Controlled Or Free Market Media
Introduction
Having a cross-disciplinary approach, as Lindhoff and Rydholm believe, the transforming of media in global age in china, leads us to look over the whole process during the time. Apparently, the concept of ownership is a significant prerequisite to discuss about the media. Although “ownership” seems, somehow, unclear in a socialist culture, Lindhoff and Rydholm use the term transition which discloses a gradual converting process from dominant political ownership to a market economic dependent one.( Lindhoff and Rydholm,2007) As Xin’s argues what has taken place in China is rather ‘commercialization without independence’ or ‘liberalization without political democratization’.(Xin,2006)
Ownership of the media
When it comes to ownership of the media, (it should be kept in mind that most of the time the media has been considered as a core political resource since 1949) two outlooks seems more probable: firstly, to watch over from economic market dependencies and secondly, unresolved contradiction between “freedom of speech” and “censorship” or on the other word, between “press freedom” and “party-state control”.
In the next step, this transition of cultural reforming as Lindhoff and Rydholm refer to Zhengrong and Yunhong , can be seen in three levels: marketization, conglomeration and capitalization. In the first step, marketization announces that financial incomes from advertising and audience fees make certain party-state media independent from state support. In the second step we are dealing with the concept of media-market oligopoly that declares a transition in investment of foreign media. Eventually, in a greater step, capitalization may lead to an integration of Chinese media as a capital based one. Besides, in the case of China because of state domination, it is controversial to say that the media are going to join global markets, as much disputable as to believe that authoritarian regime can reach the pace of global developments.
In the other side, some scholars believe that marketization has nothing to do with reduction of party-state domination. Brady in her delicate analysis on the role of CCP, central propaganda on Chinese media, states that it seems to be no contradiction between a market economy as practiced in China and the continuance of the one-party state.(Brady, 2006)
Major changes in Chinese Media toward globalization
As mentioned above, it is controversial to say that the media in china, certainly, is getting commercialized. But, there are some changes which should take into account. Many scholars point to Chinese entry to World Trade Organization as the main development toward commercialization. ” China’s WTO entry has accelerated the structural reforms”.(Ekecrantz,2007) Zhang also points out that China’s entry into the World Trade Organization has made researchers more and more interested in the interaction between Chinese television and the rest of the world (Zhang 2006).
Within the analysis of institutional changes in Chinese television, in the context of decentralization, Su claims the same idea as Zhang about the changes in Chinese media and specifically local television after joining WTO, but he continues this argument by a critical viewpoint about the action applied by state (State Administration of Radio, Film, and Television (SARFT) in 2003) to stop several broadcasting groups or generally stop “a policy of media conglomeration” as he states: “The central government’s analysis of the operation and transformation of the broadcasting system was insufficient because it failed to consider local conditions.”
(Su, 2006:43) Among a case study of Whitecanal town, a small city in northern part of China, Su emphasizes on a discreet confirmation of this claim through the conflict between city bureau and town television station. (Su, 2006)
Accordingly, China integration with the global capitalist market after the WTO admission, is seen as a Big “paradox” by Ekecrantz, as the continuous authoritarian political rule by the party and state. (Ekecrantz,2007)