FEATURE ARTICLE
Finding Balance in a Land of Limited Access
Luke T. Johnson
April
10, 2008 Journalism is a tricky business
in China, whether you’re producing it or consuming it.
Tales of the Chinese government silencing dissenting media voices
are in large supply, and despite promises of more press freedoms
in the lead-up to the Beijing Olympic Games in August, China
maintains a narrow definition of acceptable journalism.
The mid-March riots in Lhasa and Tibet’s surrounding areas
illuminated just how far China has to go before it catches up
to the journalistic standards of most of the rest of the world.
In the days following the eruptions of violence, verifiable
information was increasingly hard to come by as Chinese paramilitary
forces effectively quarantined the area, leaving foreign journalists
without access to the facts of what was happening amid the chaos.
Meanwhile, the “Net Nanny” was working overtime
on the mainland to block almost any webpage containing the word
“Tibet” as sites like YouTube and Google News were
routinely inaccessible, trapped behind “the Great Firewall
of China.”
LUKE JOHNSON is a journalist currently
based in Beijing, China, where he works as a copy editor and
a sports writer for the state-run media. His work has appeared
in China Economic Review (Shanghai), The Tyee (British Columbia)
and the North Coast Journal (California).
Limited access
to reliable information made true balance difficult to achieve.
And while precise details of the events were hard for foreign
reporters to nail down, Chinese media had a clear picture of
what they were sure was the real story: Western media were intentionally
distorting the facts to further demonize China. State-run China
Daily, the country’s largest English-language newspaper
(and my current employer), led the charge to discredit the rest
of the world, running story after front-page story detailing
the “biased and sometimes dishonest reports” in
Western media that “illustrate how news can be manipulated.”
As it happens, China had some legitimate gripes with Western
reports. As chronicled on a new Chinese-language website anti-cnn.com
– the subject of an above-the-fold story in China
Daily with the headline “Students rap media ‘hegemony’”
– foreign reports on Tibet did contain a few inaccuracies.
In one of the most egregious examples, German TV station RTL
showed a photo of a policeman wielding a baton at a fleeing
crowd under the headline “The number of dead in Lhasa
is uncertain.” The problem was that the scene actually
took place in Katmandu, Nepal, and the policemen were Nepalese.
The station later apologized for the error on its website. Whether
it was an example bias or an honest mistake is hard to say,
but in its story about the incident, China Daily matter-of-factly
declared: “Many believe Western media organizations have
used the image intentionally to smear China’s image.”
To some extent, China’s frustration with how the situation
has been depicted abroad is understandable. Tibet is an emotional
issue that inflames passions across the globe, and no matter
how much those sympathetic to the Tibetans’ cause would
like the issue to be as simple as a phrase on a T-shirt or a
bumper sticker, it is, in reality, much more complex. Whatever
happened after those peaceful protests turned into deadly riots,
the Chinese government did not act unprovoked.
With that said, it is hard to be sympathetic to China’s
cries of media bias after the government cut off access to Tibet
to all foreign journalists, allowing in 20 of their own reporters
to tell the story. Not only does this lack of access make it
impossible for journalists to give a complete and accurate account
of events, it makes the rest of the world wonder what the Chinese
government has to hide. That suspicion only grows deeper with
the not-so-mysterious blockages of Internet sites and blackouts
of CNN whenever the subject turned to Tibet – in the days
following the crackdown, CNN screens went blank anytime the
Dalai Lama’s image appeared or talk turned to Olympic
boycotts.
It is indicative of a media culture that still has a lot of
growing up to do. There was a time when the government could
get by with simply denying inconvenient events ever took place,
like a child sitting with a blanket over his head to get out
of cleaning his bedroom. It is obviously not an effective strategy
anymore, but one that is still frequently employed by China
Daily. When Angela Merkel met with the Dalai Lama last
year, the Business section was instructed not to run any stories
about Germany for the next few weeks. The protest that disrupted
the Olympic torch-lighting ceremony in Athens wasn’t mentioned
in the paper at all.
Challenges for foreign reporters
Producing balanced reports about China is indeed quite
a challenge for foreign journalists. Circumventing censors and
struggling to gain access during times of unrest is hard enough.
But there is also considerable pressure on foreign correspondents
from publishers abroad to write certain stories about China.
Rob Gifford, an NPR correspondent and author of the travel narrative
China Road, said at a recent forum discussion in Beijing
that there is a certain mindset in the West wanting to believe
preformed but somewhat outdated conceptions of China. As a result,
he said, journalists have to constantly ask themselves, “Are
we being too negative in our reporting?” If reporters
focus only on the negative aspects of China then they are not
necessarily presenting the whole story. But if they are too
positive in their reports they are accused of being “panda
huggers.”
The main challenge is getting all sides of a story, or in the
case of the Lhasa riots, any side other than the official side.
In the days after the riots, most foreign journalists were forced
to turn to alternate methods of verifying facts. One AFP reporter
told me he had to quickly familiarize himself with “microblogging”
sites like Twitter.com, a kind of social networking service
based on news feeds from SMS messages. Twitter feeds from Tibet,
he said, were not in themselves enough to verify events on the
ground during the crackdown. But by piecing together these brief
accounts with other things he read at places like the Lonely
Planet travel forum, he and his colleagues could get a
good concept of what was unfolding beyond the blockades.
Despite the day-to-day struggles to verify facts and get all
sides of a story, foreign reporters say China is one of the
safest countries in the world to work in. Although the government
still views journalists with considerable suspicion and even
requires hotels to let officials know when a journalist is in
town, cases of foreign reporters being threatened or detained
are few and far between. China is no doubt aware that making
life too hard for the foreign press these days will bring far
more negative attention than it’s worth. Of course, domestic
journalists are still very much at risk of detainment or intimidation,
but as Newsweek Beijing Bureau chief Melinda Liu said at the
same forum of foreign journalists, she is “more afraid
of getting into a car accident” than doing her job.
Though China is relatively safe for foreign reporters, it is
important for them to keep in mind the potential danger they
bring to their interview subjects. The Guardian’s
Jonathan Watts described it as “a ring of fire”
encircling foreign journalists – they themselves are safe,
but they put anyone they talk to at risk. Cases of the government
harassing and detaining individuals quoted in sensitive stories
are not hard to come by. Perhaps that is why many Chinese are
often unwilling to go on record for even the most benign stories.
Regardless, it is one more hurdle to clear in the quest to produce
accurate and verifiable journalism.
There is evidence to suggest China is on the road to a freer
journalistic environment. About a week after relative calm had
returned to the streets of Lhasa, the government handpicked
26 foreign and domestic journalists to tour the area. Those
on the trip were forbidden to “deviate from the official
itinerary,” according to a statement released by the U.S.
Embassy, but it’s still a sign of progress. Since then
China has also unblocked the BBC News website, which had been
inaccessible on the mainland for as long as anyone can remember.
It has also been announced that, under pressure from the International
Olympic Committee, the “Great Firewall” Internet
restrictions will be significantly eased during the Games. Most
surprising of all, China will be launching what Jonathan Watts
called a “semi-Freedom of Information Act” sometime
in May this year, allowing certain governmental departments
to release certain types of documents. There may be a ways to
go, but it’s a start.
Press freedom is still something China is getting used to. The
Tibet ordeal was the first major international incident since
China has been in the Olympic spotlight, and it’s true
that the government stumbled in its handling of the situation.
China would be wise to use it as a learning experience –
and as a chance to evolve. Whatever happens in the coming months
and years, China will have to adapt its standards of journalism
if it is to be taken seriously as a twenty-first-century world
power.
