By David Bandurski — China Economic Weekly, a spin-off magazine of the official People’s Daily, ran an important story yesterday about the collapse of school buildings in last year’s Sichuan earthquake. But the story, posted initially to People’s Daily Online, was removed by day’s end, a sign that some important officials at least were not pleased.
The original URL for the story at People’s Daily Online is now replaced with a tell-tale trace: “The page you wish to view no longer exists.”

[ABOVE: The China Economic Weekly story about a Tsinghua University report on seismic damage to buildings in the Sichuan earthquake is posted at People’s Daily Online yesterday.]

Nevertheless, this is a story to keep your eyes on — we’ve pasted the full Chinese text at the end of this post — and one that amply illustrates the complexity of China’s media environment. Where did the story come from? Why was it allowed to appear at all?
The story’s jumping-off point is an academic study on construction quality in the quake zone launched last year by Tsinghua University, but it makes much more explicit the findings of the study as they are relevant to the problem of school collapses.
The story, by reporter Zhou Haibin (周海滨), uses the numbers in the Tsinghua study to make it clear that schools surveyed by a team of experts suffered far more crippling damage in the quake than did government buildings. For example, while 44 percent of government buildings studied were still deemed usable, having sustained little seismic damage, only 18 percent of school buildings studied were still deemed structurally sound.
The article quotes the author of the paper, professor Lu Xinzheng (陆新征) of Tsinghua University’s Disaster Prevention and Mitigation Project Research Center, as saying that . . .

. . . the severity of school collapses in the quake owed not to [the inadequacy of] our nation’s earthquake mitigation means and objectives. The problem [he says] is the [failure of] application of these preventive means and objectives in particular regions. He says that owing to China’s national characteristics (我国国情) and limited national [government] strength, the level of seismic resistance [for buildings] in many local areas was as low as .5 to 1.0 when it should have been 1.5 to 2.0.

The long and short of it: negligence by local government officials.
Lu Xinzheng runs a decent personal website in both Chinese and English, which includes PDF downloads of much of his research over the last few years. There’s contact information too, but we’re supposing the news has already cycled past the earthquake anniversary so far as those editors back in New York and London are concerned, right?
Anyhow, a list of Lu’s recent earthquake-related research is here. One of the most interesting papers is a study of the structural weaknesses of buildings in last year’s Wenchuan earthquake. In this study, Lu and his colleagues write about the notable thinness (and hence weakness) of vertical supporting columns in frame structured buildings in Sichuan, which either buckled or broke when the quake struck.
“In the Wenchuan earthquake, most of the many frame structured buildings that either were damaged or collapsed were of this sort, particularly spacious and open buildings that were purely frame structured (most of which were school classroom complexes, see figure 8),” Lu and his colleagues write.
Fortunately, yesterday’s story from China Economic Weekly has not disappeared altogether. As of 10:51am today the story was still available at Qingdao News:

The article’s headline also appeared today in a list of “recent news” in the Chongqing section of People’s Daily Online, and the link was still active, taking readers to this Chongqing page with the full text of the report:

A search in the WiseNews Chinese news database suggests the story also ran yesterday on CCTV’s international website, and on the website of China News Service.
A partial translation of the China Economic Weekly story follows:

Seismic Investigation Team Reveals Causes of Severity of School Collapses in the Wenchuan Earthquake
China Economic Weekly
Zhou Haibin (周海滨) reporting from Beijing and Sichuan
This reporter recently received a copy of an academic paper called “An Analysis of Seismic Damage Caused to Structures in the Wenchuan Earthquake,” written by a seismic investigation team from Tsinghua University, Southwest Jiaotong University and Beijing Jiaotong University. Of the 54 government buildings that the investigative team studied, 13 percent (or 7 buildings) were deemed to have been irreparably damaged [by the quake]. Of the 44 school buildings that they studied, this ratio was 57 percent (or 25 schools), more than four times the level [of damage] seen with government buildings.
Numbers reveal damage to be most serious among school buildings
After the earthquake struck on May 12 last year, Tsinghua University arranged for a team of relevant experts to travel to Sichuan, and they teamed up with civil engineers (土木结构方面专家) from Southwest Jiaotong University and Beijing Jiaotong University, making a series of three investigations into seismic damage to structures [in the earthquake zone].
The investigative team classed structures sustaining seismic damage into four categories: 1) usable, 2) usable pending repairs, 3) use to be ceased, and 4) immediate demolition. Buildings were divided into types according to their purpose: school, government, business, factory, hospital and other public buildings.
According to the statistical chart provided in the paper, China Economic Weekly has determined that 44 of the 384 structures studied were school buildings. The numbers provided in the chart reveal that of the 44 school buildings studied, 18 percent (or 8 buildings) were deemed usable, 25 percent (or 11 buildings) were deemed usable pending repairs, 23 percent (or 10 buildings) were labeled “use to be ceased” (unusable) and 34 percent (or 15 buildings) were recommended for immediate demolition.
In comparison, the percentages in all categories for the 54 government buildings were: 44 percent usable (24 buildings), 43 percent usable pending repairs (23 buildings), 9 percent “use to be ceased” (unusable) and 4 percent for immediate demolition (2 buildings).
The paper also points out that schools and industrial structures suffered more serious seismic damage due in part due to the functionality of their designs. Schools suffering seismic damage were largely structures of masonry, with large-spanning rooms, large openings for doors and windows, projecting corridors, and in some cases no allowances made for quake resistance, so that their earthquake resistance was low. Factory building were also largely masonry structures, usually of small scale and spaces consisting predominantly of parking areas where there were few personnel. For this reason, little consideration was given [in factory buildings] for earthquake resistance, and seismic damage was rather severe.
Government buildings mostly used reinforced concrete frameworks, and seismic damage to these was minimal . . .
Ever since the quake struck, public opinion in China and overseas has turned to the issue of construction quality in the quake zone. Addressing concerns about “tofu engineering” [shoddily built structures], Sichuan’s acting vice-governor Wei Hong (魏宏) said in answer to questions from reporters that the collapse of schools in this major earthquake was the unavoidable result of natural disaster.
The author of this paper, professor Lu Xinzheng (陆新征) of Tsinghua University’s Disaster Prevention and Mitigation Project Research Center, believes that the severity of school collapses in the quake owed not to [the inadequacy of] our nation’s earthquake mitigation means and objectives. The problem [he says] is the [failure of] application of these preventive means and objectives in particular regions. He says that owing to China’s national characteristics (我国国情) and limited national [government] strength, the level of seismic resistance [for buildings] in many local areas was as low as .5 to 1.0 when it should have been 1.5 to 2.0.

—————-
震害调查组披露汶川地震校舍损毁严重原因
青岛新闻网　2009-05-26 09:06:52　中国经济周刊
记者近日获得一份由清华大学、西南交通大学、北京交通大学震害调查组撰写的《汶川地震建筑震害分析》论文报告。在调查组所调查的54处政府建筑中，有13%(7处)因被毁严重无法修复；在44处学校建筑中，这一比例为57%(25处)，是政府建筑的4倍多。
数据显示学校震害最严重
去年5·12地震发生后，清华大学组织了相关专业的专家赶赴四川，并会同西南交通大学和北京交通大学土木结构方 面专家，先后分三批开展建筑震害调查。
调查组将震后建筑结构的破坏程度分为四个等级：可以使用、加固后使用、停止使用和立即拆除。对于所查访的建筑，按使用功能分为学校、政府、商住、工厂、医院、其他公建7类。
根据论文所列出的建筑震害情况统计列表，《中国经济周刊》计算得出，在调查组查访的384处建筑中，有44处是学校建筑。统计列表给出的数据显示，在44处学校建筑中，可以使用的占18%(8处)，加固后使用的占25%(11处)，停止使用的占23%(10处)，立即拆除的占34%(15处)。
与此相对应，54处政府建筑的各项比例为：可以使用的占44%(24处)，加固后使用的占43%(23处)，停止使用的占9%(5处)，立即拆除的占4%(2处)。
论文还指出，从建筑使用用途上来看，学校和工业建筑的震害最严重。震区的学校建筑主要以砌体结构为主，加上建筑上的大开间、大门窗洞、外挑走廊，有时甚至无抗震构造措施，导致其抗震性能较差。乡镇的工业厂房多为砌体结构，规模不大而且多为人员较少的车间，因此其抗震设计的要求也很低，导致震害较为严重。政府机构多用框架结构，其震害最轻。其他类型建筑的震害介于这两类建筑之间。
震后以来，国内外有舆论直指震区建筑质量问题。对于被质疑的“豆腐渣工程”，四川省常务副省长魏宏在回答记者提问时说，大地震中校舍倒塌属于不可避免的天灾。
该论文执笔人、清华大学防灾减灾工程研究所陆新征副教授认为，地震校舍损毁严重不是我国地震设防目标和手段的问题，问题在于设防目标和手段在具体地区的应用。他表示，受我国国情、国力限制，很多地区的设防烈度实际上偏低0.5度-1度，应该+1.5度甚至2度。
专家称多原因造成教室倒塌
调查组成员之一、清华大学土木工程系副教授冯鹏接受采访时表示，教室由于开间大、墙少，抗震能力比较差，所以在地震中倒塌多。
“一直以来，我国校舍的抗震设防标准和普通建筑是一样的。而在日本，校舍的抗震设防标准要比普通建筑高一度。应当把学校建成紧急避难场所，让学校成为最安全的地方。”冯鹏建议。
记者了解到，2008年7月，住房和城乡建设部、国家质量监督检验检疫总局联合发布了新修订的《建筑抗震设计规范》和《建筑工程抗震设防分类标准》，其中将学校校舍等人员密集的公共建筑提高到重点设防类，学校建筑的抗震设防烈度要高于本地1度。
“单纯质量问题不会造成大规模倒塌，原因是多方面的”，冯鹏认为，一是由于教室开间大、墙少，抗震能力比较差。二是和建设年代有关，上世纪90年代初建造的希望小学是按“89规范”来做的，倒塌情况并不严重。而那些不按规范或更早年代的学校，则毁坏严重。
此外，工程质量也被认为是影响因素之一，“所有的工程都和工程质量有关”，冯鹏表示。
国内一家建筑科研机构的一位专家表示，曾在地震后被派往灾区进行调研，他说，凡是按照抗震规范进行正规设计、且施工质量有保障的房屋，在高烈度地区大部分做到了开裂而不倒塌，在低烈度地区震害程度大部分较轻。“一所坍塌严重的学校所在地的另一所希望小学，同样的结构，却只有轻微裂缝，完全不像劫后余生的样子。”他表示。“考察中，确实发现了施工质量问题，如配料上的偷工减料，还有的不按抗震要求施工、操作上的不合理，使得震害雪上加霜。”
提高设防水平受制经济水平
据冯鹏介绍，目前我国大城市中仅有北京等少数城市的抗震设防为8度，全国省会城市中只有海口是8.5度。抗震设防度越高，抗震能力就越强。
此前，北京清华大学土木工程系教授陈肇元就提出，大规模提高我国建设安全度。
“从8度到9度，一度之差，建筑的荷载却可增加一倍。”冯鹏也表示，提高抗震设防度和经济发展水平有关，“89规范”实施前后，盖一座房子所花的钱要提高20-30%以上，因为提高抗震设防标准需要增加基建投入。公开资料显示，抗震烈度每增加一度，结构的成本可能要增加5%-10%左右。
“山西有很多地方是9度区，没有人愿意去做投资，原因就是建造成本太大。从6度提高到7度，所需成本不是非常大，从7度到8度，成本就会很大。”冯鹏坦言。
目前我国房屋建造一般都是仅满足国家最低设防标准，冯鹏建议，国家应该鼓励业主自己选择盖更加安全的房子，选择更高级别的设防标准。(记者 周海滨/北京、四川报道)
[Posted by David Bandurski, May 26, 2009, 11:39am HK]

By David Bandurski — The scope and reach of the criminal offense of bribery (受贿罪) has never been clear in China. But the lines become even murkier when the charge is applied to one of the country’s most nebulous professions: journalism. Are Chinese journalists “government officials” or “state personnel” to whom stiffer penalties should apply? Or are they performing ordinary service jobs outside the purview of the Criminal Law on bribery involving state officials?
These questions, which we saw in the Meng Huaihu (孟怀虎) case two years ago, have been replayed this month in the trial of Fu Hua (傅桦), a former reporter for Shanghai’s China Business News. They concern us here because they touch on more fundamental questions about press freedom, the role of journalism and journalists in China, and related issues such as the need (as some say) for a press law that might clear up ambiguities about journalists’ rights and obligations.

[ABOVE: Screenshot of news of recent Fu Hua case running on a Chinese website, pictures Fu Hua outside the court in Beijing.]

Anti-bribery laws in China have been “primarily directed to ‘bribe-takers,’ i.e., governmental officials, state personnel (guojia gongzou renyuan) and high ranking company managers and directors.”
At first glance, journalists don’t seem to fit the bill. But despite the many changes that have come to China’s media in the recent two decades — which have, in complicated ways, upset the traditional notion of the press as a “mouthpiece” (喉舌) of the party and government — the idea that journalists are NOT working for the state remains dangerous from the party’s point of view. The notion that the party must control, or “guide,” public opinion is deemed critical to the survival of one-party rule.
If journalists aren’t working for the state in China, who ARE they working for? Not the public, surely.
For now, we’ll let that million-dollar question hang and turn to some coverage of the recent Fu Hua case, which hints at these questions.
Last week, China News Service, the country’s number-two official newswire, ran an interesting play-by-play of goings on inside the courtroom during the Fu Hua case, which was heard earlier this month in Beijing’s Chaoyang District Court.
Interestingly, the article begins with an “editor’s note” that is really a disclaimer of sorts, making it clear that the news service is not taking a position on the case or the arguments presented therein.
For readers who aren’t familiar with the Fu Hua case, a general sketch is provided in the translation below. Basically, it seems Fu Hua did accept cash (5,000 yuan, by his own admission) in exchange for a list of sources for a story about construction problems at an airport in Jilin Province.
But the circumstances of the case are complicated, seemingly involving also a coerced confession Fu Hua later retracted, and Fu has maintained that he “was wrong, but not guilty [under the law].”

Editor’s Note: Our goal in publishing this article is to objectively report the facts and reveal the points on each side [of this case], exploring the legal questions involved. It is not our intent to comment on the administering of justice or punishment for those involved.
On May 12, Fu Hua (傅桦), formerly a reporter for the Beijing bureau of China Business News, sat in the defendants chair at Beijing’s Chaoyang District Court — the crime in question, bribery. He said: “This whole affair has gone on for several years, and I just hope to bring it to an end soon so that I can go on living in peace.”
A Journalist Accepts Money and Is Arrested
In 2003, Fu Hua managed through his old schoolteacher to get in touch with Zhang Guangtao (张广涛), then deputy director of the Civil Aviation Administration in Jilin Province (and now a defendant in a separate case). The latter said he wished to be interviewed. Getting in touch with Zhang Guangtao, as it turned out, was a pivotal point in Fu Hua’s rapid downward slide.
Our reporter learned from the procurator’s office of Beijing’s Chaoyang District that sometime around April 2005, Zhang Guangtao gave Fu Hua a telephone call and said he hoped Fu Hua would look into the Changchun’s Longjiabao Airport [photo here]. Zhang then arranged contact between Li Shen (李申) — who is a defendant in a separate case — and Fu Hua. After this, Li Shen arrived in Beijing and gave Fu Hua materials concerning construction problems at Longjiabao Airport, implying that there were tensions between the official in charge of Longjiabao Airport, Zhang Jun (张军), and Zhang Guangtao, his deputy. They wished to use the publication of a report on construction problems at the airport to impact unfavorably on Zhang Jun, the ultimate goal being to establish Zhang Guangtao as head of the project. Fu Hua then notified his newspaper about the story, saying he had received a “letter from a reader.” He asked to be sent to Jilin to look into the story. The paper agreed and sent another reporter along with him.
According to the procurator’s office of Beijing’s Chaoyang District, Fu Hua phoned his contact, Li Shen, in June 2005 to inform him he was on his way to Jilin. Li Shen set up a meeting with Fu Hua at a Beijing teahouse and provided a number of sources and contact numbers for the story. Saying it would be inconvenient for him to receive Fu Hua once he was in Jilin, Li Shen gave the reporter 30,000 yuan [NOTE: this is the account given by prosecutors, which differs from Fu’s]. Once they had gotten to Jilin, Fu Hua and his colleague interviewed a number of relevant officials and workers and took photographs at the airport site. After they returned to Beijing, they wrote two stories that appeared in the July 14 edition of China Business News: “Lingering Quality and Safety Problems Stick Out: Behind Consignment Delays at Longjiabao Airport” (质量问题安全隐患凸现　龙家堡机场延误交付的背后) and “Corners Can’t Be Cut on Quality and Safety” (质量安全不能打折扣). After the reports came out, Li Shen and Zhang Guangtao were very pleased.
According to the prosecuting attorney who prepared the case [against Fu Hua], at the end of July and beginning of August 2005, Li Shen arranged to meet with Fu Hua in order to discuss the possibility of re-running the articles on the Internet to amplify their effect. Fu Hua said that it was common practice for Websites to charge 1,000 yuan per article for placement online, and Li Shen responded by giving Fu Hua 10,000 yuan. Later, Fu Hua went through his personal connections to get the articles published on several Websites, perhaps paying nothing in exchange.
In April 2007, police in Jilin Province uncovered evidence of the link to Fu Hua while investigating Zhang Guangtao and Li Shen. In June of the same year, police belonging directly to the Jilin Public Security Bureau criminally detained Fu Hua outside the offices of China Business News on charges of accepting bribes (公司、企业人员受贿罪). The police later ascertained that Fu Hua’s employer, the Beijing bureau of China Business News Company Limited, was a state-owned company, that both its place of business and the site of Fu Hua’s accepting of the bribes in question were within Beijing’s Chaoyang District, and that the case fell within the jurisdiction of prosecutors in Beijing. They delivered the case materials to the Beijing Municipal Procuratorate. In October 2007, the Beijing Municipal Procuratorate handed these materials to prosecutors in Chaoyang District, who began their investigation. Fu Hua was released on bail to await trial with restricted liberty on charges of bribery.
In March 2008, prosecutors brought an indictment in the Chaoyang District Court, accusing Fu Hua of bribery for writing two negative news stories about airport construction [in Changchun] after receiving gratitude fees totalling 30,000 yuan.
[The article goes into the details of charges and counter-charges about the amount of money Fu Hua received. Prosecutors insist he accepted 40,000 yuan, a charge Fu Hua apparently confessed to in Jilin under duress, but subsequently denied.]
In May 2009, the court session was opened [in Fu Hua’s case].
In the courtroom, Fu Hua admitted it was true that he had received 10,000 yuan in online public relations fees (公关费) [for placing his reports on Websites], but he again denied having received a 30,000 yuan payment, saying Li Shen had not given him 30,000 during their meeting but only 5,000 yuan.
Why did he withdraw his confession? A report in Jinhua Times quoted Fu Hua as saying that “they (the police in Jilin) told me after they beat me that Zhang Guangtao, the deputy head of Longjiabao Airport, and Zhang Jun, the head of Longjiabao Airport, resented one another. [They said] Zhang Guangtao and Li Shen had been detained, and that one said I was given 80,000 and another said I was given 40,000. If I continued to be uncooperative [they said], they would handle the case according to the higher figure.” Late at night the next day, [Fu Hua] gave in, admitting he “had known about the resentment between the two men, had accepted 40,000 yuan in gratitude fees and had written the negative reports in line with Zhang Guangtao’s wishes in order to get at Zhang Jun.”
The [Jinghua Times] report said that Fu Hua claims that as soon as he arrived in Jilin . . . his confession was extracted through torture. Fearing trouble he didn’t dare check his injuries at the detention jail [immediately following his release]. Once he returned to Beijing he went to the hospital for an expert examination. There the doctor told him he had multiple rib fractures.
Fu Hua said in the courtroom that as a news reporter his reports [on the Changchun airport] were faultless. But he should not [he said] have taken the 5,000 yuan interview fee Li Shen had offered him, as this was “a violation of journalistic ethics.” He said he “was wrong, but not guilty [under the law].”
Can journalists be guilty of accepting bribes?
While prosecutors maintain that Fu Hua is guilty of bribery, his defense lawyer, Zhou Ze (周泽) believes his client’s actions do not constitute bribery. The two sides parried about this in the courtroom, engaging in fierce debate.
The crime of bribery is a special criminal charge concerning the behavior of government employees (国家工作人员).
The first point of contention between the two sides centered on whether or not Fu Hua could be considered a government employee, and whether [as a reporter] he was carrying out public business (从事公务).
Zhou Ze held that according to the “Summary of a Work Forum on the Hearing of Economic Crime Cases at Courts Nationwide” (全国法院审理经济犯罪案件工作座谈会纪要), released by the Supreme People’s Court in [November] 2003, carrying out public business entails carrying out organizational, leadership, supervisory or management roles for government organs, state-owned enterprises, enterprise or institutional units (企业事业单位), or people’s organizations. Public business primarily involves public affairs directly connected with [state] functions and powers, and assigned duties or activities involving the supervision or management of state-owned property, and “those ordinary labor and technical activities, such as those carried out by salesmen or ticket collectors, are not generally regarded as public business.” Zhou Ze argued on this basis that journalists, whose entire work surrounds the gathering of information and writing of articles, or the production of [television or radio] programs, are not engaged in public business, but rather in ordinary service jobs.
The prosecutors argued that the basic factor in determining the issue of the crime of bribery was engagement in public business. Public business [they argued] is executing in accordance with the law a particular [state] function or power, performing a definite post. All public business [they argued] is manifested either directly or indirectly as the handling of the public affairs of the state or society. “The news reports carried out by news reporters amount to conduct in a post, they are public affairs connected with a [state] function or power, and they are one form of engagement in public business.”
“If we say that the interviewing and reporting carried out by the journalist is ‘engagement in public business’ then refusing to grant a journalist a desired interview or otherwise inhibiting a journalist’s work would constitute a crime of obstruction,” Zhou Ze affirmed [in his counter-argument]. Journalists are not government employees (国家工作人员), Zhou Ze said, so naturally they are not subject to the crime of bribery.
“Journalists represent the broad masses of the people in exercising the right to supervision by public opinion, so of course this has the quality of public business,” the prosecution countered.
“In our country the right to report the news and the right to carry out supervision by public opinon [press monitoring] are vested by authority and standing (享有权威地位). News units are registered and approved according to relevant national regulations, and generally the state is their source of capital. The Beijing bureau of China Business News where [the defendant] Fu Hua was employed was established by three separate state-owned insitutions or state-owned enterprises, and from an asset standpoint it is 100 percent state-owned, so of course it is a state-owned company. News reports are a kind of special form of exercise of the right to supervision by public opinion entrusted to news units (新闻单位), they possess a monopoly quality (具有垄断性) and this right is not something that any individual or any organization can simply have or exercise.”
Zhou Ze pointed out that when Fu Hua proceeded to Changchun to carry out his reporting [for the airport stories] he had not yet obtained his [official] press card [issued by the General Administration of Press and Publications]. Therefore, his behavior could not be regarded as an exercise of authority and could not constitute grounds for the crime of bribery.
Prosecutors maintained that the issue of whether or not [the reporter had] obtained a press card was immaterial to the question of whether or not the crime of bribery applied. Most key was whether [he was] engaged in public business or not, whether he was acting in a journalist’s capacity or not. While it is true that Fu Hua did not possess a press card at the time that he reported and wrote the two articles in question, his newspaper has submitted proof that “Fu Hua began work for Shanghai’s China Business News Group in March 2005, working as a reporter in the assets and finance section of the Beijing news center, his principle work being the reporting and writing of news reports.” Both of the bylined reports in question also say “staff reporter Fu Hua.” From this we can see that the newspaper group has confirmed Fu Hua’s status as a journalist.

The following is a portion of an interview with Fu Hua that accompanies the China News Service story at many Chinese portal sites:

Reporter: The Longjiabao Airport has been approved by Jilin Province as a project up to standard, and prosecutors say they have found errors in your original news reports. How do you see this question?
Fu Hua: I won’t offer my comments on this issue. Anyone who can think for themselves and open their own eyes can grasp the situation at a glance. My report was truthful. There were no problems. We went into the airport and took photographs and made recordings. We even interviewed local government departments such as the Development and Reform Commission and the Administration of Work Safety. Go back to the report and it will all be clear.
Reporter: You’ve worked as a judge before, so you must have know what would come of accepting money?
Fu Hua: I was apprehensive about taking the money at the time. I wouldn’t take the money at the time, and Li Shen said, “Look, if you don’t dare take the money, I don’t dare give you the list of sources. How can I trust you if you don’t trust me?” I took the money in order to dispel Li Shen’s doubts, and I thought I would give the money to the newspaper when the time was right. But the newspaper, bowing to pressure, removed the article from the Website, and one opportunity after another just passed right by until things got really troublesome. This was a ticking bomb being passed around like a hot potato, and it eventually exploded in my hands.
Reporter: You gave a few hundred yuan to your colleague [who helped report the story], so why didn’t you let him in on it?
Fu Hua: I didn’t let my colleague know because I thought it might cause them trouble. I wanted to protect them.
Reporter: When you accepted the invitation to pursue the story, did you know what their goal was?
Fu Hua: I knew at the time that the two of them (Zhang Jun and Zhang Guangtao) did not get along. It wasn’t a personal feud, just a difference over the work styles of the other. But I had no idea this would lead to such huge problems.
Reporter: What warning do you think this whole affair sends to you, to the media, to other reporters?
Fu Hua: Even if its a penny, don’t take it!

ADDITIONAL READING:
“Linfen Gag Fee Case Sparks Media Ethics Debate in China,” CMP, October 30, 2008
“Extortion or official bribery? Zhejiang court rules journalist Meng Huaihu must be punished as a public servant,” CMP, April 20, 2007
[Posted by David Bandurski, May 25, 2009, 3:03pm HK]

By David Bandurski — Zhejiang’s provincial people’s congress approved legislation last March that would make Hangzhou the first city in China to require Web users to register with valid identification before participating in local chatrooms and forums. This so-called “real-name Web registration system,” which was to take effect on May 1, seems for the moment, however, to be on hold.
A story from the official Xinhua News Agency, posted at many Web portals and run in a number of newspapers today, reports that the Hangzhou regulations have for the moment been “shelved” (束之高阁). [See the full Chinese text of the Hangzhou legislation HERE.]

[ABOVE: Screenshot of May 18 coverage in the Liberation Daily of Hangzhou’s “real-name Web registration system.”]

We can confirm what Xinhua is reporting — that users can, at present, get into major forums at Hangzhou portals, including Hangzhou Online, without providing any additional information.
After reading a statement in the registration section of Hangzhou Online stating that we would not “use this Website to harm national security, to twist or manufacture facts,” etc., we clicked “Accept” and went directly to the registration form.
Registering was as simple as typing in a username, setting a password and providing an e-mail address. There was no need whatsoever to provide valid proof of identity.
Below is a screenshot of an account we registered successfully from Hong Kong today:

Internet service providers in Hangzhou told the Xinhua reporter that they were waiting for specific instructions on the new legislation from “relevant government departments.”

“Accurately confirming information about Web users is very difficult to do,” said the head of one local Website in Hangzhou. “How should we confirm [their information]? Should we have them come in person to us and offer proof, or should we demand that Web users be truthful when they fill in their information? We haven’t yet seen a specific regulation about this.”

[Posted by David Bandurski, May 20, 2009, 3:09pm HK]

By David Bandurski — We are generally more likely to nitpick the work of Western journalists in China (on the rare occasions when we do turn an eye on their coverage of media issues) than to come to their defense. But the spitting match this week between The Telegraph and China Daily on the issue of “propaganda” deserves a moment’s discussion. [Frontpage Image: Propaganda poster photographed by Spiff_27 avalaible at Flickr.com under Creative Commons license.]
I’ll try to be brief.
The exchange in question began with a report by The Telegraph correspondent Peter Foster about how China had launched its “60th Anniversary patriotic campaign,” which he referred to as “propaganda.”
As Foster has since pointed out, The Telegraph is not alone in using the word “propaganda” to describe campaigns like this one to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the CCP.
Nevertheless, it was Foster’s report that drew an itchy rebuttal in China Daily by Australian columnist Patrick Whiteley, who said of The Telegraph:

“By constantly labeling Chinese government initiatives as ‘communist propaganda’ the newspaper deliberately paints a sinister and very outdated picture harking back to the days of ‘reds under the beds’ and the ‘yellow peril.'”

Whiteley’s basic point, if I understand him correctly, is that China no longer does propaganda. The director of China’s Central Publicity Department is not a “propagandist” — he is simply a politician, not unlike statesmen anywhere else in the world.
Whiteley’s argument centers on the English translation of the Chinese word xuanchuan (宣传), which, as he points out, cannot always simply be rendered “propaganda.”
If, against Whiteley’s better judgement, one insists on translating xuanchuan as “propaganda,” a simple and neutral Chinese word is saddled with a dark and unfair negativity. What you’ve basically done is taken a harmless word — something like “promote” — and infused it with the “evil shadow of Nazi Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels.”
That’s just not fair to well-meaning cadres like Li Changchun, China’s politburo standing committee member in charge of ideology, who I suppose we should call instead the CCP’s “chief message getter-outer.”
I could make a more elaborate argument about Chinese “propaganda,” but I did say I wanted to be brief. So I’ll just stick to an article about CCP media policy printed in last Sunday’s edition of the official Beijing Daily newspaper.

[ABOVE: Front page of May 10 edition of the official Beijing Daily with a report laying out “propaganda” guidelines for coverage of the 60th anniversary of the CCP.]

As a bold experiment I will resist rendering xuanchuan as “propaganda.” Here goes:

“Carrying Forward the Spirit of Patriotism and Adhering to Correct Guidance of Public Opinion to Create a CCP Anniversary of Soaring Spirit in a Social Atmosphere of Harmony”
Making an inspection yesterday at Beijing Television and the Beijing Bureau of Xinhua News Agency of preparations for news and publicity of the 60th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China, Member of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the CPC and Beijing Municipal Party Secretary Liu Qi (刘淇) demanded that [media] powerfully carry forward the spirit of patriotism and adhere to correct guidance of public opinion, creating a soaring spirit, joy and serenity, and a harmonious and civilized atmosphere for the celebration of the 60th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China by publicizing the glorious achievements and successful experiences of the capital city . . .
Liu Qi emphasized that news and publicity departments must tightly adhere to the events and topics as determined by the Central Party, publicizing the resplendent journey since the founding of the new China 60 years ago, carrying forward the spirit of patriotism and upholding correct guidance of public opinion, publicizing the glorious achievements and successful experiences of the capital city, singing loudly the main themes of praise of the party, of socialism, of economic reforms, of our great mother country and of our various peoples . . .

I believe this excerpt, just one from among scores of articles over the last week alone dealing with media policy at the local level, is sufficient to illustrate my point.
I hope Mr. Whiteley, should he happen upon my translation, finds it instructive. Like all of us, Mr. Whiteley has a great deal to learn about precisely how China’s propaganda apparatus works — and how it is changing.
As a final point, I caution against simplistic comparisons with radically different press and political environments. Mr. Whiteley asks:

Would The Telegraph‘s Washington correspondents ever write: “An Internet poll conducted across several leading US websites as part of a government propaganda campaign to mark the Fourth of July, has drawn a patriotic response”?

As The Telegraph‘s China correspondents know, I’ve taken a couple of them to task privately about niggling issues in certain recent reports about press policies in China. They took these in stride, mindful of their own learning curves.
Still, I feel quite certain the answer to Whiteley’s question is NO — not for the reasons, however, that his strange rhetorical question implies. While the Fourth of July is certainly a party, it is not a one-party political affair, and press coverage of the holiday would never be organized and financed by the local, state or federal governments. Pray, what “leading US websites” are directly operated and controlled by government institutions that tell them what they can and cannot report, and what they MUST?
But I promised to be brief, and I have this sinking feeling I’ve been pulled down into an argument with a first-grader who insists that peanut butter isn’t sticky.
[Posted by David Bandurski, May 15, 2009, 2:08pm]

By David Bandurski — South Korea may have spearheaded the use of grueling boot camps to tackle the problem of so-called “Internet addiction,” but China is apparently leading the way in experimental treatments for this still very controversial condition. And Internet addiction and its determined enemies have brought a mini-storm of coverage and commentary in China’s media this month.
The latest controversy about “Internet addiction,” which has been hotly debated among Chinese experts in recent years, is swirling around Zhejiang doctor Yang Yongxin (杨永信), a widely known expert on Internet addiction and a fierce critic of online games, particularly World of Warcraft.

[ABOVE: World of Warcraft, destructor of Chinese youth?]

On May 7, China Youth Daily ran three reports about the use of electric shock therapy on children admitted to Yang Yongxin’s clinic in Zhejiang.
Other newspapers followed up on the story, with Guangzhou Daily asking suggestively in a headline over the weekend: “What is more frightening than Internet addiction?”
China’s chatrooms were hot on the heels of this issue late last year after a Web user identifying herself as Wu Xuying (武旭影) posted an account of her own experiences in Dr. Yang’s program. The post was called, “My Story, and a Diary of My State of Mind in the ‘Yang Yongxin Web Addiction Treatment Center’” (我的小故事及在“杨永信网戒中心”的心理日记), and it made the rounds on sites like Tianya and MOP.
The writer concluded with a list of what she saw as the problems with Yang Yongxin’s treatment methods. Here was the fourth:

4. Violation of human rights and of the right to privacy.
Yang Yongxin says himself in his classes: “Privacy does not exist for anyone here.” The so-called comment sessions are all about forcibly “airing out” your private business before the world. And the sessions are also filmed . . . If what he pushes is judging the standards of others, and if what he himself promotes is extreme or wrong, then those who are branded as wrong by him [in these comment sessions] (even under-aged children), are they not suffering a kind of spiritual brainwashing, being malevolently misguided, or even suffering personal attack?

Responding to the recent uptick in coverage of this issue, QQ.com has set up a special features page in their Views section, aggregating bunches of content about Yang Yongxin and Internet addiction. The editor’s note begins:

Recent news reports have brought the Internet addiction treatment methods of “national web addiction expert” Yang Yongxin (杨永信) into the spotlight. His curing methods, which involve attaching electrodes to childrens’ temples or fingers and stimulating the brain with electric current, have been fiercely controversial. There are presently more than 100 children receiving this form of treatment at the Fourth People’s Hospital in Linyi City, Shandong Province, and they are not permitted to leave. According to Yang Yongxin’s own figures, close to 3,000 “children with Internet addictions” (网瘾孩子) have received this sort of “treatment” at the facility.
Experts have debated whether Internet addiction can actually be classed as a mental disorder, and discussion has been renewed recently. Now it has become evident that electroshock therapy is also being used to treat Internet addiction. And what is more frightening is that the parents of these children have expressed their support. When a debate among experts is up against market demand, what should be done? . . .

[ABOVE: QQ.com’s feature page on Internet addiction and the controversy over Yang Yongxin’s treatment methods.]

One of the commentaries promoted on QQ’s feature page is written by journalist, media scholar and former CMP fellow Hu Yong (胡泳), who is also author of the recent Chinese book The Rising Cacophony.
A few portions of Hu Yong’s commentary follow:

“Breathing is Also an Addiction”
By Hu Yong
May 13, 2009
. . . So-called Internet addition refers to the repeated and excessive use of the Internet to the point that is becomes a kind of mental disorder. It can manifest itself as the intense desire to use the Internet repeatedly, and withdrawal symptoms are often observed when Internet use is decreased. At the same time, the disorder can result in somatic symptoms. Some experts have given us chilling numbers, saying that approximately 20 million people in China have Internet addiction or are predisposed. This shocking number prompted Yang Yongxin to write on his blog that if we cannot effectively control the spread of Internet addiction, it would mean the “death of the party and the nation” (亡党亡国) and would mean entire Chinese people “would be without children and grandchildren,” that it would make America’s 1970s policy of “victory without war” become a reality, allowing Chinese culture to perish under the onslaught of online imperialism!
Well, with things coming to such a point as that, how can our party and nation afford not to give this top priority? What is regrettable, though, is that these experts [like Yang Yongxin] have not to this day been able to define clearly what Internet addiction is . . .
But I don’t know whether our society has thought about this question: as the diagnosis and treatment of Internet addiction lacks clear standards, there are certain treatment methods that might, even while they deal with Internet addiction, subject children to even more frightful demons. Used on our so-called “Web addicted youth,” certain methods of dealing with psychological disorders might do physical and mental harm to our children. Moreover, we must ask who it is that gave some of these adults the power to limit the personal freedoms of their children?
FURTHER READING:
* “Yang Yongxin, saving youngsters from Internet addiction,” CRIEnglish.com, October 22, 2008
* Lixuan Zhang, Clinton Amos and William C. McDowell. “Rapid Communication: A Comparative Study of Internet Addiction between the United States and China,” Cyberpsychology & Behavior, Volume 11, Number 6, 2008
* “In Korea, a Boot Camp Cure for Web Addiction,” The New York Times, November 18, 2007
* “Inside China’s Fight Against Internet Addiction,” Time, January 28, 2009
* “US Shows Signs of Net Addiction,” BBC News, October 18, 2006
* “Internet Addiction May Affect One In Eight In USA,” October 18, 2006 [Medical study abstract here]
[Posted by David Bandurski, May 14, 2009, 3:15pm HK]

By Qian Gang — History often makes us wring our hands. But perhaps this story, which is still very near to us, cannot yet be called history. On March 1, 2008, 72 days before devastating Wenchuan earthquake struck, earthquake preparedness quiz competitions were held in various parts of Sichuan. I don’t know whether people in Chengdu still remember cartoons like Dull Dog Versus the Overlord (笨笨狗PK巨能霸) [video here] and Toad Child (蟾童) [video here], which sought to convey basic scientific facts about earthquakes.
And I wonder how, after the earthquake struck, the Luojiang County team (罗江代表队) that won the “Deyang City Cup” (德阳数码电脑城杯), the first prize in Dayang’s local televised quiz for earthquake preparedness knowledge, assessed that competition that had been tied up so intimately with their lives and well-being.

[ABOVE: A still from “Toad Child,” an earthquake preparedness cartoon that aired in Chengdu ahead of last year’s Wenchuan earthquake.]

The earthquake destroyed much, including people’s memories. After the earthquake struck, we rarely heard people talk again about the earthquake preparedness work that was carried out before the quake.
But Wenchuan is not the final stop. There will be other major disasters in our future. So we must keep our wits about us, and we must learn our painful lessons.
The efforts we did make must not be obliterated, even if they fell short.

[ABOVE: Still from the television cartoon “Dull Dog,” which aired just weeks before the Sichuan quake struck. Here Dull Dog says, “Look, these are geological maps I searched out using my computer.”]

The test questions for a couple of these earthquake preparedness competitions are still available on the websites of the Mianyang and Deyang earthquake protection bureaus. There are 100 questions on the test form for Mianyang, and 200 on the test form for Deyang.
When I read these lists of questions I felt deeply sad and conflicted. What makes the deepest impression when you read these questions is knowing that prior to the 8.0 magnitude earthquake the government and people in the quake zone were not entirely ignorant about earthquakes and safety measures. Mianyang and Deyang were both designated as key areas for earthquake surveillance and protection (重点监视防御区) in 2004, and this state “secret” (机密) had already effectively been made public by means of these earthquake preparedness competitions themselves.
The test materials made it clear that these cities were located in an earthquake zone (the Longmenshan Fault passes through both cities), and that earthquakes had occurred there before (the 6.2 Beichuan earthquake in 1958 and the 1976 quakes at Songbo and Pingwu).
Both cities stressed the importance of building safety in these tests. Question number 88 on the Mianyang test, a multiple choice question, asks: “In earthquake disasters that have happened in recent years, what is the key reason for the common occurrence of the collapse of ‘shoddy’ buildings? A: work is not done according to standards; B: cheating on workmanship and materials; C: pre-fabricated structures cannot sufficiently withstand earthquakes.”
Question number 146 on the Deyang test asked: “Why must work quality be emphasized in particular as a factor in the earthquake resistance of buildings?” The standard answer provided for this question even raised the issue of the 1995 collapse of a structurally weak middle school building in Guangdong after an earthquake struck the Taiwan Straits.
There were no short-term predictions for the Wenchuan earthquake, and the event caught everyone off-guard. But one important impetus behind these quiz competitions — aside from the tenth anniversary of China’s Law on Earthquake Disaster Prevention — was the long–term forecast made in 2005.
Aba, Chengdu, Mianyang, Dayong — all of these places that later fell within the earthquake disaster zone — had already leapt into action.
The events of March 1, 2008, were of course merely quiz competitions. An major earthquake was already near, and even though these competitions conveyed important facts and concepts, it was already too late to make thorough inspections and repairs. But the topics and questions in these quiz competitions harbor important lessons for future earthquake preparedness work. China will experience more earthquakes, even major ones.
I hope that the government departments responsible for earthquake preparedness work will revise and bring back these valuable materials used for the quiz competitions, sharing them nationwide.
If these materials are revised according to the lessons of the Wenchuan earthquake, then I hope the government will place greater emphasis on the question of construction quality, particularly quality issues at schools and public buildings — and also on emergency information for students.
There should also be more emphasis on testing and reporting (of geological data) by the general public (群测群防), encouraging social organizations and individuals to conduct seismic monitoring to give us more information about possible quakes. Both of these focal points have been raised in the revised Law on Earthquake Disaster Prevention, which took effect on May 1.
[Posted by David Bandurski, May 12, 2009, 6:22pm HK]

By David Bandurski — Today marks the one-year anniversary of the Wenchuan earthquake. According to the latest official numbers, 68,712 died in the quake, of which 5,335 were students, and 17,921 remain missing, bringing the official human toll of the earthquake to 86,633. Given the importance of this anniversary, one might expect it to dominate the front pages of major newspapers across China. But that’s not exactly the full story today.
The two major stories today are the earthquake anniversary and the discovery of China’s first domestic case of swine flu in the city of Chengdu, which happens to be just 50 miles from the epicenter of last year’s quake.
Both of these stories were given priority on the front page of the party’s official People’s Daily today.
The narrow news space at the top of People’s Daily, generally devoted to important policy announcements, ran a story about an important directive from President Hu Jintao on readiness in dealing with the H1NI virus. Hu said China “needed to further strengthen its leadership, continuing to take the initiative in tackling crisis preparedness work, scientifically and effectively carrying out preventive measures, using all strength to check the spread of the epidemic in our country and ensure the health and safety of the Chinese people.”

[ABOVE: The front page of the party’s official People’s Daily today.]

The larger story below this one (with photo) was about Hu Jintao’s meeting in Chengdu with various diplomats and heads of state present in Sichuan to attend the Wenchuan earthquake memorial event today. Hu Jintao expressed his thanks for the broad international support China was given in its time of need, and praised the way the Chinese people (the People’s Liberation Army, etc.) had “united in the struggle” for rescue and relief following the quake.
Most newspapers, party and commercial, have given prominence to the earthquake anniversary on their front pages. For an excellent collage of front pages across the country, visit this special page set up by QQ.com.
Here is the front page of today’s Southern Metropolis Daily, somewhat reminiscent of front pages we saw across China during the national period of mourning last year:

[ABOVE: The front page of today’s Southern Metropolis Daily: “.”]

But a few papers, notably Shanghai’s Oriental Morning Post, focussed their front page attention on the H1N1 story. Here is today’s Oriental Morning Post, which shows a photo of the swine flu patient — a Chinese graduate student from the University of Missouri — currently under treatment in Chengdu.

[Posted by David Bandurski, May 12, 2009, 12:07pm HK]

By Qian Gang — It has been a year already since the May 12 earthquake in Sichuan. And as we remember that painful experience, we must engage in thorough reflection. That means also taking a fresh look at what actual steps were taken to prevent or mitigate disaster. [Frontpage Image: “China earthquake” by Sweejak, available at Flickr.com under Creative Commons license.]
This does not mean that we must tear everything down and rebuild from scratch. In fact, we have many decent laws in our country that simply need to be put into action, and promptly. We have stringent regulations that through disuse have become empty scraps of paper.
With the help of the Internet, I have ferreted out some of these old documents, and I would like to share them with everyone here, so that we may draw important lessons from them.
On January 31, 2005, more than three years before the earthquake struck, the government of Sichuan province sent down government order No. 6 (“川府发”[2005]6号文件). It was called, “Notice Concerning Further Steps in the Work of Earthquake Prevention and Preparedness” (关于进一步加强防震减灾工作的通知). In accordance with regulations on openness in government affairs, this document was printed in the Sichuan Government Bulletin (四川政报) and is still available online today.

[ABOVE: Screenshot of the Sichuan Government Bulletin online site, with 2005 document No. 06 on enhancing earthquake preparedness. Were any of these steps taken?]

This document deals specifically with the strengthening of work toward preventing and mitigating earthquake damage, and lays out a full-scale strategy on how to “comprehensively improve seismic monitoring” (全面提高地震监测能力), “comprehensively raise our capacity for earthquake forecasting and emergency decision making and management” (高地震预报和应急决策管理水平), and how to conduct earthquake safety work in the countryside.
One thing in the document that should grab our attention as we read it today is its clear language about the need to “urgently rebuild and reinforce various dangerous and old schools” (及时改造和加固各级各类危、旧校舍).
When I continued searching along these lines, I was surprised to discover that many provinces and cities issued similar documents on earthquake disaster prevention and mitigation in early 2005.
Shaanxi said “priority had to be given to primary and secondary schools in rural areas, and to earthquake fortifications at hospitals” (要高度重视农村中小学校舍、医院的抗震设防). Guangxi said “educational departments and other relevant government offices at various levels must work urgently to rebuild and reinforce dangerous or old school buildings of various kinds in all areas” (各级教育主管部门和有关部门要及时改造和加固各级各类危、旧校舍). The city of Xi’an said “there is a need to pay special attention to the fortification of primary and secondary school structures against earthquakes, and those that do not comply with the demands of earthquake protection must be rebuilt” (要高度重视农村中小学校舍的抗震设防，对达不到抗震设防要求的要进行改造).
On July 28, 2005, on the very same day that the anniversary of the Tangshan Earthquake was commemorated, the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development held a national forum attended by the heads of earthquake disaster prevention offices across the country. The ministry demanded that “special attention be paid to the seismic fortification of large-scale public buildings” (特别注意大型公共建筑的抗震设防), that “leadership be strengthened and responsibility be taken, employing measures to ensure every effort is made to reduce injury and loss of life in the event of a disaster.”
Every single one of these documents makes reference to another important document, the State Council’s “Notice Concerning the Strengthening of Prevention and Mitigation Work for Earthquake Disasters” (No. 25, 2004). This document serves as the policy reference for all of these local and regional documents on earthquake readiness.
If you make a careful reading of the speech delivered by Zhang Peizhen (张培震) of the China Earthquake Administration’s Institute of Geology to the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress on June 30, 2008, everything becomes clear instantly. Zhang, who is head of the Institute of Geology, said: “In 2004, the China Earthquake Administration organized earthquake experts from around the country to carry out research on earthquake rise from 2005 to 2020. They designed 22 areas around the country that were considered to be priority regions for earthquake monitoring and defense.”
The documents released by the State Council and by various provincial and city governments at that time were clearly part of an overall government push for earthquake disaster prevention.
But the burning question is: were these documents actually translated into action?
For example, taking into account the fact that most all of these documents mention the urgent need to reinforce school buildings, we must go back and ask: after the government raised this issue, what was the response of the various government officials responsible? Did education offices file their own reports on the situation? Were any funds appropriated for this work? How were housing and development offices involved? Did lower-level governments put these policies or recommendations into effect? Further, did the media play the role it should have in publicizing the issue and monitoring the situation?
It is never too late to make amends. The first goal of reflecting back must be to root out fatal loopholes. We have to take a pragmatic approach in getting a clear picture of what actions were taken after the 2004 State Council document was handed down. With this information in hand, we must take a fresh look at every step in earthquake distaster prevention and mitigation work, up to the moment that the earthquake struck.
The comprehensive push for earthquake readiness that we can glimpse from these government documents, a push that was prompted by long-term earthquake forecasts from experts, was followed not long after by last year’s Wenchuan earthquake. These documents hold extremely valuable lessons as we review our policy successes and failures in disaster warning and prevention. The government, academics, the media, all of us must give these administrative clues the attention they deserve — and we can afford even less to willfully ignore them.
A version of this article appeared in the May 7 edition of Southern Weekend.
[Posted by David Bandurski, May 8, 2009, 12:36pm]