Freedom of the press is a fundamental right of both individuals and the press recognized by international human rights treaties, domestic constitutional documents in most foreign jurisdictions and also 1982 Constitution in China. Protection of press freedom in China is, however, very problematic due to many reasons. One essential reason is the failure to strike a proper balance between freedom of the press and public interest. This dissertation seeks to explore possibilities for how to strike a proper balance between press freedom and public interest in China through studying historical development of press control and press freedom in China, analyzing current situation and cases about press freedom in China, and examining international and western experience in balancing press freedom and public interest. The objective of the dissertation is to find reasonable ways to balance press freedom and public interest in theory and in practice as it applies to China, in the hope that protection of press freedom of citizens and the press in China could be considerably improved.

To begin with, the dissertation provides an analysis of the history and current situation of conflicts between press freedom and public interest in China, which has revealed that press freedom is often suppressed by Chinese government in the name of public interest when the two are in conflict. Furthermore, the dissertation points out that the tension between the tendency of Chinese government to control the press freedom and the pursuit by the press for that freedom has been intensified in the past ten years.

Secondly, the dissertation examines possible reasons accounting for poor protection of press freedom in China, which include factors such as deficient legal system of the press, lack of balancing principles or models that can be applied in judicial practice, and external intervention of political factors.

Although the national circumstances of China may be unique and quite different from those in western countries, the protection of human rights and rule of law are universal values. So the dissertation devotes part of its attention to the study of the theories, legislative experience and judicial practice of press freedom in western democratic countries. The developing history of press freedom in western countries testifies that lack of press freedom leads to the social tensions and conflicts, and with more and more press freedom is granted to the media, their regimes turn to be relatively stable with good governance. There are some experience of western democratic countries that worth learning by China, such as the balancing formula of interests, the strict delineation of the scope of public interest, the scientific application of the principle of proportionality, and other balancing methodologies and models.

Taking into consideration the status quo of press freedom in China and poor governance of Chinese regime, the dissertation argues that, when press freedom and public interest conflict with each other in China, more protection should be given to press freedom and more restraints should be set on the governmental power from unduly restricting press freedom in the name of public interest so as to strike a balance between the two. This dissertation concludes that, only when progressive reforms in legislative, judicial and political systems are done will pendulum swing to press freedom in China. These reforms include, but are not limited to, drafting a special press law, building judicial remedy mechanisms, and getting rid of external obstacles by advancing political reforms.