The China Daily is China’s premier English-language birdcage liner. No, wait. The China Daily is China’s premier English-language warmed over plate of crap. Government mouthpiece. Propagandisitic spittle.
Damn. One more try: The China Daily is China’s premier English-language newspaper. It makes a fascinating read, although you have to do a bit of reading between the lines to get the more interesting story.
After scrutinizing a few issues, I believe most of the articles can be lumped into one of three categories.
The first category consists of the outright lies or propaganda that the government is most keen to promote. These articles are generally the most fun. Of late, SARS-related news has dominated this category, with the Iraq war playing a close second.
A sampling of recent headlines:
- Effective measures taken on disease
- SARS: Fear, over-reaction unnecessary
- SARS: Gov’t goes all out
Typically, these articles contain strings of unattibuted assertions, bolstered with half-hearted praise from beleaguered WHO officials who are clearly eager not to antagonize the Chinese authorities. “The WHO singled out China’s efforts for praise. ‘They’re not deliberately infecting peasants, as far as we can tell,’ Dr. Ben McWestern gushed in admiration.”
The China Daily web site even has a special section on SARS, which is headed with the following insane lie: “China has attached great importance to the control of atypical pneumonia…and is able to curb the spread of the disease.”
The second category consists of what appear to be legitimate features. These are mostly notable for being almost exlusively concerned with business or economic development. The national obsession with growth practical drips off the pages of the China Daily, although this emphasis obviously also reflects the intended English-speaking audience of the newspaper.
The final category, which is perhaps the most fascinating, consists of articles that are openly critical of the goverment. Here’s a small excerpt from an opinion piece headlined “School tragedy exposes local interference,” which concerns a recent food-poisoning scandal in Chinese public schools.
Such practices are legacies from the planned economy, when governments were entitled to interfere with microeconomic activities. While China is now working toward a stronger market economy, it seems there is still a long way to go before government at all levels change their mindsets accordingly.
Until every government understands their role in a market economy, there is no guarantee the Haicheng case will not repeat itself…
My guess is that articles like this are a means for the central government to deliver a rebuke to a provincial governments. Either that, or the authorities do occasionally allow the media to take the public’s side in isolated incidents that have caused an outcry.
In either case, the language is fairly fascinating. Sometimes the China Daily refers to something called the “socialist market economy,” but in this case, that nonsensical piece of jargon has been jettisoned in favor of juicy, plain-spoken phrases like “under-the-table deals” and “corruption.” The rhetoric of the editorial actually seems more aggressively capitalist than you would find in America, where school lunches would probably be considered a pretty good candidate for government-mandated market distortions.
The contrast between China’s economic liberalism and political illiberalism continues to be the most interesting aspect of the country for me.
