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Dallas Smythe's concept of "cultural screening" is often overlooked, despite its crucial importance for the politics of technology. Smythe posited that developing socialist countries should scrutinize technology imported from capitalist countries due to its potentially adverse ideological impacts. In this paper, I examine and develop this concept by analyzing the intricate dynamics of class politics characterizing socialist China's technological development. This paper also contributes to Chinese science and technology studies (STS) by providing new insights and perspectives. Unlike Smythe, who did not explicitly focus on class, Maoism emphasizes the role of class politics in shaping technological development. According to Mao, the participation of the masses in technological development is a key manifestation of socialism, whereas technocratic and intellectual approaches reflect capitalism. Therefore, he understood the development of technology as a "line struggle" between socialist and capitalist roads and prompted the mass mobilization of workers to study Maoist philosophy to ensure the implementation of "proletarian politics in command." The philosophy study movement aimed to reshape epistemological relationships between knowledge and practice, workers and technocrats, and labor and technology/machinery to mediate class politics in technological development in socialist China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Discerning what populists mean by the people is crucial for understanding populism. However, the appeals populists make to the people differ across political systems, with distinctions particularly evident between democratic contexts and one-party states such as China. Articulations of the people in Chinese populist communication remain underexplored, which is a gap this paper addresses by clarifying how the people is constructed in the discourses that underpin Chinese populism. A total of 61 populism cases were examined through discourse and meta-analyses, from which three manifestations of the people emerged. First, the Chinese nation serves as an ideological glue to mobilize people to protest against those seen as betraying their Chinese identity or violating the sovereignty and dignity of China. Second, the mass is associated with an affective aversion to scientists and experts, but also with mass support for a satirical subculture that challenges the hegemony of elite-dominated cultural production and cultural institutions. Finally, socially vulnerable groups assemble powerless people in situations of economic impoverishment, political marginalization, and social vulnerability. The analysis reveals how these three conceptualizations of the people drive online Chinese bottom-up populism, allowing netizens to serve as mediators and pitting the people against corrupt elites and the establishment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A call for papers on an increased use of internet and information & communication technologies (ICT) in rural China is presented.

This paper content analyzed 1584 news samples from 10 newspapers in China in 2012 and 2018 with the aim of exploring how the style of news has changed concurrent with the rapid expansion of digital media. The results showed that newspaper journalism in China is currently undergoing de-professionalization. Among six conventional indicators of professional news, three (brevity, immediacy, plurality of sources) are in significant decline, and the other three (adherence to conventional news structure, objectivity, and public orientation) are in partial decline. Such a shift can be interpreted as a decline in news quality, or alternatively, the formation of new journalism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A call for paper for communication research on the important health issues in China is presented.

The article offers information on the call for papers for the special issue of the "Chinese Journal of Communication," entitled "Communicating Health in China: The Role of Health Communication Research."

Given that the political institution of Hong Kong is not fully democratic and is incompetent in channeling public opinion to the executive branch, the Hong Kong media perform the “surrogate democracy function,” wherein they act as the representative of the Hong Kong people in monitoring the government. This simultaneously provides a breeding ground for media populism. Focusing on newspaper editorials and reports on issues of public finance in Hong Kong, this paper analyzes the rhetoric of media populism, which has become part of the journalism culture of the city since the transfer of sovereignty. The paper reveals that media populism is formed by the construction of a populist diagnostic frame, which implies antagonism between the rich government and the deprived people. The populist diagnostic frame is exercised by (1) lexical creations that imply the government–people relation in public finance, (2) omitting inter-class redistribution by in-grouping both the middle class and the lower class as “the people,” and (3) validating the people’s will by interpreting poll results. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The paper is concerned with how Chinese public and civil society understand the so-called socialism with Chinese characteristics, or Chinese-style modernization, in the era of post-globalization capitalism and in light of their social imaginaries of technology and industry. The authors discuss historically formed as well as newly arising social imaginaries of the importance and role of industry, science, and technology in China when formulating an alternative, non-western vision of modernization presented in public cultural forms such as movies, TV dramas, social media discussions or broadcasted public conversations. The emphasis is on the particularity of the Chinese approaches toward industry, technology, and social development, and how they are similar to or different from liberal philosophies of technology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The COVID-19 pandemic propelled many countries into a "state of exception," under which several regular governance norms were suspended and emergency regulations were enacted. China was no exception. After its initial domestic vacillation, China implemented rigorous measures to control its borders and employed digital technologies, such as health codes and intelligent gate magnets, to streamline inbound travel management. These measures were in place until the end of 2022. Drawing on 30 in-depth semi-structured interviews and public and social media posts, this study examines the multifaceted role of digital governance in the management of inbound travelers during the COVID-19 pandemic in China. Digital governance facilitated and streamlined the quarantining of inbound travelers. Meanwhile, the use of digital measures was entangled with the institutional logic of China's local governance, which sometimes had to reconcile contradictory goals. Theoretically, the paper enriches our understanding of not only the idiosyncrasies of Chinese digital governance but also of techno-biopolitics under a COVID-19-induced tentative state of exception, which sheds light on a possible future in which digital technologies are deeply integrated into the institutional logic of governance in an increasingly turbulent world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyzes the coverage of China in the UK national daily press for the calendar year 2008. The article demonstrates that, although there were many articles mentioning China, these were distributed throughout the year so as to emphasize large-scale and dramatic events. Second, the articles were not evenly distributed across the titles analyzed. The big-selling down-market titles had very few substantial articles on China. The mid-market titles had more, but the total was still very small. Only the up-market titles, with their elite readership, covered China regularly and in depth. The article then compares the quality of the coverage through an analysis of the frames present in the Sun, the Daily Express, and the Financial Times. The article finds that the coverage had some similarities across all titles, but that the two more popular titles concentrated on negative aspects of China while the elite title carried more nuanced coverage. It is speculated that the Financial Times has more detailed and better-rounded coverage of China primarily because the readers are much more likely to have professional and personal relations with China and need a better picture of the realities of that country. The less wealthy and well-educated readers of the other papers have little direct experience of China, and the country can be used as one of the markers of a dangerous and threatening world. It is noted that this is an analysis of what is present in newspapers, and no valid conclusions can be drawn about audience attitudes from this evidence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper introduces the special issue “China: Internationalizing the Creative Industries”, describing the Australian Research Council funded “MATE” project which provides the conceptual background for the questions the issue explores. The MATE project began with the expectation that as China evolves from its status as a developing country with an emphasis on primary industries and manufacturing, to a mature, market-driven economy benefiting from high levels of international investment, it will become more actively engaged with the global “knowledge economy” and “information society”. In this context, developments in the “creative industries”, which are playing such an important role in developed economies, might reasonably be expected in China. Although China continues to be characterised by strong central-policy settings, as the domestic consumer market matures there is greater scope for consumer-led creative business development. The “MATE” project aimed to capture some of these changes as they began to gain momentum across a range of services: Media, Advertising, Tourism and Education. This special issue continues this theme with papers that explore the theoretical challenges, economic questions and implications, and practical instantiations of creative industries growth in China. All papers contained in this special issue have been peer-reviewed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In China, scholarly journals are affiliated with the particular governing organizations that house them. This process of what can be characterized as danweization has given the editors of these journals almost unchallenged power, prompting the contributors to seek their favor through guanxi networks. Drawing on fieldwork and in-depth interviews with key journal editors in media studies, this paper aims to explore the configuration of guanxi networks, the dynamics of guanxi practice in the gatekeeping process, and the implications of this practice for communication scholarship. We found that guanxi functions as a multi-layered particularism to facilitate the flow of information, to advance the priority of given papers, and to increase the rate at which such papers are published. In consequence, these journals publish a disproportionate number of articles by colleagues from the same sponsoring danwei. The operation of guanxi networks is so entrenched that it raises questions about the integrity of knowledge production and academic autonomy in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In Hong Kong’s open and law-abiding society, applying the political principle of “one country, two systems” presents a challenge to the Chinese government, particularly regarding its efforts to control media ownership. Focusing on the structure of media ownership in Hong Kong, this paper describes the ways in which the Internet – especially social media – has empowered activists and alternative media by providing a means of avoiding censorship and social control. This paper also describes the Chinese government’s use of political power and capital to censor and shape the media landscape in Hong Kong in order to dampen public interest in politics and influence public opinion. Finally, this paper attempts to identify potential solutions to this problem. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In China, youths actively transfer places of political pilgrimage to images on digital social media to perform their national identity construction. This paper seeks answers to two questions: How does a physical space, such as Tiananmen Square, influence the national identity construction of Chinese youths when they digitalize their experiences using the location-based services (LBS) of social media? What characterizes the interaction between youths as individuals and their institutionalized political pilgrimages? We collected 1,008 image-and-text and 147 video-and-text microblogs produced by Chinese youths in Tiananmen Square in 2019 to analyze their political pilgrimage experiences using multimodal discourse analysis and visual grammar theory. After conducting in-depth interviews with selected microbloggers for further verification, we found that national identity construction consisted of both emotional arousal and emotional repression. The tension between arousal and repression was prevalent during the flag-raising ceremony in Tiananmen Square, and the social outcomes of this tension led to the simultaneous strengthening and destabilization of the national identity. Additionally, the LBS function of social media converted traditional offline spatial practice rituals to digital opportunities through which Chinese youths enjoyed constructing their national identities with online viewers far from the physical location. This finding is significant in theorizing location-based identity construction in social media. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent development of the global media market, including the purported decline of American media and the rise of regional centers, have shown the inadequacy of existing theories in capturing the essence of such changes and an urgent need to re-conceptualize key concepts such as culture and market economy. This paper examines the role of culture as it is reflected in the way viewing preferences feed back to production decisions that lead to the transformation of imported media genre, using the reception and transformation of reality television in Greater China as an example. The paper argues that there is the need to go beyond the dualistic “either-or” conceptual framework and see cultural/economic, and media/audience power as moving forces rather than dualistic dichotomies with a linear, predetermined relation. The paper explores the potential of the Chinese Yin/Yang mode of thinking for developing an alternative analytical model for media studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using content analysis, this paper explores the policy-making trends for Internet governance in China. It examines the manner by which policy changes over time, the different policy-making agencies in the country, and the various application scopes and topical focuses of policy. This paper aims to determine the distribution of key policy decisions over different policy-making agencies and which policy issues receive the most attention from China's government in its efforts to regulate the Internet. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In recent decades, the dramatic socioeconomic changes that have occurred in China have increasingly affected the social lives of older Chinese adults. The purpose of this study is to determine whether the social networks developed in an online community contributed to the subjective well-being of this age group. The underlying mechanism of this effect was examined by investigating a senior-oriented online community (OldKids). An online survey was administered to participants in the OldKids network. The results showed that the proposed theoretical model was effective in demonstrating that their participation in the OldKids network improved the participants’ subjective well-being through the mediation of perceived social support and feelings of social connectedness. The theoretical and practical implications of the results are discussed in this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In an analysis of ten Chinese mediation episodes, three complementary strategies were identified: the strategy to bring about a predetermined outcome, the strategy to alleviate adversity and the strategy to promote compromise. In this paper, the strategy to alleviate adversity between disputing parties is discussed. The strategy discussed here includes two tactics – balancing and minimization. Balancing is defined in this paper as making both sides appear to be evenly matched by comforting one party in front of the other, whom the mediator's “pre-determined outcome” favours. Minimization is a tactic of framing, where the mediator frames the event in such a way as to minimize the focal point or the cause of the conflict. This analysis reflects the typical Chinese value of seeking the middle way and concern withguanxi(interrelation). It is argued that, by adopting these tactics in order to solve “intangible issues” (i.e. adversity/hostility) (Lewicki and Litterer, 1985), Chinese mediators would violate neutrality, in order for the disputants to clear the barriers to reaching an agreement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Emerging from the early Shanzhaiji, or bandit cell phones, the notion of Shanzhai has developed into a prominent cultural phenomenon in China since 2008. This paper examines the discourse on Shanzhai cultural production in Chinese metropolitan newspapers and those of the Communist Party. The research questions pertain to how a grassroots cultural phenomenon is discursively constructed and how social and media structures manifest themselves in this process of discourse construction. Within the framework of discourse analysis, the dimensions of authenticity and legitimacy cut across all discursive categories regarding Shanzhai cultural production. Depending on the relationships between the two dimensions, a rival discourse and a harmony discourse were found in the archived news reports and editorials. The author argues that authenticity is oriented toward power relationships or content and themes of the cultural productions in the two discourses, respectively. The discourses reflect contesting efforts to construct cultural hegemony in Chinese society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

I examine the possible differences between the concept of media instrumentalization and political parallelism. In the first part of this paper, I aim to reconstruct the history of the concept of political parallelism that derives from Seymour-Ure's concept of party parallelism. I will then discuss why and how party parallelism has transformed into political parallelism by following the transformation of mass political parties. Different dimensions of political parallelism are illustrated, including how it is linked to specific structures of the public sphere and to the idea of external pluralism. A similar discussion focuses on media instrumentalization. In the last part, I attempt to highlight different social and political conditions that motivate instrumentalization and political parallelism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a sequel to China Can Say No, China Is Not Happy is the bestseller of 2009 in China. The book praises China's post-80s generation for their act of patriotism, condemns the West, in general, and the United States, in particular, for exploiting the Chinese and for causing a global economic crisis. It also criticizes the Chinese liberal elite and overseas returnees for being Western-influenced mental slaves and traitors. The authors of the book call for an abandonment of “literary tone”, advocate a tough stand against Western countries, and envision China as the leader of the world through its economic and military power. This paper examines the major themes and belligerent rhetoric employed in the book through an application of Kenneth Burke's rhetorical concepts of identification, terministic screens, and representative anecdotes. The author of this paper contends that such use of rhetoric demonstrates the language habit of China's political discourse in its modern history, escalates blind nationalism, and widens the gap in intercultural understanding between China and the US. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the relationship between revolutionary history television dramas and the social context in which these dramas are televised in China with In Those Passionate Days serving as an example. Specifically, the paper focuses on the construction of the hero in the drama and the ways in which audiences' interpretations of the drama are indicative of a contemporary revival of Confucian values and practices in Chinese society. The audience is people born after 1980 as this generation is often related to a new generation in China that values independence and hedonism, unlike their parents. Based on a reception analysis of the 1980s-generation viewers of the drama, the paper shows that In Those Passionate Days in the participants' views is structured around the Confucian values of benevolence, qing, and filial piety – values the viewers also found desirable and practiced in their daily lives. The study concludes with the view that the media is key to promoting historically grounded values and practices that legitimize the leadership of the state and provide a moral code for social relationships in contemporary China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the growing cultural trend of Chinese online fiction. Using Gans's twin concepts of taste culture and taste public, it looks at online fiction as a product of two taste cultures evident on the Chinese Web. The paper then explores the growing appeal of online fiction for consumers and producers (or readers and authors) in relation to two key issues: are there important differences between online fiction and print fiction? Is the participatory nature of online fiction leading to a reinvigoration of literary creativity in the Chinese-speaking world? The relationship between the consumer and the producer of Chinese online fiction can also be explored in terms of an attention economy, and the evolving market for this type of fiction provides an excellent example of how such an economy functions. The attention economy encourages competition for the attention of readers and consequently ensures that the values of the taste public consuming this fiction strongly dictate its content and its continued improvement as a form of literary production. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The diffusion of the Internet in China has provoked heated discussion about its impact on democracy in the country. Based on an extensive review of the literature, this paper examines the political impact of the Internet in China. It argues that the Internet itself will not be a driving force for political changes, but rather will play a facilitating role during democratization in China. This paper takes a macroscopic approach, and its main contribution lies in three areas. First, it provides a succinct synthesis of the current research on the development of the Internet, censorship, and counter-censorship in China. Second, it adopts a comparative perspective by relating the roles of the Internet to those of traditional media during the democratization processes in history. Third, it offers insights into factors that mediate the democratizing power of the Internet in China, including citizens' political participation, the political environment, media revitalization, and international influence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many countries expect e-government to increase the efficiency of public administration and revitalize government-citizen interaction. This paper reviews the existing research on e-government and expands it with a detailed examination of China, where e-government development is considered an important component of the national informatization strategy. To assess the status and driving factors of deployment, a detailed inventory of the e-government capacities of all Chinese provinces was created, allowing a more nuanced assessment than earlier studies. Although the data reveal that information delivery and basic interactional and communicative features dominate, the study also finds a range of advanced transactional and participatory services offered. Furthermore, despite strong guidance by the central government, distinct regional disparities are visible; these can be explained by differences in government spending on science and technology, economic resources, education, and urbanization rate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the aftermath of China's ICT-driven and mass-mediated neoliberal development, the need to reduce China's economic vulnerability to transnational market volatility and to pacify class tensions by improving social justice and redistributing social resources has become urgent. The “socialist harmonious society” concept marks a more sophisticated and socially-oriented mode of governance. By examining two state projects under the auspices of constructing a socialist harmonious society, i.e., the state-endorsed surge of charity activities and the state-subsidized increase of vocational education targeting exclusively rural migrants, this paper argues that these emerging sites of governance, often responding to and defined by China's ICT-driven and mass-mediated neoliberal development, mark the neoliberal restructuring of state activities, and that what distinguishes this new mode of governance is the neoliberal notion of redistribution, which is central to the quasi-inclusive social institutions discussed in this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study uses an inductive method to carry out a redefinition of communication competence from a Chinese perspective by means of a thorough review of related literature published between 1980 and 2007, to explore how ethnic Chinese communicate in daily social interactions. Taking two decades' worth of research into communication competence - that is, the combination of effectiveness and appropriateness in communication - as a point of departure, this paper suggests that being a competent communicator in Chinese societies is quite different from being so in Western societies. Unlike past research, which has tended to emphasize effectiveness, the paper argues that appropriateness is also a critical factor for competent communication among Chinese. As for establishing and maintaining relationships in daily interactions, Chinese societies have subtle and intricate rules in communication. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the digital era, most media organizations are exploring their own models to introduce news convergence and to make it work and profitable. This paper makes a comparative analysis between two local/regional newspapers, China's Beijing Youth Daily (BYD) and Denmark's Nordjyske, on their newsroom convergence models. The author finds that BYD focuses on the newspaper-based model with a strategy of integrating the content of BYD and its subsidiary newspapers, and it promotes interactivity between newspapers and the web (internet and mobile phone). It maintains the traditional separate and cascade newsrooms with newspapers mainly supplying content to websites. By contrast, Nordjyske has applied a multimedia-based model implementing resource sharing, content sharing and cross-promotion via multiple platforms including TV, radio, print, and website. It uses matrix-organization in its newsrooms with reporters organized around news beats. At present, BYD is blocked by policy barriers that prohibit newspapers from running broadcasting services in China. When the market is further deregulated, there is possibility that BYD will follow Nordjyske's practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper argues that media and communications theory, as with cultural and creative industries analysis, can benefit from a deeper understanding of economic growth theory. Economic growth theory is elucidated in the context of both cultural and media studies and with respect to modern Chinese economic development. Economic growth is a complex evolutionary process that is tightly integrated with socio-cultural and political processes. This paper seeks to explore this mechanism and to advance cultural theory from an erstwhile political-economy perspective to one centred about the co-evolutionary dynamics of economic and socio-political systems. A generic model is presented in which economic and social systems co-evolve through the origination, adoption and retention of new ideas, and in which the creative industries are a key part of this process. The paper concludes that digital media capabilities are a primary source of economic development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the process by which user-created content in contemporary China has evolved from being appropriated as a weapon of political mobilization and accusation to serving as a vehicle of independent self-representation. The analysis is set in the context of the social, political and economic metamorphosis that China has undergone in the past five decades and foregrounds the dynamics of political, economic and technological forces transforming Chinese media. The metaphor of “the wall” is used to chart the contours of the struggle for self-expression and representation. The paper concludes with a brief discussion of the political and social implications of the Internet and networked user created media content for China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent research points to the evolution of a symbiotic relationship between bloggers and the professional news media, in which blogs influence and supplement the work of journalists but do not appear to be replacing it entirely. Such relationships are developing not only on a country-by-country basis but also on a global scale, assisted by the phenomenon of “bridge blogs”. Will this lead to a more democratic global information order? This paper examines the China case, and the emerging relationship between blogs, bridge blogs, and foreign correspondents who cover China. It concludes that if blogs and citizen media are contributing to a more democratic global information order, it is more of a “representative” form of democracy - not a pure “many to many” global discourse that many Internet idealists had hoped. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Taking a narrative perspective, this paper analyzes a public address titled “the Causes of the Unpopularity of the Foreigner in China”. It was given by a Chinese envoy named Wu Ting-fang in 1900 immediately following the Boxer Rebellion. First, the paper represents the narrative event and context - the Boxer Rebellion, within which Wu's speech was given. It then analyzes how Wu challenged the dominant Western construction of the Boxer Rebellion and constructed a different story. Finally, it discusses how Wu's personal background and experiences legitimized his ability and qualification to proffer an alternative construction. The rhetorical artifices Wu used to construct a coherent and factually grounded story include stating all the facts, reconstructing the ordering relations of these facts, and reestablishing the identities and images of the people involved in the story. Wu's special education and career background, which made him a welcome speaker on the topic of cultural differences in Western public forums, legitimizes his role as a truthful storyteller. Transculturally and transtemporally created, Wu's personal experience narrative is not merely an instrument to communicate personal experiences to other people. It transcends spatial and temporal limits and is productive of human knowledge. His speech is pertinent to the present, as all manner of civil and theological clashes of civilization both continue and start anew. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the role of media and communication at times of public crisis and contends that a modern, open information system is a precondition for good crisis management. It traces evolving policy discourse in Mainland China with a special focus on the relationship between the authorities and media. An overview is provided to contextualize and historicize the contemporary development. By examining a series of critical news events triggered by public crises, especially the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) epidemic in 2003, it provides a broad assessment of the issues involved in the creation of China's open information system, with regard to both institutional policy-making as well as everyday journalistic practices in reporting the emergent events. Finally, the paper discusses pertinent legislative and regulatory measures in recent years that hold particular importance to state-media relationship during public crises, especially the Emergency Response Law promulgated in June 2007. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the rapid development and wide popularization of information and communication technology (ICT), two trends in the policy implementation process of open government information channels have emerged: online and offline. This research uses an implementation behavior theoretical framework and panel data of 31 provincial governments in mainland China from 2008–2017 to compare and analyze the factors influencing the implementation of online and offline channels. The results demonstrate that over 10 years, online channels have replaced offline channels as the main channels of open government information and that there are significant differences in the influence of different factors on the online and offline channels. Upward pressure and internal willingness do not significantly impact offline channels but have partially significant positive effects on online channels. Citizen participation and the regional environment have significant effects on online and offline channels, but the effects are inconsistent. The findings add to the literature on the implementation of different policy elements in the field of policy science, providing a decision-making reference for governments to adjust and balance the implementation process between online and offline channels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article offers a review of the Chinese-language literature on environmental communication in mainland China. In particular, it discusses the main features, promises, and limitations of the relevant literature. All academic papers matching particular keywords for environmental communication in seven top-ranking Chinese-language media and communication journals (four in mainland China, one in Hong Kong, and two in Taiwan) were collected and analysed quantitatively. The first section of the article presents the findings of the quantitative analysis based on several aspects, including the journals’ main interests, distribution of publications over time, types of topics, research methods, leading authors in the field, their choices of research methods and topics, and the inclusion of English-language literature. The article turns to qualitatively examining the wider available Chinese-language literature on environmental communication. It then evaluates the current status of and challenges to Chinese-language research in this field and suggests some directions for future research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The prolific rise of Chinese non-governmental organizations (NGOs) for advancing social and political change has attracted considerable attention in recent years. Nonetheless, limited communication studies research has been conducted to further contemporary understanding of these emerging collectives, particularly beyond the popular hype of digital and social media-led “revolutions” in civic engagement or dystopian accounts of Chinese society. This paper reviews the key contours of communication scholarship on Chinese NGOs and highlights the major contributions of the articles in this special issue. We also propose three dialectical tensions to stimulate future research in mediated Chinese NGO organizing, and to help advance the communicative purposes, practices and prospects of Chinese NGOs. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Planning, in its reinvented form, is an important tool for government macro-steering, but the role of the Internet in planning has been overlooked by researchers. Educational reforms are illustrative of the planning processes that characterize policy-making in China. Through a case study of educational policy in Qingbaijiang District in Chengdu, this paper examines how the Internet changes the limits of planning in educational equalization. The trial-site status of the district allows us to see how pragmatic adaptation of the new technology works on the ground, enabling an overall improvement in quality. However, at the same time, this strengthens elite schools, thus, paradoxically, creating inequality on a different level. Hence, this is a unique case to understand the limits of planning in China, and the key implication for research is that the Internet – and indeed techno-science as a social order – should be included in future analyses of planning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzed 113 popular children's websites and the children's sections of general websites in China. It also examined 511 ads that appeared on the homepages of these websites. Commercialism and health concerns were the primary focus of the analysis. The results showed that these websites did not adequately protect children's health and privacy online. Less than 20% of the websites surveyed contained any type of health warning. Nearly half of the websites collected personal information from children, but only a handful of them asked for parental permission. Each website hosted more than four ads on its homepage, most of which were graphical and unlabeled. The implications of this negligence for mitigation actions are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The formal invitation extended to South Africa by China late in 2010 to join the BRIC formation of emerging economies (Brazil, Russia, India, and China) may be seen as a confirmation of the growing economic ties between China and South Africa. The expanded trade between these two countries allows South Africa an opportunity to meet its development needs. For China, the interest in South Africa as an emerging market forms part of its growing interest in Africa for resources, markets, and diplomatic support. However, this involvement has not been unequivocally welcomed. While China's growing concern in Africa is seen as an opportunity by some for the continent to grow its economies and become a stronger presence in international markets, others are concerned that the economic boost that China brings to the African continent comes with too many strings attached. These critics are concerned that China's controversial human rights record may pose a bad example for African countries, especially when China's domestic policies lead to neutrality over human rights abuses in African countries where it seeks to establish links with the ruling elite. Some of these critics go as far as to say that China's involvement in Africa constitutes a new type of imperialism and a “scramble for Africa”. This paper investigates how the South African media reports on China and how this reporting compares with the reporting on other BRIC countries to establish whether the negative views by international media of China's involvement in Africa, as noted in the academic literature, also holds true of the South African media's general views of China's involvement in Africa. The article aims to contextualize this reporting through a reference to the South African media landscape as itself a contested and transitional space. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

According to various literatures, commercialization will inevitably pull the media away from its traditional, historical association with political groups and political institutions, and shift it toward the ambit of commerce and trade. This paper argues that this may not be the case, notably in the non-Western world. In fact, commercialization provides a range of opportunities for the state to intervene more deeply, and to strengthen its impact and influence on the media and on its content. We will be using the experiences of two countries, China and South Africa, the economic and political powerhouses in Asia and Africa respectively, to illustrate this phenomenon. In spite of their differences, commercialization has produced strikingly similar patterns of heightened state intervention in both countries. This is what we call the “paradox of commercialization”. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the two decades since 2001, when China joined the World Trade Organization, the commercialization of the Chinese media has become a significant force. With the increasing demand for original content and a possible “cultural trade deficit” in media content, there has been much discussion about agglomeration and clustering. Beijing, as the national media centre of China, has witnessed the process of media agglomeration while facing the problem of cultural export during the commercialization of the media. Michael Curtin's idea of media capital, which sees it as absorbing media resources and personnel and exporting media products transnationally, provides a dynamic perspective on understanding media agglomeration and dispersion under different political social and cultural circumstances. Hence, the question of whether Beijing will transform into a transnational media capital is worth studying in order to observe and comprehend China's media industry in transition. Drawing on Michael Curtin's three media capital trajectories, this paper interprets tensions and challenges generated in the process of media industry agglomeration and growth in Beijing. Emphasis is placed on the third trajectory, socio-cultural variation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay analyzes the emergence of China as a world power. It discusses a series of studies on press discourses initiated by the Center for Communication Research (CCR) at the City University of Hong Kong. It attributes the country's growth to economic liberalization. In addition, the article analyzes the role of the Chinese press in globalization in the country.

China's emerging media market, despite having heavy entry regulations, attracts foreign companies that suffer from saturation and stagnation in their home markets. This paper seeks to provide an understanding of how some of the world's largest media companies perceive their opportunities and challenges in China by discussing research interviews with company managers. It analyzes the findings of the interviews in the light of existing conceptualizations, which suggest that in emerging and opening media markets, cultural barriers to the success of imported media increase with the waning interest in foreign media and the increasing strength of the domestic media industry. The article suggests that Chinese audiences will become more inwardly oriented in their media tastes and that if the Chinese media market opens further in the future, the existing advantages that the Western media companies appear to have over their Chinese counterparts will have diminished by that time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Emerging media afford netizens the opportunity to participate in critical civic discourse by collaboratively constructing and sharing previously inaccessible information across multiple platforms. This paper examined the communicative behaviors constituting the recent phenomenon of cyber vigilantism (human flesh search) in China, particularly how emerging media have been appropriated for online searches to hunt for personal information about social deviants to restore public morality. Our findings suggest that the identification of corrupt officials and circulation of their private data online amplified attention on their abuse of power and pressured the authorities toward greater accountability. Blogs, forums, and social networking sites helped support the expression of alternative public opinions. Novel mash-ups further stimulated the transmediation of political parodies that challenged state discourse across video-sharing sites. This article concludes with implications and recommendations for critical and comparative research toward a broadened and culturally nuanced notion of civic participation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Individualism and collectivism form a paired concept frequently used in studying cross-cultural communication. Yet conflicting findings on collectivism have led researchers to question its applicability across cultures, especially concerning the meaning of “collective”. By definition, “collective” refers to large groups that, through a common identity, tie the members together into a community. The scale to measure collectivism, however, has often used in-group members as examples to explore the way respondents relate to others. As these “others” were used to stand for “collectives”, something that they are not, the meaning of collectivism became muddied, and its validity and reliability suffered. A re-examination of the collectivism concept from a Chinese standpoint is called for, as Confucian teachings have been considered as the philosophical basis for collectivism, and East Asian societies - especially Chinese societies - have often been seen as prototypical collectivist cultures. The purpose of this paper is, however, not to propose a Chinese version of collectivism. Rather, the goal is to clearly distinguish between “collective” and “others” in studying collectivism. Based on an in-depth analysis of Chinese and Confucian cultures and the literature on guanxi, it is argued that the concept of relationalism will more closely reflect the way self relates to others in these societies. Moreover, a tripartite model of individualism, relationalism, and collectivism will provide a more comprehensive framework for the study of the way self relates to others in a cross-cultural context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China has a reputation as an economy based on utility: the large-scale manufacture of low-priced goods. But useful values like functionality, fitness for purpose and efficiency are only part of the story. More important are what Veblen called “honorific” values, arguably the driving force of development, change and value in any economy. To understand the Chinese economy therefore, it is not sufficient to point to its utilitarian aspect. Honorific status-competition is a more fundamental driver than utilitarian cost-competition. We argue that “social network markets” are the expression of these honorific values, relationships and connections that structure and coordinate individual choices. This paper explores how such markets are developing in China in the area of fashion and fashion media. These, we argue, are an expression of “risk culture” for high-end entrepreneurial consumers and producers alike, providing a stimulus to dynamic innovation in the arena of personal taste and comportment, as part of an international cultural system based on constant change. We examine the launch of Vogue China in 2005, and China's reception as a fashion player among the international editions of Vogue, as an expression of a “decisive moment” in the integration of China into an international social network market based on honorific values. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A difficult copyright environment, combined with the Chinese government's continuing power over key distribution and promotion channels, including radio, television, publishing and concerts (Baranovitch, 2003; Brady, 2006), have been key factors in the failure of international labels to secure a dominant position in China's rapidly developing domestic music market. This paper argues that while international record labels have been paralyzed by concepts of value that depend on an ability to control the copying of music products and to enforce intellectual property rights (Montgomery & Potts, 2008), domestic music and entertainment businesses are actively exploring strategies that allow them to function in a weak copyright environment. Cultural policies ostensibly intended to prevent the circulation of heterodox content are having an important side-effect: making it more attractive for music-related businesses to promote and distribute local content. As a result, domestic music and entertainment businesses are developing a distinct advantage in the highly competitive Chinese market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines the US hegemonic pressure upon the organizational change in China's intellectual property rights (IPR) regime. Through the theoretical lens of the hegemony theory, the paper has analyzed the Special 301 Reports by the United States Trade Representative (USTR) from 2000 to 2007 via theme analysis and achieved four research results. First, it is the shared notion of the United States to integrate China into the Agreement of Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) by upgrading and restructuring China's IPR regime so as to better protect the US IPR and obtain greater Chinese market access. Second, China has to make repeated compromises in reforming its IPR regime due to the increasing US pressure and domestic needs. Third, by controlling the international IPR institutions, the United States has successfully generated broad consent among even disadvantaged countries like China to continue updating their IPR regime in US terms. Finally, despite initial reluctance, China has gradually established, restructured, and updated its IPR regime and shown promising signs to take IPR seriously, which needs to be taken into consideration in the future US-China IPR negotiations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The existing literature has recognized that democratic regimes tend to allow pluralistic media content, whereas authoritarian regimes mostly permit pro-regime media content. This discussion has long focused on domestic news at the national level. However, the implications of foreign news have seldom been explored. By examining the Hong Kong National Security Law, this article compares the world's media interpretations of China. The findings show that (1) democratic regimes mainly reported negatively, but authoritarian regimes reported pluralistically, (2) democratic regimes largely framed the Security Law as China's intervention and the justification of foreign assistance, but authoritarian regimes framed it as a matter of China's internal affairs and countersanctions against foreign intervention in Hong Kong, and (3) both democratic and authoritarian regimes covered Western sanctions on China more than Chinese countersanctions on the West. The conclusion strongly supports the thesis that regime type is the most significant determiner of the reporting style adopted by foreign news organizations. This article focuses on an internationally controversial case study to understand the literature on perceptions of China and regime type. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the Chinese government’s use of the print media to justify the national language policy and address individuals’ concerns about the vitality of regional varieties of the Chinese language (i.e., Cantonese) in its coverage of the Protecting Cantonese Movement (July 2010) in Guangzhou. The analysis revealed that the Chinese government adopted a relatively reconciliatory response to the Movement, which apparently contested the relevant language policy. However, the media texts maintained the national policy of promoting Putonghua as inviolable, whereas they assigned Cantonese the role of the carrier of cultural tradition and stressed that the rise or fall of particular regional language depended on regional socioeconomic developments. Such media discussions showed that the state carefully managed relevant discussions about the vitality of regional Chinese varieties within the discursive space defined by legalistic, cultural, and socioeconomic development discourses. These discursive boundaries reflect the dominance of linguistic instrumentalism in the Chinese government’s language policymaking. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]