Reporting China on the Rise: A Study on the Field of Foreign Correspondence in Contemporary China

Abstract

At the time of growing attention from the international community to understand and interpret China as a rising power and global order challenger, foreign press corps in China serve as the vital messengers and sense makers of this distant other for the global public. The pressure from transformation of media industry, change of global geopolitics and economy, as well as China’s tightening press control and ideology control all make it overwhelmingly intriguing as well as urgent to examine the field of foreign correspondence in contemporary China.

This study brings together Bourdieu’s notion of journalistic field and Shoemaker and Reese’s model of Hierarchy of Influence to map out the structure and dynamics of foreign correspondence in China during China’s President Xi Jinping’s first term in office (2012~2017). It applies a hierarchical analysis to examine the structure (power relations) and position of the field of foreign correspondence in China and how these power relations shape news production practice to inform public vision on this rising power. Hallin and Mancini’s typology of media system is employed for a cross-national comparison of external pressure from larger field of power.

Drawing on an analysis of 101 online survey response, 19 in-depth semi-structured interview with current and former China correspondents, and discourse analysis of 151 news articles, assisted with secondhand literature of China correspondents’ self-accounts, this study examined the habitus and illusio of the agents, how they take up different positions, negotiating with different pressures from routines, organizational, and institutional levels, consequently projecting these power relations onto the final news product, and how national prism, as reflected via the shaping power of media system and national interest of each home country, still hold strong grip over the field of China correspondence.

Chapter 1 conceptualizes the theoretical framework for this study, a hierarchical model of foreign correspondence field; Chapter 2 unpacks the boundary, historical trajectory, and configuration of the field of China correspondence; Chapter 3 analyzes the habitus of China correspondents in terms of their Chinese habitus and journalistic habitus, and proposes two typologies of China correspondents based on their professional role perception and positions in the field; Chapter 4 discusses press review as a source of pressure from routine level; Chapter 5 examines the organizational structure and professional autonomy of China correspondents and how these pressures impact their news production; Chapter 6 focuses on institutional interruptive forces including censorship and repressive regulations; Chapter 7 tackles the national variance reflected on final news product through a comparative discourse analysis of the media coverage on South China Sea from 12 mainstream newspapers in four countries. The final chapter discusses and reflects on the key findings of this study, which argue that the field of foreign correspondence in contemporary China is a rather heteronomous one, subjected to huge external pressures from political and economic fields; national variance still overtakes a “global media culture”.

The study is the first of its kind to extensively analyze China correspondents and their work from the perspective of field theory. It is expected to shed light on understanding the mechanisms of foreign correspondence, and provide insights for expanding the new journalistic field paradigm in media and journalism study.

Date of Award	12 Jan 2018
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	City University of Hong Kong
Supervisor	Chin Chuan LEE (Supervisor) & Jan SERVAES (Supervisor)