getting the news out quickly, so that at least some critical information, particularly about breaking news events, is made public in record time. This more active posture was reflected to a limited extent during last year’s Beijing Olympics, but this year’s 60th anniversary has offered a stark contrast.
The Beijing Olympics were an international affair. Under the glaring lights of world attention, the authorities took a somewhat more open stance on press controls, even if this brought no relief for Chinese journalists.
The 60th anniversary is a “household affair,” China’s own business, and with social and political stability as the overriding domestic priorities the authorities are exercising strict control over the media.
The heart of the five “goods” is the “goodness of the Chinese Communist Party,” which means that the party’s leadership position is beyond question, and that the CCP’s accomplishments are resplendent and undeniable. As for the errors and blunders of the past 60 years, the human tragedies and buried injustices, these cannot be addressed at all.
Propaganda controls notwithstanding, the 60th anniversary will inevitably become an occasion to reflect back on sixty years of Communist Party rule. Whether or not CCP leaders are capable of taking an earnest and clear-eyed look at the party’s own record will be a key test of the party’s leadership.
But the initial signs are not encouraging.
The sensitivity of June Fourth is without question — this is a topic no media can be expected to broach. But so far even such episodes as the Anti-Rightist Movement of 1957 and the actions against rightists during the Lushan Conference of 1959, events on which the party long ago pronounced its official verdict, have become dangerous topics ahead of the 60th anniversary. Why? Because they touch on the crimes of Mao Zedong and on the serious failings of China’s political system.
Major web portals in China have planned a number of historical retrospectives, each of which highlights one important event during every year since 1949. Sohu.com has posted special features called “History in the Twinkling of an Eye” (回望历史瞬间) and “30 Years of Reform” (改革开放叁十年). Netease has one called “Made in China” (中国制造). The official Xinhua Online has a retrospective called “Footprints of the Republic” (共和国的足迹).
But what sort of events and landmarks do these highlight?
The Anti-Rightist Movement, during which some 550,000 people were politically persecuted as rightists, and millions of others dragged down into the chaos, was surely the defining event of 1957. Is it there? No, of course not.
The Great Starvation, which claimed the lives of some 36 million people, and the crushing of moves to promote democracy within the party, both resulted in large measure from the political madness of the Lushan Conference. Surely, that event merits attention in a historical retrospective.
But can we find it in 1959? No, of course not. We find at best fleeting references.
For 1957, Xinhua Online mentions “rectification within the party,” but includes only very light treatment of the campaign against rightists. QQ.com chooses to focus on Mao Zedong’s criticism of Ma Yanchu’s proposals on limiting population growth in China, but sidesteps the whole Anti-Rightist Movement. Sohu.com mentions the destruction of Beijing’s city wall in 1957. Netease notes only the conclusion of China’s first Five-year Plan.
For 1959, Xinhua Online highlights the putting down of rebellion in Tibet. Sohu.com notes the general pardon issued for war criminals and former Nationalist officials (as well as many “counterrevolutionaries”) to commemorate the republic’s tenth anniversary. Netease and QQ both choose to focus on the 1959 discovery of the oil field in Daqing.
None of these major web portals dared devote coverage to the Lushan Conference.
Two portals, Netease and QQ, did offer online polls that allowed users to select what they saw as the major events during particular years, and these included events like the Anti-Rightist Movement and the Lushan Conference. But these episodes in history could not be elaborated, and they could not become major defining events for those years.
In fact, we understand from our sources that user comments in the online polling sections of these sites are being actively removed. Forums for online comment have seemed unprecedentedly cold and cheerless ahead of the anniversary.
Websites have also been handed an explicit notice by the authorities letting them know that these two topics – the Anti-Rightist Movement and the Lushan Conference – are of extreme sensitivity.
In a moment of high spectacle, we have struck a new low. And this side-stepping of major episodes in China’s history does significant damage yet again to the credibility of China’s media.
[Posted by David Bandurski, September 10, 2009, 3:57pm HK]




[For reference, we publish the full Chinese text here of the 1999 editorial by columnist and CMP fellow Yan Lieshan (鄢烈山) published on the front page of Southern Weekend to commemorate China’s National Day.]
从臣民社会到公民社会
——庆祝中华人民共和国成立50周年
鄢烈山
50年前的今天，古城北京举行开国大典，毛泽东主席在天安门城楼上向全世界庄严宣告：中华人民共和国中央人民政府成立了！这位无产阶级革命家和政治家，用他特有的富于诗意的语言，简洁明快地揭示了这个伟大历史事件的深厚意蕴：“占人类总数四分之一的中国人从此站立起来了。”
中国人民从此站起来了！不言而喻，从前中国人民是跪着的，是俯伏着的。难道不是这样吗?几千年来，中国是一个封建君主专制的臣民杜会，“普天之下，莫非王土；率土之滨，莫非王臣”。家天下兴，百姓苦；家天下亡，百姓亦苦。自上个世纪中叶，帝国主义列强以炮舰轰开我们的国门，一百多年里，这群强盗杀我人民，割我领土，索我“赔款”，神州大地被浸没在一片血与火的海洋之中。
然而，中华儿女是有血性有骨气的，中华民族岂甘忍受任人宰割的命运?他们要推翻内外压迫者，赢得生而为人的权利与中华民族的尊严。他们中的先进分子披荆斩棘探寻着救国救民的真理。他们曾试图“师夷长技以制夷”。 1894年(甲午)中日之战的失败宣告了“洋务运动”的失败和“中体西用”道路的破产；1905年日本战胜沙俄，更使国人看到了“立宪”对于富国强兵的重要性。人们认识到，所谓坚船利炮并非仅仅是器物制造技术的成果，军事实力与战争动员能力并非无源之水、无本之木，中国只有在政治经济等事关根本的制度层面变法维新，才能改变积贫积弱受人欺侮的局面。目睹无数血写的事实，大多数的中国人才达成共识，以“宁赠友邦，勿予家奴”为信条的腐朽卖国的封建王朝若不彻底推翻，中华民族就不可能避免亡国亡种的灾祸，起而拥护孙中山领导的“目的在求中国之自由平等”的民主革命。
从“五四”新文化运动到八年浴血抗战，到推翻国民党蒋家王朝建立新中国，“民主”，一直是引领中华民族踏平坎坷，走向胜利的光辉的旗帜。在战争最艰苦的阶段人们憧憬着新中国，他们发自内心深处地歌唱“没有共产党就没有新中国”，因为看到“她建设了敌后根据地，她实行了民主好处多”，相信“她一心救中国，她指引了人民解放的道路”。几千年来被“治”得一盘散沙的中华民族，何以有了空前团结一致的凝聚力，这力量比铁还硬，比钢还强?因为人们是在向法西斯蒂开火，是要让一切不民主的制度死亡，是亘古未有的民主信念“向着太阳，向着自由，向着新中国发出万丈光芒！”
中华人民共和国的诞生，其所以是划时代的，是因为它意味着，中华民族从此可以挣脱被束缚被奴役的命运。对外，赢得了国家独立解放，将以爱好和平自由的姿态成为世界各民族大家庭中平等的一员；对内，赢得了人民当家作主，各族人民将以勤劳勇敢正直的品格组成一个在法律面前人人平等的“公民杜会”。人民当家作主，是“公民社会”的本质特征，它不仅是语言学和政治学家给出的“人民共和国”这个词语的含义，而且是我们的立国之本，是我们这个政权的合法性的道义基础，是我们的社会主义制度区别于一切剥削阶级专政制度的真义和正义所在。
“天下为公”，“天视自我民视，天听自我民听”，可以说是中华民族的祖先最久远的关于公民社会的理想，但几千年来一直是个乌托邦。在世界史上，从中世纪的“主权在神”到宗教革命后的“主权在君”，再到18世纪启蒙时代以来形成“主权在民”的思想，国际社会普遍承认“民主”的涵义，是人民参与政治过程井赋予政府行为的合法性，国家政权是为人民服务的公器而不是少数人作威作福的工具，是保障公民自由与人权的盾牌而不是少数人滥用权势的利器；但理论不等于是现实，资本主义社会的民主只能是资产阶级的民主。中国共产党领导人民进行革命，建立新中国，而今又领导人民进行社会主义建设和改革，正如江泽民同志所说，“是要实现全中国人民的自由、民主和人权。”我们的民主理应是最广泛最真实的民主，虽然这仍然是我们须不懈追求的目标。
正是努力实行最广泛的人民民主，中国人民有了当家作主的感觉，才焕发出了前所未有的劳动积极性和首创精神，让中华大地涌现出蓬勃的活力和生机，用不长的时间在旧中国一穷二白的基础上，建立了比较完整的工业体系和国民经济体系。也恰是由于党和国家的政治生活后来违背了民主集中制的原则，出现了个人专断，“运动”群众进行所谓“大民主”，使中国人民经历了以“文革”为高潮的极“左”路线造成的大劫难。党的十一届三中全会拨乱反正，邓小平同志领导全党全国人民总结“文革”和．建国后的经验教训，他旗帜鲜明地提出：“没有民主就没有社会主义，就没有社会主义的现代化。”并高瞻远瞩地指出：“为了保障人民民主，必须加强法制。必须使民主制度化、法制化。”
遵循邓小平的理论，20年来，我们大力发展社会主义民主，健全社会主义法制，努力改变“无法无天”的局面，切实保障人民当家作主，参与管理国家事务和社会事务、管理经济和文化事业的权利，成就有目共睹。《中华人民共和国宪法》修正案庄严地载入了“建设社会主文法治国家”的目标；《中国共产党章程》庄重承诺(也是规定)：“党必须在宪法和法律的范围内活动。”从此，任何组织和个人都不再享有超越宪法和法律的特权。作为现代民主国家依法治国基本方略的成果，这些年我国先后制定了一系列实体法和程序法。为防止滥用行政权力，保障公民的自由与人权，我国于 1989年出台了《中华人民共和国行政诉讼法》，为“秋菊”们民告官“讨说法”提供了法律依据；今年又颁布了《行政复议法》，强调以法律作为判别是非的标准，开始改变以权力为标准的传统状况。此外，如《国家赔偿法》的颁行，新的刑事诉讼法对无罪推定原则的采用，都是中国公民权利得到前所未有的保障的显证。与此同时，村民自治、厂务公开、政务公开等一系列民主建设正在展开，我国人民正在逐步提高对杜会与公共事务管理的发言权。尤其值得大书特书的是，二千年来我们不断解放思想，打破形形色色的精神桎梏，确立了建立社会主义市场经济体制的伟大目标，努力为全体公民创造发挥个人潜能，参与平等竞争获取成功的机会，极大地解放了社会生产力，也切实提升了人民的生活水准和人格尊严。
不必讳言，在我们这样一个有长期封建主义传统，经济和教育欠发达的国家，要达成完全的民主与法治，实现充分的自由与人权，还需要经过相当长时间的艰苦奋斗。官贵民贱的等级制思想和“官本位”的封建遗风，吏治腐败、司法腐败等种种严重腐蚀政权、涣散人心的丑恶现象，它们的存在与蔓延，是与人民共和国的国体绝不相容的。历史的经验告诉我们：对外，若国家没有完整的独立的主权，就不可能保障本国公民的人权；对内，若人民没有当家作王的权利，则不可能实现杜会安定、经济发展和综合国力的强盛，以维护国家主权。两者是互相关联、积极互动的关系。因此，作为中华人民共和国的公民，作为真正的爱国者，为了增强我们国家的经济实力和国防实力，为了增进中华民族对人类社会的影响与贡献，我们必须以高度的历史使命感加强社会主义民主与法治建设，促进政治民主化、经济市场化和社会治理法制化，从而增强民族的凝聚力。
自知者明，自胜者强。让我们在邓小平理论指引下，以更加成熟的理念，更加坚定的意志，深入推进政治和经济体制改革，扩大对外开放，扫除发展道路上的一切拦路虎，阔步迈向21世纪，创造光辉灿烂的未来，把我国建设成为一个富强民主文明的社会主义现代化国家，实现中华民族的伟大复兴！
来源：南方周末 来源日期：1999-10-1

By David Bandurski — Public opinion channeling is hot, hot, hot. If you’re in charge of a party or government organ in China, or the head of a local police force, chances are you’re scrambling to get on board with Hu Jintao’s new program for news and propaganda work. You want your people to be a lot more savvy in getting your message out, and you want to avoid the dreaded “public opinion crisis.”
What you need, first and foremost, is training and team building. State media reported last week that a three-day training session on public opinion channeling for news and information was held in Gansu province, with 134 police officials in attendance.
A Legal Daily article re-posted at People’s Daily Online said the Gansu session was the first of its kind “for police leaders working on the front lines,” and that it would be “advantageous in utilizing the media to support and publicize advanced models of police work and team building.”

[ABOVE: Screenshot of coverage of local media cadres meeting in April 2009 to discuss more effective channeling of public opinion.]

To some extent, it makes sense that leaders and local authorities in China are more interested in what some dismiss as run-of-the-mill “spin control.” Isn’t it a sign of progress, for example, for government spokespeople to step out more frequently and explain a situation, and the government’s position? [See the back-and-forth in the comments HERE for a plucky discussion along these lines.]
We have to remember, though, that these “spin” tactics are being applied against a backdrop of strict propaganda controls, party-government monopolization of news voices, and rigorous internet censorship mechanisms. The government’s voice is amplified. Reporters, meanwhile, can only sit on their hands, or join in the amplification.
But the recent mention of “public opinion channeling” by the vice-director of China’s State-Owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission, who encouraged state-owned enterprises to set up press offices to combat “negative news,” has drawn some mild criticism in China’s media.
The basic argument in a few editorials, including one in Guangzhou Daily yesterday, has been to support the idea that media should play a crucial role in improving state-owned enterprises by conducting watchdog journalism, ferreting out problems that enterprises can then address.
The concern, in other words, should not be to massage their public image, but to address the real problems that are the real cause of their poor public images. If the government really wants to clean up state-owned enterprises, it should invite more “bad” public opinion, not less.
Below is a translation of yesterday’s article in Guangzhou Daily, which suggests the strong focus lately on “public opinion channeling” — trendy though it is — exposes an old way of thinking about information, namely that “the responsibility for a poor image lies with the media, and with the news report itself,” not in internal problems in enterprises and/or institutions.

There is More to Image Improvement than Public Opinion Channeling
Guangzhou Daily
September 6, 2009
The role of the media is to reveal the facts and to inform the public, but as to what impression these facts make on the public, and how they shape public feeling, this is a matter of the news event itself and of the judgment of the public.
The channeling of public opinion is a topic getting more and more attention. It is now, perhaps, an uptrend of sorts. Online e-government services and the set up of official press spokesperson systems — these are all about correctly and effectively channeling public opinion in order to create a favorable dynamic between the people and the public sector. In recent days, in order to instruct state-owned enterprises to improve their news release systems, the State Asset Regulatory Commission has said it will come out with a policy establishing press spokesperson systems for state-owned enterprises and other related information release mechanisms so that the voices of enterprises can be actively and effectively heard.
Nowadays it is popular practice to utilize the media and carry out public opinion channeling in order to raise your own good image. And clearly, this action by state-owned enterprises to set up press spokesperson systems is in response to recent “negative news” about a number of enterprises. In a push to improve the situation and create a favorable public opinion environment for the development of state-owned enterprises, the enterprises themselves are staking a lot on these press spokespeople.
But many people have raised doubts about whether it will make any difference at all to the public image of state-owned enterprises to have spokespeople out there channeling public opinion. The reasons is simple. Because the onus is on the enterprises themselves, not just on public opinion channeling, for the general improvement of their public image. If an enterprise hopes to win the approval of the public, the secret lies not in the manipulation of public opinion but in its own behavior.
The rolling out of the press spokesperson system is only one means for state-owned enterprises to face the public directly. Smashing through the dominance of [state] monopolies, sharing the super-profits equitably with the public, accepting public supervision and raising efficiency — these are the only ways central state-owned enterprises can win favorable images.
The role of the media is to reveal the facts and to inform the public, but as to what impression these facts make on the public, and how they shape public feeling, this is a matter of the news event itself and of the judgment of the public. We often say that the masses have sharp eyes, and this is precisely the point.
In reality, of course, there are always those who make a habit of clouding the eyes of the people, and suppression of the media and of individual journalists becomes their trusty ace card. In some places, after mining accidents happen, the first thought is not to reveal the full extent of the casualties to the public, but rather to do everything humanly possible to ensure the truth is hidden and that journalists are prevented from covering the story. As they see it, news reporting smudges a black mark on their safety record . . . Applying the same reason, when mass incidents occur in some areas, they are kept under wraps from the beginning and media prevented from reporting. But experience has shown that reporting by the media promotes the resolution of such incidents, and in fact helps benefit the image [of local leaders] in the eyes of the public . . .
The watchdog function of the press may affect the interests of a particular area, office or enterprise in the short term. But in the longer run, this influence of public opinion will be beneficial to overall interests. Regrettably, many people still persist in believing that the responsibility for a poor image lies with the media, and with the news report itself . . .

[Posted by David Bandurski, September 7, 2009, 2:09pm]

By David Bandurski — We wrote last month at CMP about how Hu Jintao’s policy of active agenda-setting and “public opinion channeling” — what we’ve termed Control 2.0 — has enshrined the notion of public opinion as crisis. In other words, party leaders often approach real crises of public interest as public relations challenges. On the surface, at least, they seem less concerned with addressing real social problems, and more concerned with convincing everyone these problems do not exist.
In a piece posted last week at the website Oeeee.com (奥一), writer Xiao Hanjie (肖汉杰) argued along similar lines after Huang Danhua (黄丹华), vice-director of China’s State-Owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of the State Council encouraged state-owned enterprises to set up press offices to combat “negative news.”

[ABOVE: Knocking the news dead: a government spokeswoman for the city of Changsha is voted one of China’s ten prettiest government spokeswomen.]

Why, Xiao asked, when enterprises should be concerned with identifying and addressing problems in restructuring and operation, was the focus on “channeling public opinion”?
A full translation of Xiao’s editorial follows:

“Public opinion channeling” not as good as “being channeled by public opinion”
September 2, 2009
The vice-director of the State-Owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of the State Council, Huang Danhua (黄丹华) said recently that a number of central-level enterprises had been beset with “negative news coverage.” He advised that central-level enterprises set up news release systems and employ official spokespeople in order to improve channeling of public opinion (Beijing Morning Post, September 1, 2009).
So problems happen, and the reaction is not to establish supervision mechanisms to look into their own long-established bad practices. No, instead they set up news release structures so they can “channel public opinion.” So it’s as though they assume when the bells go off that the problem doesn’t lie in the system and in their own work, but rather in the fact that there are no spokespeople to carry out public opinion channeling.
Channeling public opinion? Isn’t it more to the point to say they dread public opinion? They say they channel public opinion “in order to create a favorable public opinion environment for the reform of state-owned enterprises.” I disagree with this completely . . . Public opinion can reflect on advantages and disadvantages, and so it can assist central-level enterprises in assessing their own faults and strengths. Why, then, would you attempt to channel public opinion, twisting its original purpose and the spirit of free criticism? And in a false public opinion environment, how are central-level enterprises supposed to assess their own advantages and disadvantages?
A French writer once wrote that “without the freedom to criticize, praise is utterly worthless.” This could no doubt be taken as a jab at the idea that central-level enterprises should “channel public opinion.” Public opinion channeling is about releasing “positive news” and avoiding “negative news,” about talking up political achievements and playing down problems. This process affects the ability of the public to really understand the facts and come to their own judgments, and ultimately it does harm to the public’s freedom of expression. If we begin to see public opinion turning very kind in favor of state-owned enterprises, what meaning is there in that?
What’s more, the “tactic” of public opinion channeling is generally about not publicly airing news and information and the voices of public opinion, about letting the public see only those things that are “praiseworthy.” This is a disservice to the factual nature of the news, and an invasion of the public’s right to know. The principals of journalism tell us that the news should convey comprehensive and objective facts. The people have a right to know the full story, and they have a right to freely express their opinions about news fact.
“Public opinion channeling” is good for problem avoidance, but it cannot resolve problems that are objectively there. How much better it would be to channelled [in our actions] by public opinion, first listening to what public opinion is telling us, then promoting those things that are beneficial while abolishing those things that are harmful . . .
Along with the development of the Internet and other new media, as speech is becoming freer by the day, “public opinion channeling” is not a reasonable method, and is not suited to the information spirit of the age. As for the “negative news” facing public institutions and state enterprises, the urgent priority should be to accept public opinion and criticism, seeking out the problems that exist at the institutional and management level and making changes. The thought should not be with how to lead and channel public opinion, allowing the rot to take root inside our enterprises.

[Posted by David Bandurski, September 6, 2009, 8:57am HK]

By Qian Gang — It is no petty crime in China to be accused of setting up an “illegal organization.” Last month, the organization “Gongmeng,” a group of rights defense lawyers that had not obtained legal registration, was branded an “illegal organization,” and its Gongmeng Legal Research Center was raided and closed down.
At the end of April, the Wenzhou Business Club of the Dongguan General Chamber of Commerce in Guangzhou was ruled an “illegal organization” “daring to carry out activities” in the name of a social group, and was ordered to cease all operations. Some time before this, authorities in Guangzhou said taxi drivers who organized a general strike late last year under the auspices of a “collective tea time” (集体喝茶), “[in fact] had illegal organizations working behind the scenes.”
Under strict censorship controls, the vast majority of Chinese journalists are suffocated with a silent fury over such trumped up allegations. But this week instead we’ve seen the opposite — media aggressively opening fire on a so-called “illegal organization.”
On August 26, the Beijing News reported that Zhao Yang (赵阳), a member of the City Administrative Department of Nanjing’s Xuanwu District – this is the office that runs the local brigades of non-police ‘city inspectors’ charged with keeping public order in China’s urban neighborhoods – had been charged with organizing an online “national joint session of city administrative department heads.” Zhao had dared to hold an event without proper registration and in the name of a social group, so this amounted to the act of “illegal organization.”

[ABOVE: Do city inspectors need their own guild? Screenshot of coverage at Hebei News Online of city inspectors overseeing the demolition of “illegal” housing in Hebei.]

The reporter following up on the story came across this organization’s statutes. They discovered that the organization had a founding chairman, an honorary chairman, a rotating chairmanship, a managing director, a deputy director, an executive council and so on. It had set up an administrative headquarters, and even had a membership fee system in place. It had already held three national conferences, had issued awards and conferred titles. It had decided on national standards for city inspector identification. For all intents and purposes, it was the national guild for city inspectors in China.
The report caused an uproar. For the authorities to see “illegal organizations” as thorns in their side, that was one thing. But it seemed like a great big joke for government officials like city administrative department heads to be participating in such organizations. The media followed up on the story and found that the organization behind these joint sessions was in fact a private company, which was scooping up all of the funds. A private company boss, in other words, had been toying with city administrative department heads across the country, offering public relations and crisis management services to address the poor public image of city inspectors.
Like a rat scurrying through a busy market, this organization of city inspectors was suddenly the target of unmitigated attacks. Between August 26 and September 3, over just nine days, 353 reports appeared on the Internet (returned in a Baidu search of the terms “city administration heads” and “illegal organization”). Of these, 56 were re-postings of the original Beijing News story. People were up in arms about many different things, including how various local governments could be using taxpayer money to support such an organization.
One Web user at the popular portal QQ.com summed the case up in a snide imitation of the divisive CCP jargon generally used in the event of social unrest:

This is all about ‘people ignorant of the situation’ and ‘at the instigation of a few elements’ daring to take part in ‘illegal organizations.’ As for participation in ‘illegal organizations’ by city inspection heads, we can only say that they were ‘controlled by people with ulterior motives.’

Journalist Guo Yukuan (郭宇宽) wrote in Huashang Bao that the charges made against this “national joint session” were identical to those made against Gongmeng and its founder, Xu Zhiyong: “First of all, it did not register with the Ministry of Civil Affairs. Secondly, it definitely did not have credentials as a public charity organization. So regardless of whether the units involved gave money and participated voluntarily, the founders fall under suspicion of tax evasion for perhaps not having reported taxes to the tax authorities.”
Guo Yukuan (郭宇宽) continues:

Some people will say, if they’re not doing anything illegal, why didn’t they just go and register? But you have to understand that in China the registration process is incredibly troublesome. To register a non-profit organization, you must find a government office or other institution (事业单位) willing to back you up …. And if you want to register as a company, well, then there are substantial tax burdens involved, and setting up an office, even if you don’t have a cent of income, can require tens of thousands of yuan. Who could possibly play such a game? And for all that, you are still not allowed to do activities in the name of a public charity organization . . . We need to think about the fact that it is this excess control that has created this situation in which all over the country we have these ‘illegal organizations’ ‘daring to hold activities.’

China’s media, which are still strictly controlled, must keep quiet about many things that would infuriate the public if known. Like trees abiding in the cracks of a sheer cliff face, they grow twisted. They make only glancing and oblique attacks against the hovering mass of authoritarian power.
Unable to issue direct calls for the relaxation of controls on civic groups in China, the media have paid back in the same coin, viciously attacking the “national joint session of city administrative department heads,” an “illegal organization” bringing private and official business together in an unsavory alliance.
Citizens and media in China have numerous “soft opposition” (软抗争) tactics at their disposal. There is “pretending to be deaf and dumb” (装聋作哑), for example, when journalists hear thunder but act as though they had no idea a storm was coming. The Chinese edition of Esquire had to know last month that Gongmeng was in trouble, and yet they used the small window of opportunity in which the government had not yet fully shut Xu Zhiyong’s mouth, promoting him to the magazine’s cover.
Then there are “word games” (文字游戏), as when Web users criticized Hu Jintao’s policy of “harmony” (a.k.a., censorship) on the Internet by making a cottage industry out of a humorous synonym, “river crab.”
There is the “fresh flower with thorns” (鲜花带刺), writing in a panegyric style what is essentially a critical report – as when media reported on a Hope School that did not collapse in the 2008 Sichuan earthquake as a way of drawing attention to the problem of shoddy school construction.
These tactics of opposition are necessitated by a society that is basically unwell. Chinese media have no other choice but to carry out a low-grade guerrilla war with authoritarian power. Of course we are eager for a time when criticism is afforded dignity, a time of open and rational debate, a time when the ordinary monitoring of power is possible and acceptable. But that time can only come in China when freedom of expression is respected.
[Posted by David Bandurski, September 4, 2009, 12:36pm HK]

By David Bandurski — Interested in trying your hand at the fine art of press censorship? The city of Zhuzhou, in China’s inland Hunan province, wants you. A notice posted on one of Zhuzhou’s official news sites yesterday called for applicants to its news commentary group, or xinwen yuepingzu (新闻阅评组), a group tasked with issuing post-facto criticisms citing violations of propaganda discipline which can often result in disciplinary action against specific media and/or journalists. [Frontpage photo by kvitlauk available at Flickr.com under Creative Commons license.]
China’s central-level news commentary group, unofficially situated within the Central Propaganda Department, is a powerful group of 7-9 mostly retired propaganda officials with a potentially powerful influence over the press. It was the news commentary group that forced the brief shutdown in 2006 of the journal Freezing Point.

[ABOVE: Want to be a censor? Call this number. Screenshot of notice published at Zhuzhou Online.]

Formed in the early 1990s, the news commentary group was a response in part to changes in China’s media brought on by the process of commercialization. In a censorship system focused on prior instructions on “discipline,” more freewheeling media were finding creative ways to push the boundaries. One answer to this problem was to add a layer of censorship, a group that could make its own after-the-fact assessments of how well media were towing the party line. [See, “China’s Shadow Censor Commissars,” FEER, March 2006.]
Party leaders throughout China’s bureaucracy set about establishing their own news commentary groups, some for media generally and others focused specifically on the Internet.
In what it characterizes as a reshuffle designed to better guide public opinion locally, Zhuzhou is now casting about publicly for new members of its news commentary group. Here is the announcement:

City Propaganda Department Publicly Seeks News Commentators
August 31, 2009
www.zhuzhouwang.com
The propaganda department of the party committee of Zhuzhou is looking to hire news commentators. If you love the news, if you support the news work of Zhuzhou and care about the growth of media in Zhuzhou, if you have a strong knowledge of the news and a decent command of writing, then you can either call 2868-0232 and apply, or apply directly at the news division of the city propaganda department.
The news commentary group is an important means of ensuring the correct guidance of public opinion of news propaganda, and the quality of news reports. Our city has supported this work for a number of years already. In order to improve the effectiveness of news propaganda in our city, to ensure correct guidance of public opinion, and to better uphold the news policy of “Three Closenesses,” the municipal propaganda department has decided to reshuffle its news commentary team, and now publicly seeks scores of news commentators from the general population.
News commentators are responsible for criticisms of city-level media, and will be paid on a per-article basis. We ask that all those interested send an example of news criticism, with name, sex, age, employer and contact information, to the news division of the city propaganda department at [email protected] before September 5.

[Posted by David Bandurski, September 1, 2009, 12:02am HK]