Incorporating Responsibility: 2008


	Full Chinese language text of the report



	Shi Tao


	Illegally providing state secrets


	November 23, 2014

HRIC Trends Bulletin on "China's Environment and Situation of Water"

HRIC Statement for Tibetan Uprising Day: "March 10: Out of Exile, Into the Streets!"

Where's Hu Now?: Let your voice be heard on Hu Jintao's U.S. visit

HRIC Comments on HR 4780: Global Online Freedom Act of 2006

Li Zhi Appellate Ruling: English translation

HRIC Testimony to "Monitoring Respect for Human Rights"

Articles Alert: Feb 2006

HRIC Trends Bulletin: Media Crackdowns in China

HRIC Testimony to "Internet in China" Congressional Hearing


		Change text size		Print this page

Media Control in China
[First printed in China Rights Forum, No.4 2004]

Following are translated excerpts from a book-length report written by He Qinglian and published in Chinese by HRIC. Media Control in China describes how China's much-lauded economic modernization has allowed the government to camouflage its pervasive control under the glossy façade of consumerism, with a shift from ham-fisted censorship to an elaborate architecture of Party supervision, amorphous legislation, stringent licensing mechanisms, handpicked personnel and concentrated media ownership.

PART I: Chinese Journalists in Fetters

The relationship between the Chinese news media and the Chinese government is diametrically opposite of that between the media and the government in democratic societies. In modern democracies, the media perform the function of a social watchdog. Government policy, the personal integrity of government officials and foreign relations are all objects of critical debate by the media. In China, however, the government exercises tight control over public opinion, has designated many areas off-limits for public discussion and has imposed penalties to restrict journalists' freedom of action.

According to an investigation published by the New Yorkbased Committee to Protect Journalists, between 1998 and 2002 38 Chinese journalists were arrested on charges suggesting a state frame-up, and 32 were incarcerated, the largest number anywhere in the world.While Chinese journalists live peacefully on the surface, any exercise of social responsibility or professional conscience brings them under risk.

In this section I describe the cases of a few journalists who have suffered persecution, and briefly enumerate some other cases I have come across in recent years. It should be noted, however, that because this type of pressure and persecution is not made public, the evidence presented here is far from comprehensive. Generally speaking, the central government controls the media by means of political power and a series of top-down coercive policies. Local governments, lacking the supreme power and authority of the central government, rely on a multiplicity of control methods: on their own local media they can exert direct political control. In respect of reporters outside their jurisdiction, they exert control either directly through violence or indirectly through what Chinese officialdom commonly refers to as "saying hello"—exerting pressure on offi- cials from the reporters' place of origin to bring the offending organs into line.

Control is directed first of all at sources of information, in recognition of the fact that, in the words of the American media scholar Melvin Mencher, "News sources are a journalist's lifeblood. A journalist cannot do his job unless a news source tells him what happened."The more direct the source of information, the stronger the guarantee that the news will be timely and reliable. At the same time, a journalist needs to broaden the channels of information as much as possible.The essence of journalism is to collect information from all sources and then use a broad range of media, including newspapers, television and radio, to disseminate news to the wider public.

The government therefore uses its power to control news sources and to restrict ordinary people from providing information to Chinese media and especially to foreign media. Apart from the application of various laws and regulations, local government officials impose more arbitrary forms of control in accordance with the spirit of central government policy. Long years of suppression have bred in Chinese journalists a habit of "self-discipline," and most Chinese journalists resign themselves to playing the role of "Party mouthpieces" or seek to exploit their social influence for personal gain.

Journalists with a sense of social responsibility tend to adopt a sort of camouflage: they assume that the central government leadership is wise and that the Chinese socialist system is correct, and conclude that low-level corruption and its disastrous consequences can be attributed to the individual actions of a minority of officials. According to this line of thought, by revealing the facts, journalists can help the top leadership understand what is really going on so these problems can be dealt with effectively. While these journalists believe their self-protective approach will guarantee their personal safety, events have proven them naive.The examples cited below show that in reality the central and local governments are united in their views of how to deal with the news media. When journalists are framed and attacked by local officials, as happens all too often, and are courageously supported by other local media, the central government maintains a shameful silence that amounts to tacit consent to and encouragement of the local government's unscrupulous behavior.

Control at the source

Since the 1990s, China has witnessed a period of widespread graft and corruption accompanied by shocking events such as the Nandan coal mine accident in Guangxi, the Nanjing poisoning case and labor uprisings in Liaoyang, but these stories have very rarely been reported by the Chinese media.Any report of an industrial accident that appears in the press represents a hard battle by journalists to disclose it. It is difficult for non-journalists to appreciate the difficulties involved, not only in getting to the bottom of a story, but in battling the various levels of the Chinese bureaucracy.When such reports finally see light of day and compel the Chinese government to declare that it will "resolve the problem," they bring no honor to the courageous journalists who fought for them, but more typically spell the end of the journalists' careers, or even land them in prison.

Generally speaking, the Chinese government employs the following methods to control the media:

Black eyes and blackouts
Since the 1990s local leaders have demonstrated a growing tendency to instigate violent attacks against journalists in an effort to bring newsgathering activities under "unified control." While the people who carry out the actual obstruction of interviews and newsgathering activities are typically boozedup layabouts, local bullies and members of the criminal underworld, they inevitably have local authorities behind them. The central government's failure to speak out against violent interference with news reporting has only emboldened local government in its abuses. Following a huge explosion at the Liupanshui coalmine in Guizhou Province, no less than the deputy provincial governor, Liu Changgui, ordered the arrest of journalists and the forcible exposure of their film. In notorious cases in Nandan, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, and in Yichun, Jiangxi Province, the people responsible for interfering with journalist activities included local officials, public security officers and public prosecutors.[1]

After the mining accident on July 17, 2001 that killed 81 people in Nandan, Guangxi, the Nandan municipal government made every effort to impose a news blackout and ordered physical assaults on anyone who spoke to a journalist. When Guangxi TV, the Nanguo Zaobao (South Morning Post) and the Bagui Dushibao (Bagui City Courier)—all three from Guangxi—dispatched reporters to cover the story ten days after the accident, local government officials slammed doors in their faces and told them that nothing had happened.The people in charge of the mine also flatly denied that an accident had occurred. Collusion between Nandan mine management and the local criminal underworld discouraged miners from coming into contact with journalists.

One journalist for the Bagui Dushibao, having tried unsuccessfully to gain access to the mining area, came across an overhanging cliff from which he planned to take photos of the mine shaft, which was still leaking water. Suddenly two armed men emerged from a thicket, and one of them shouted at the journalist,"What are you doing here? Are you a reporter?"The other man said, "If he's a reporter, let's do him in and chuck him over the cliff." Scared to death, the journalist surreptitiously removed his press and ID cards from his pocket, threw them off the cliff and told the men he was in Nandan visiting relatives. Since the two men found no ID on him, they settled for simply chasing him from the mine area.

The central government's failure to speak out against violent interference with news reporting has only emboldened local government in its abuses.

Local people eventually guided other journalists to a particular county that had been hardest hit by the disaster, where they photographed many miners' families weeping, performing funerary sacrifices and burning belongings left by the dead.The video footage was a breakthrough in the coverage of this story, but when the journalists showed it to local government officials, a number of them claimed it was faked, and flatly denied that there had been an accident. One deputy secretary of the Guangxi Autonomous Region even shouted abuse at a People's Daily reporter and shut him out of a news conference (literally, "unified control meeting") concerning the accident.[2]

During the course of this accident and its aftermath, the Chinese government gained considerable experience in controlling the news media. From then on, whenever a similar accident occurred, journalists found it extremely difficult to gain access to the scene to conduct interviews.The Jiangxi provincial government's actions following an explosion at a fireworks factory in Huangmao Township, Wanzai County illustrate how officials were able to effectively impose a full news blackout.

On December 30, 2001, with the Chinese public still distraught over the Nandan coal mine accident, a huge explosion shook Huangmao Township, turning several hundred meters around the fireworks factory into scorched earth.The blast flattened buildings and shattered nearly every window within a radius of several kilometers. Even iron gates were warped by the shockwave. It was a truly shocking sight.

After the explosion, local government officials did their utmost to impose a news blackout.The local public security bureau set up roadblocks at all main thoroughfares to prevent journalists from approaching the scene of the accident, and local hospitals admitting casualties had armed police posted. Local Jiangxi media failed to report a single word about the incident.The official Xinhua News Agency, while reporting the recovery of 20 bodies by the early hours of December 31, made no mention of any missing people. Given the awesome power of the explosion, local people found it difficult to believe that only twenty people had died, and joked derisively that this was a case of "statistics with Chinese characteristics."[3]

With Jiangxi media making no report of the accident, residents of Nanchang, the provincial capital,were unaware that an explosion that had shocked China and the world had occurred in their province. Only when Jiangxi natives overseas read about the accident on the Internet and telephoned home did people in the province learn the awful news. Netizens were aggrieved not only by the death toll, but even more by the extent of the news blackout.

Because Jiangxi provincial Party Committee Secretary Meng Jianzhu was a close friend of then-Party Secretary Jiang Zemin, even the national media were subjected to all sorts of restrictions. The People's Daily, which had previously played an important role in exposing the tragedy at the tin mine in Nandan County, failed to publish a single word about this accident.

The Jiangxi Provincial government claimed that the Wanzai County explosion was a "mishap" caused by a negligent female machine operator, a lie so brazen that it provoked fierce criticism from Beijing newspapers over which the Jiangxi government had no jurisdiction. On January 7, 2001, Beijing's Gongren Ribao (Workers Daily) published an editorial entitled "We Cannot Accept this 'Mishap'" which stated, "The use of the term 'mishap' is a misapprehension."

Government officials continued to tell deliberate lies, but after the facts of the accident were widely circulated in Internet chatrooms, Premier Zhu Rongji was ultimately forced to make a public apology. Even then no senior government official said anything positive about the role journalists had played. On the eighteenth day after this accident that shocked the international community, the Chinese State Administration of Safety held a news conference on production safety. When some journalists raised the question of local government officials who had ordered journalists beaten for trying to inform the public, the agency's deputy director, who was presiding over the news conference, replied, "In principle, news reports should not make a big fuss about or exaggerate accidents affecting production safety.There must be unity for the sake of social stability." He added, "Unified news management ought to be observed with respect to reports from the scene of accidents, the number of casualties and the handling of the situation."[4]

Gentle persuasion
Violence against journalists is used all over China, but newspapers very rarely report such incidents.The case detailed below is typical:

On June 1, 2002, Zhao Jingchao and L¨¹ Tingchuan, reporters for the Jinan Shibao (Jinan Times), and Yang Fucheng, a reporter for Shandong Qingnian (Shandong Youth) magazine, traveled together to follow up on complaints from villagers of Ximeng village in Ninyang County, Shandong Province. Villagers had accused the local Party branch secretary, Liu Fangzhu, of corruption and of keeping a private jail cell where he had villagers tortured.While they were driving home after their interviews, the three journalists received a phone call from the magazine editor telling them that Ninyang County public security officers were about to intercept them, and that they should hurry back to Jinan.While they were still en route, several police vehicles overtook them at high speed with howling sirens and barred their way. At around 4:30 p.m., the deputy director of the Ninyang County Party committee propaganda department, Ji Weijian, arrived on the scene and took the journalists back to his offices, where he instructed the Sidian town mayor, surnamed Zhang, to take over.

Mayor Zhang ordered the town government work team that had beaten up the villagers to force the journalists to surrender all their film rolls, interview notes and audiotapes. At approximately 7:30 p.m., the two government officials left the office, and a dozen plainclothes policemen burst in and proceeded to beat and kick the three journalists, inflicting severe head injuries on Zhao Jingchao. Not one propaganda department official stepped forward to stop the assault.The three journalists were then taken to the public security bureau for interrogation, during the course of which Zhao identified the policemen who had assaulted him, only to be ferociously beaten once again. It was only after midnight, when a group of journalists dispatched by the Jinan Shibao showed up, that the police released the journalists.[5]

A person concerned about this issue collected newspaper reports relating similar attacks on journalists between September and December 2000:

September 16: Deng Qiang, deputy chief of the Ningde City public security bureau in Fujian, not only prevented journalists from covering a public court sentencing, but actually came to blows with them in broad daylight and confiscated their camcorders.

September 28: A group comprised of the China Association for Quality Promotion and the Xi'an Office of Quality Control went to Xi'an's Wild Rose Computer City (a computer and software mall) to conduct a statutory inspection.The general manager of the mall, Qian Xiaoyan, ordered his subordinates to tear up the inspectors' IDs and chase and beat up accompanying journalists.A CCTV film camera worth 570,000 yuan was broken and two inspectors were injured. According to reports, the general manager had political backing in Xi'an. October 16: Zhang Xiuying, Party committee secretary of the Shanxi Medical Electronic Equipment Factory, led more than 20 men into the reference room of the Shanxi Gongrenbao (Shanxi Workers' Daily) and attacked two journalists, apparently in retaliation for a news article reporting a merger dispute involving his factory.

October 16: Members of a village protection team attacked two journalists from the Nanfang Dushibao (Nanfang Daily) with iron clubs and wooden cudgels while they were gathering information regarding a violent clan incident in the Baiyun suburb of Guangzhou.The journalists were beaten unconscious and had their cell phones and interview notebooks snatched.Although a crowd of people witnessed the incident, no one reported it to the police. One of the assailants told the journalists, "How dare you reporters come here and nose around! We'll kill you."

November 7: On the eve of China's Journalists' Day, as the Chinese government proclaimed its commitment to protecting the rights and interests of journalists, a huge fire broke out at a Taiwanese-owned shoe factory in the outskirts of Guangzhou, razing three warehouses covering an area of more than 1,000 square meters. When four journalists for Guangzhou's Yangcheng Wanbao (Yangcheng Evening News) went to the scene of the accident to conduct interviews, they were threatened, pushed, chased and beaten by a mob at the instigation of factory management.

One of the assailants told the journalists, "How dare you reporters come here and nose around! We'll kill you."

November 9: On the day after Journalists' Day, a journalist for Nanning Wanbao (Nanning Evening News) who was involved in a traffic accident was assaulted by the other driver to prevent him from reporting the accident to the police and taking pictures of the scene.

November 20: A collapse at the building site of a heating plant in the southern outskirts of Jinan, Shandong Province, killed four workers and injured one.When journalists for Shenghuo Ribao (Life Daily) and Qilu Wanbao (Qilu Evening News) went to the scene, they were insulted, surrounded and beaten up by plant security staff. One of the journalists suffered a cerebral concussion and had his camera equipment destroyed.

November 22: When the singer Mao Ning was stabbed, two journalists for the Beijing Qingnianbao (Beijing Youth Daily) rushed to Zhaoyang Hospital to interview her, but were blocked and beaten by people at her bedside. Their cameras were stolen and their film exposed. This incident was followed with interest by the national media.

December 4: Six journalists for Shaanxi's Huashangbao (Chinese Business View) who were covering the Tianlong coal mine explosion in Hejin, Shanxi Province,were attacked with bricks and cudgels by goons working for the mine.Two of them went missing.[6]

Read the full translated excerpt of He Qinglian's Media Control in China.

//

ENDNOTES

[1] Guangzhou journalist Zhao Shilong, who has covered a number of significant national events, has written a vivid essay recounting his own experiences in a "high-risk profession." Zhao Shilong, "Shi shui zai zurao caifang?" (Who is stopping journalists from conducting interviews?), Nanfeng Chuang (The Window of the South Wind), February 2002.

[2] Zhao Shilong, ibid.

[3] Tai Yueng Po (The Sun), Hong Kong, January 1, 2002.

[4] Fazhi Ribao (Legal Daily), Beijing, January 17, 2001. Editor's note: On February 20, 2004, the Xinhua News Agency reported that Wan Ruizhong, a former county Party head in southwestern Guangxi, was executed after being found guilty of taking 3.2 million yuan in bribes from the operators of the Lajiapo tin mine in return for concealing a fatal flooding of the mine, which killed at least 81 people in 2001. The Xinhua report said that armed thugs were hired to keep reporters away, as a result of which the incident was not reported until two weeks after it occurred.

[5] "Shandong jizhe fang tangwu'an zao jingcha duda" (Shandong journalists savagely beaten while investigating a case of corruption), Pingguo Ribao (Apple Daily), Hong Kong, January 8, 2002.

[6] "Zhongguo jizhe de hong yu hei" (The Good and Bad Among Chinese Journalists), a critique of the current state of Chinese journalism. Source: bbs.beida-online.com.

//