Anointing a New Enemy

Abstract

Do nations require an adversary? US media coverage of China, as reflected in national news magazines, was analyzed before and after the breakup of the Soviet Union to determine how media portrayed this global power change. China received significantly more coverage after the Soviet Union breakup, and the post-breakup themes and frames about China were significantly different and more negative. This study of coverage related to global power shifts suggests that adversarial political relationships are mirrored in a nation's domestic media and may be necessary for national unity.Keywords / breakup of the Soviet Union / China / China frame / cultural affinity / economic/trade factors / international news hole / media coverage / national interest / national news magazines / political relations / world system theory

Differentiated “Others”: Representations of the European Union and the United States From Chinese State Media in COVID-19-Related News Reports

“…However, this rather amiable representation quickly deteriorated after some historical events, such as the breakup of the USSR, which greatly shaped the then US-China relationship with their implications percolating to present interactions between the two countries. As Stone and Xiao (2007) has pointed out, the coverage of China from the US media increased significantly in the post-breakup era, but the themes and frames about China were drastically different and increasingly negative. The collapse of the Soviet Union and the Eastern bloc communist countries have left China “as the single largest remaining communist nation emerged to fill the vacuum” (Ono & Yang Jiao, 2008, p. 407).…”

“…On the other hand, the “linkage and de-linkage” of human rights and trade policies toward China by the US were still hotly debated by the media (Zhang, 2010). China was depicted as a competitor of the US and its increased global influence would negatively affect the US (Stone & Xiao, 2007). The increased global influence of China has led to more diversified topics when it comes to representing China from the US media, though this diversity does not necessarily lead to an improved image of the country.…”

“…Although China has emerged as a rising power with political and economic influence across the globe, “a Sinophobic dimension remains a constitutive aspect of the discourse” (Ono & Yang Jiao, 2008, p. 409). Though there is literature suggesting China’s image has seen a slight improvement a decade ago (e.g., Moyo, 2010), but that did not stop the mounting Sinophobic discourse in the US media’s representations of China (Lams, 2016), which is often fueled by the stories on human right abuses and political suppression (Lee, 2002; Liss, 2003; Stone & Xiao, 2007; Syed, 2010). Moyo (2010) compared the reports of CNN and Xinhua news agency’s reports on the Tibetan protests and pointed out that the CNN intended to advance a manipulative and unjust neoliberal international order through its selective articulation of human right and use it as a political tool.…”

How China’s flagship news program frames “the West”: Foreign news coverage of CCTV’s Xinwen Lianbo before and during Xi Jinping’s presidency

“…As an emerging power with the world's biggest population, China has been receiving increasing amounts of attention in the Western media. Since the Communist Party seized power in 1949, the framing of contemporary China has been associated with Sino-Western relations, and "friend and foe frames" have been prevalent in the Western media (Stone & Xiao, 2007;Golan & Lukito, 2015;Ooi & D'Arcangelis, 2018). In their review of the coverage in American magazines of Mao Zedong and China under his rule during the Cold War, Yu, and Riffe (1989) found that the framing of Mao's China was closely correlated to the development of Sino-Western relations.…”

“…In the past, research on the framing of China by media in the West has yielded insightful findings and revealed similar patterns, such as the enduring "friend versus enemy" frame (Stone & Xiao, 2007;Golan & Lukito, 2015;Ooi & D'Arcangelis, 2018). However, the framing of the West by Chinese media has not yet been fully explored.…”