Lecture Chinese media
- 1. CHINA, ASIA, AND THE DE-WESTINISED APPROACH Wilfred Wang Wilfred.wang@monash.edu
- 2. LECTURE OUTLINES 1. Setting up the theme: Alternative modernity – what is a western narrative of digital media (reflecting our familiar approach) (Iwabuchi); 2. A brief overview of the Chinese media, from the Mao to post- Deng era; keyword: marketisation (Winfield and Peng); 3. The advent of the Internet – from grassroot UGCs to the ‘mainstreamization’ of the net; key ideas: formation of digital industries, the WTO (IP), the state’s come-back, the rise of the Internet giants, Baidu, Alibaba & Tencent (Li; Keane); 4. Recalling Chinese diaspora: identity re-connect, not just cultural exports (Keane).
- 3. MODERNITY – WHOSE STANDARD? • A post-colonial critique • Hard (Technical) measures: GDP, Internet Coverage, Railway, Airport, Education, Real estate/household items (do you have a radio, TV, or smartphone); • Soft (knowledge) measures: Knowledge, Values, Norms, Worldview • Media plays a crucial part in both Hard and Soft measures: having internet is advanced; and FB spreads certain knowledge about the world. • Knowledge: not just academic knowledge but the sense of knowing and hence, being & becoming (identity). • Modernity is a western (US/Europe) frame of reference to measure the different processes of development in the world (economic, infrastructure, political and even cultural).
- 4. DIGITAL MEDIA & THE CALIFORNIAN IDEOLOGY • During the 1960s, some American hippies were looking for alternative media to present their views in countering the mainstream media representations and dominant social values; • ‘During the '70s and '80s, many of the fundamental advances in personal computing and networking were made by people influenced by the technological optimism of the new left and the counter-culture. By the '90s, some of these ex-hippies had even become owners and managers of high-tech corporations in their own right and the pioneering work of the community media activists has been largely recuperated by hi-tech commerce.’ (Barbrook and Cameron) • Entrepreneurship, individual empowerment, personal freedom, and the irrelevancy of the nation-state (anti-statism). Digital media will bring the end to (corporate dominated) market. • Why is it important? These myths are not only American centric but they have gradually become the norms of the digital era, the guideline we use to imagine digital media, cultures and politics across the world.
- 5. BUT, WHAT IF … Suspend the western frame of reference to think about: what is media, what is/are role(s) of media, how media function, operate and being experience? A de-westernised media and cultural studies approach
- 6. CHINA ? • The largest communist country in the world; • One party rule – The Communist Party of China (CPC); • Non-democratic authoritarian state; • The largest population – the biggest audience in the world (Curtin, 2007): more than 1.3billion • Mao-era: 1949-1976, Post-Mao/Reform Era: since 1978, post-reform: 2000 onwards; • Second largest economy in the world after the U.S.; Australia’s main trading partner; • The largest internet population in the world – more than 720million* by the end of 2017 (55% penetration rate). * Australia’s general population is around 24 million
- 7. CHINESE MEDIA – MAO’S ERA • Media is part of the state’s ideological apparatus; • Media function to support the Party’s agenda and interest; • ‘Watchdog on Party’s leash’ (Zhao, 2010); • Standardized with limited choice: CCTV (Centre China Television), People’s Daily, China National Radio, Xinhua News Agency, and their provincial and regional branches; • First media-related studies: the Beijing University of Television established 2 years (1960) after the launch of CCTV (1958) • Media were fully state owned and operated; uniformed content.
- 8. THE PEOPLE’S DAILY, THE PARTY’S EVERYDAY • Mainly supported the revolutionary discourse; • Very leader-centric: Mao, 1967; Xi Jinping: 2018 Media • Mao’s era: an instrument for class struggle • Post-Mao: a mean of nation building and modernisation
- 9. GET RICH AND MAKE PROFIT! ‘The Party, as the major media owner, not only encourages and tolerates conglomerates for financial reasons but also to control chaotic free competition and limit the proliferation of minor papers.’ (Winfield and Peng, 2005, p. 264) Western countries: media conglomerates are horrible!! (many of you wrote about Murdoch) BUT: China is not alone, S Korea has similar situation where the Govt supports big businesses to invest in media and entertainment industries since the Asian Financial Crisis in 1997, hence a highly concentrated media power there
- 10. MARKETISATION … TO A CERTAIN EXTEND • Early voices to call for reforms and media liberations during the final decade of Mao’s rule; • Part of Deng Xiaoping’s reform policies started since 1978, but media’s reform came much later (early 1990s); • Regional branches were expected to find their own sources of financial revenue, hence, operations and editorial; • A more marketized system and environment; • Entertainment media and investigative journalism started to trump; • Journalists and editors were more willing to push the Party’s bottom line for market differentiation and competitions; • For the first time, Chinese media started to challenge or test the Party line for market competitions; • The SARS outbreak in 2003 has been a well cited example; • Between the Party Line and bottom line (Zhao, 2008) - between serving the Party and consumers
- 11. CONSUMING THE PARTY LINE • The touching story of a female Japanese entrepreneur • A-shin’s characters of hardworking, motherhood, creativity, kindness support the Deng Xiaoping’s reform agendas (Lull, 1991) • A-shin represents the negotiation between reform (global modernity) and traditions (national characters): a mother/a kind boss, a good wife/creative businesswoman; a good daughter-in-law/a brave and creative market negotiator; loyal to the nation ; • First launched in the mainland China in 1984, CCTV, 80% reception rate; Re- broadcasted in 2007 by Hunan TV (one of the major players in Chinese TV).
- 12. THEN THE INTERNET:• US/West: market-driven development, the Silicon Valley; • China: through an anti-US/NATO alliance nationalism-driven event； • Chinese embassy was bombed by the US/NATO air force, 3 Chinese citizens (journalists) were killed; • China govt set up the Strong Nation Forum (part of People’s Daily) to encourage online discussions; • Online anger quickly became offline protests; • A realisation of commoners’ voices, values and role through the Internet; • Sinologist: China is always defined through ethnic nationalism rather than citizenry democratisation.
- 13. BUT QUICKLY OUT OF CONTROL (2000-2008ISH) • The combined of online participation and media commercialisation (Zhao, 2008; Yu, 2009; Zhang, 2012); • A ground for mocking the powerful, political satire, negotiating with reality, and simply, entertainment and leisure; (youth: Liu, 2010; rural migrant workers: Qiu, 2009; civic rights: Zhao, 2008; Yang, 2008); • High level of creativity, grassroots expressions and unconventional representations (look at Li’s reading).
- 15. STATE INTERVENTION • Prior to the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games; • Face – the global image and standing; • Peaceful rise through trade, culture and technologies; • A green, a humanistic, & a technological Olympic Games； • Media and Internet were deemed to be important; • Mao: ideology (internal) • Deng: reform (internal) • Late- HU and Xi (external, global)
- 16. NOT JUST STANDING UP BUT ALSO GOING OUT • From a defensive to a more proactive national strategic framework;
- 17. INSTITUTIONALISATION • Both the Chinese governments and technology firms have been forced to compiled to the copyright/IP agreements since China’s assertion to the W.T.O. late 2001; • Xunlei, a tech giant failed to enter the US market due to accusation of breaching IP laws; • Massive online ‘cleaning’ campaigns; • Professionalisation – eliminating UGC at all cost; • Political censorship (blocking, shutting down and suspending); • Commercial collaboration: iQiyi – Netflix, Walt Disney – Tencent Video, Youku*-Marvel *Youku is coming to Australia (w/ S&J Media)
- 18. CLEANING UP WINNIE THE POOH
- 19. LICENCES-PARTNERSHIP ARRANGEMENTS Platforms Partnered TV licence holder iQiyi Galaxy International TV (joint venture of Jiangsu Broadcasting Corporation， National Radio, and iQiyi) Youku Wasu Media (Hangzhou broadcasting Corporation) Tencent Video Southern Media Corporation Sohu Video Southern Media Corporation PPTV Wasu Media Storm Video Galaxy International TV LeTV CNTV (China Networked Television) Baidu Video Galaxy International TV Kuaibo (Qvod Player) CNTV
- 20. UGC?
- 21. OVERLAPPING JURISDICTIONS • The ambiguous online regulatory environments: Administration of China (CAC), the ministry of Culture (MoC), and the Cyberspace Affairs Council of China (CACC); , the State Administration of Press, Public, Radio, Film and Television (SAPPRFT)* • Spatialised governance • Non-media/information related governing bodies * Abolished in March 2018 and now directly subordinated to the Publicity Department of the Communist Party of China, or CCPPD.
- 23. CONCENTRATION OF DIGITAL MEDIA OWNERSHIP – THE BAT Initially: • Baidu (search engine) • Alibaba (online shopping) • Tencent (instant messenger) Now (overlapping): • Video streaming • Digital finance and payments • Games • Shopping • Communications.
- 24. DIGITAL GIANT AS CHINA’S NEW ‘DIPLOMATS’HTTPS://QZ.COM/505220/THE-LIST-OF-CEOS-FACING-OFF-DURING-CHINESE-PRESIDENT-XI-JINPINGS-STATE-VISIT-TO-THE-US-SHOWS-THE-IMPORTANCE-OF- TECH/
- 25. GOING OUT TO WHERE ? • Popular discourse: a new form of (Chinese) cultural imperialism; • BUT – none of the gone out content carry universal language; nor are the content different with those back in China; • Lack of non-Chinese representations;
- 26. IT’S ME! THE CHINESE DIASPORA • Re-connection with the Chinese overseas around the world; • Backdrop: overseas students, immigrations (parents), investors, tourists, working holidays; • Re-connecting with the motherland; • The Dream of the Great Chinese Rejuvenation (zhonghua minzu weida fuxing) – Xi Jinping • The Dream cannot be achieved without all Chinese around the world; • This is not new – Reforms during the late imperial court era, China’s Revolution (1911) and Deng’s call for investments; • Similar: The Bollywood – Indian diaspora (Therwart, 2010) • Commercial: contemporary migrants are more urban-middle class; old migrants – the forgotten, marginalised • Contrasting: K-wave (set up partnership with YouTube, focus on choreography rather than lyrics, the visual rather than the thematical)
- 27. DE-WESTERNISE THE SILICON VALLEY • What’s the true story about the Silicon Valley? • the West Coast counterculture (the hippies) and radicalism of the 1960s, formed the building blocks of the Californian ideology, Barbrook and Cameron are effectively arguing for both a historical and a geographic understanding of what we would now call the platform society (Barbrook and Cameron, 1997). • All those imaginations about democracy, individuality, subversive, decentralisation were part of the American histories in the western cost (Eastern cost being the political, elitist capitals); • Media, the Internet, are always local, embedded within the history and geography of a nation, a region and a place.