January 9, 2017
Beijing \u2014 Chinese President Xi Jinping\u2019s message to the newly established China Global Television Network sounds simple enough. It\u2019s one he\u2019s repeated over and over to state media during his nearly five years in power.
\u201cTell China\u2019s story well,\u201d he said in a congratulatory letter published by the broadcaster on New Year\u2019s Eve, the day the organization launched.
But as China pushes to enhance its influence abroad, CGTN\u2019s mission is anything but simple. Experts on Chinese media say the new network will be at the forefront of Beijing\u2019s foreign propaganda offensive, one of President Xi\u2019s top priorities as he seeks to expand his country’s international reach and burnish its global image.
The launch comes at an auspicious time for China, says Mareike Ohlberg, a research associate at the Mercator Institute for China Studies in Berlin who studies China\u2019s global propaganda efforts. With liberal democracy facing a growing crisis across the West, she says the Chinese Communist Party see an opening to reshape global opinion in favor of its own political system and values.
\u201cRight now there are lots of opportunities,\u201d Ms. Ohlberg says. \u201cThe more people who agree that China’s model is better, the more secure the Communist Party can feel at home and also in its role internationally.\u201d
CGTN isn\u2019t an entirely new organization, but rather a rebranding of Central China Television\u2019s international networks and digital presence. The broadcaster\u2019s foreign language channels, video content, and digital media all fall under the new group.
Anne-Marie Brady, a global fellow at the Wilson Center in Washington who specializes in Chinese propaganda, says in an email that the network\u2019s makeover signifies a \u201cfurther upping the ante\u201d of China\u2019s external propaganda efforts. She explains that while China has successfully projected a positive image of its domestic economy to Western countries, it has long struggled to do the same for its political system.
Indeed, the most recent results from an ongoing global opinion poll by Pew Research Center found that 55 percent of respondents in the United States have an unfavorable view of the country, up from 39 percent in 2007. Many countries in Western Europe share similar views.
The launch of CGTN reflects a growing sophistication of the Communist Party\u2019s Propaganda Department. It includes a new logo and a pair of new mobile apps for news and live broadcasts. CCTV’s accounts on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, and Tumblr have all been rebranded as CGTN. Because the social media platforms are all blocked in China, they are all aimed at international audiences.
\u201cThe subtle name change reveals that China understands it needs to disguise the obvious links to the Chinese official media in order to make the message from China more attractive, and to lure in audiences who won’t know the source,\u201d Ms. Brady says.
But achieving that level of separation will be difficult to achieve, says Yuen Ying Chan, founding director of the Journalism and Media Studies Program at the University of Hong Kong, especially after Xi told state-run media outlets to pledge absolute loyalty to the Communist Party last year.
\u201cYou want to manage the media, control the media, and then you want the global public to be attracted to it, to believe it,\u201d she says about the Communist Party. \u201cThat’s an inherent contradiction. I don’t see how it can be done.\u201d
Still, some experts warn that it would be wrong to dismiss China\u2019s efforts in trying to influence public opinion in the West. In 2009, Beijing reportedly announced that it would invest 45 billion renminbi ($6.5 billion) to strengthen its international news coverage and help spread its message abroad. Backed by a large government bankroll, China\u2019s media outlets have become more ambitious as they try to transform the Communist Party into a global voice.
\u201cThis is something that has really gained traction since Xi Jinping came to power,\u201d says Ohlberg of the Mercator Institute. \u201cThis idea that China has an alternative to offer to so-called Western liberal democracy, and that it should push that more heavily.\u201d
CGTN has channels in English, Arabic, French, Spanish, and Russian, and production centers in Washington and Nairobi. It also has nearly 43 million likes on Facebook \u2013 the most of any major broadcaster in the world \u2013 despite the social network being blocked in China since 2009. (CNN has 25.5 million likes and BBC News has 37 million.)
In addition to CGTN, the official Xinhua News Agency has expanded aggressively overseas in recent years. In 2011, it leased a giant billboard in New York’s Times Square that has, among other things, broadcast videos promoting China’s position on the South China Sea territorial dispute.
China has also made its mark on academic institutions. Some 500 Confucius Institutes have been set up on university campuses worldwide to spread Chinese language and culture, with plans in place to double the number to 1,000 by 2020.
And on Saturday, the University of International Business and Economics in Beijing opened a new research center charged with finding new ways to boost China’s voice in the international community.
China has a long way to go toward breaking the West\u2019s dominance in the realm of international soft power. It ranked 28th in the world on the Soft Power 30 index for 2016 , sandwiched between Russia and the Czech Republic and well behind the United States and Great Britain, which ranked first and second respectively. The index was compiled by Portland Communications, a London-based public relations agency.
No one knows how successful China\u2019s expanded propaganda campaign will be. But it has already raised concerns in Washington, if to a lesser extent than Russia’s increasingly sophisticated tactics. On Dec. 23, President Obama signed into law a \u201ccounter-propaganda\u201d bill that was included in the National Defense Authorization Act for the 2017 fiscal year.
The bill\u2019s sponsor, Sen. Rob Portman (R) of Ohio, said it was aimed at propaganda from \u00ab\u00a0Russia, China, and other nations. \u00a0\u00bb The bill calls for the establishment of a center in the State Department to coordinate \u201ccounter-propaganda\u201d efforts and creates a grant program for non-governmental organizations that are engaged in related work.
\u201cOur enemies are using foreign propaganda and disinformation against us and our allies, and so far the US government has been asleep at the wheel,\u201d Senator Portman said in a statement. \u201cWith this bill now law, we are finally signaling that enough is enough; the United States will no longer sit on the sidelines.\u201d
China\u2019s state-run media interpreted the bill in a different light. A commentary published Dec. 28 in People\u2019s Daily, the main newspaper of the Communist Party, says the bill\u2019s adoption \u201csuggests that America\u2019s message to the world is losing its appeal in the face of a much more fiercely competitive market place of ideas.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n

\nSimilarity rank: 0\n<\/div>\n

Sentiment rank: 1.2<\/div>\n

\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n