Monitoring Editor: 1) Handle various tasks related to information safety; 2) propose specific information safety-related requirements, oversee the implementation and analysis of data; 3) gather requirements for information safety editing, oversee implementation and guarantee implementation results. Job requirements: undergraduate degree or junior college plus three or more years of work experience; experience working as a monitoring editor. Resume.

…

Sina Weibo users largely mocked the ad on Monday. “Compensation: 50 Cents,” wrote one user, a reference to the amount of money government-hired online commentators are rumored to receive for every pro-government comment they post online.

“Monitoring experience a must, editing experience not necessary,” joked another.

Readers unsure if they’re cut out for the position can have a look at the comments below the job posting and see which ones jump out at them as in need of further monitoring.

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Post tags: Internet censorship, online public opinion, propaganda, sina weibo
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In terms of breadth and boldness, the People’s Daily series is nothing to write home about. Most of the language is a song of self congratulation from China’s leaders about the progress they say they have already made on political reform.

On issues many would regard as fundamental to substantive and meaningful political reform, the People’s Daily series seems to shut the door. It says quite explicitly, for example, that “the leadership of the Party must be upheld”:

In actively and steadily promoting political reform we must uphold the fundamental political system and basic economic system of our country. We must uphold as one the three [principles of] the leadership of the Party, the people as masters of their own country (人民当家作主), and governing of the country by rule of law.

The obvious problem — arguably the crux of reform itself — is the clear conflict between the first priority, the firm commitment to the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party, and the second and third priorities. Can there really be rule of law if Party leaders can manipulate the courts? And how is the mastery of the public to be exercised?

CMP also translates responses from readers concerned about how the Chinese government can check its own power without a separation of powers

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Post tags: 18th party congress, people's daily, political reform, propaganda
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For example, editors at Global Times, a popular newspaper that has Chinese and English editions, have been ordered to run commentaries or editorials that separate criticism of Mr. Bo from the welfare-oriented economic policies he championed in Chongqing, perhaps because party leaders want to take credit for similar policies in the future. The English edition is also supposed to criticize Western news coverage that has emphasized splits within the party, one person with knowledge of the order said.

Not in decades has such a widespread and finely tuned propaganda campaign been rolled out during the purge of an official. In the last two major purges, in 2006 and 1995, party leaders did not flood the media with nearly so much propaganda. And not since the bloodshed of 1989 have editorials insisting that officials and cadres reaffirm fealty to the party appeared with such frequency and vehemence.

Some analysts have said the purging of Mr. Bo presents the biggest challenge for the party since that period. The crisis was set off in February when Wang Lijun, a former police chief in Chongqing, fled to an American Consulate to present evidence of what he said was a murder plot involving Mr. Bo’s family.

“We haven’t seen this kind of direct meddling with the media across the board in a long, long time,” said David Bandurski, editor of the China Media Project at the University of Hong Kong. “You can really sense the anxiety and the uneasiness. They’re pushing so intently this message of unity and solidarity, and you know all is not well.”

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Post tags: Bo Xilai, propaganda
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Monday marked the official observance of Learn From Lei Feng Day in China, a holiday initiated by Mao Zedong in 1962 which turned a dead young soldier into a folk hero, and the central government has revved up the propaganda machine to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the death of “China’s most famous Communist do-gooder.” From The Wall Street Journal:

Best known for helping little old ladies cross the street and offering to darn his fellow soldiers’ socks, the life of onetime People’s Liberation Army soldier Lei Feng is one of the Communist Party’s oldest set pieces. With the 1963 publication of his diary (in which enthusiastic paeans to Mao and the Communist Party feature prominently), he became a posthumous propaganda sensation, with the Party urging citizens to “learn from Comrade Lei Feng.” Now, as China confronts the excesses of its economic system — including growing concern over public corruption and fears about diminished public morality — the government is working harder than ever to make Lei Feng in vogue.

Efforts to resurrect Lei Feng’s ghost are everywhere: Last week, the education ministry released a bulletin urging schools to host activities promoting the soldier. That inspired one group of 1,000 college students to dress up in vintage military garb and stand outside Shanghai metro stations and extol his virtues. Some preached the importance of good manners inside the metro cars; others offered hugs to strangers. Thousands of students Monday across the country likewise participated in “Lei Feng is in my heart” campaigns, drawing pictures, penning essays and singing songs.

A state-run Xinhua news agency article published last week declared that contemporary China is like a symphony – a single “harmonious society” – and that Lei Feng is akin to its “first violin.”

CCTV’s news web site created a special page devoted to the spirit of Lei Feng, and a Xinhua News called Lei Feng “China’s icon of altruism”‘ in a celebratory profile last week:

“Where do we come from? What are we? Where are we going?”

These questions, raised by french Post-Impressionist artist Paul Gauguin (1848-1903), are widely considered to represent the human race’s deepest meditations on the meaning of life.

According to the article, elite members of the human race, including Russian writer Leo Tolstoy (1828-1910), German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860), the ancient Chinese poets Qu Yuan and Chen Zi’ang, who both wrote more than 1,000 years ago, asked similar questions, but never found the answer.

“Lei Feng, an ordinary soldier, has given a perfect answer,” the lengthy article maintained.

The Wall Street Journal article adds that Internet users have expressed their cynicism at the CCP’s immortalization of Lei Feng, however, and The New York Times reports that China’s netizens have responded to state media coverage of Lei Feng with snickers:

One posting on Sina Weibo, the country’s popular microblog service, seemed to sum up the sentiment that it is party officials, not ordinary citizens, who should be studying Lei Feng’s selflessness. “Your children have migrated overseas but you ask me to learn from Lei Feng in China,” said the posting by the sharp-tongued blogger who goes by the name Notebook and has two million followers. “I have cancer because of the poisonous milk I drank but you ask me to learn from Lei Feng.” The post was deleted by censors on Friday.

Even Ren Zhiqiang, one of China’s wealthiest property developers, could not help himself. Apparently invoking a line from Lei Feng’s official diary that schoolchildren once memorized, “My only ambition is to be a rustless screw for the great cause of revolution,” Mr. Ren called the legend a naked propaganda tool “for turning all citizens into screws that can be willfully placed anywhere.”

“That way, there is no need for democracy, human rights or freedom,” he wrote.

Dai Qing, a muckraking journalist and lapsed Communist Party member, said that many Chinese were offended by the patronizing message of moral righteousness. “Would I help a senior citizen or a child in need?” she said in an interview. “Of course I would, but not because I was told to do so by a government movement. Empathy is a minimal requirement of human decency, not one that should be directed by a political party.”

The editor of the state-run Global Times applauded the satirical spoofs that have appeared online, writes Danwei, which has a long tradition of reporting on Lei Feng and translated the following comment posted by Hu Xijin to his Weibo account along with the spoof photo above:

The louder the volume of the government campaign to study Lei Feng, the more such spoofs will be enthusiastically circulated online. This is the sigh-inducing balance of contemporary China’s public debate. When I see such Photoshop images, my heart just feels uncomfortable. But I know that the fact that such photographs appear is a sign of China’s progress. Making everything appear ugly is not just a way of thinking but has become a way of existing. Its importance to China is like that of the waste water pipes and sewers that even a city of light cannot do without.

© Scott Greene for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Global Times, Hu xijin, Learn From Lei Feng Day, Lei Feng, Mao Zedong, propaganda, satire, sina weibo
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Update: Lei Feng once said: “I’ll be a bolt in whatever part of the machinery of state the Party wants to screw me.” (Thanks to reader Roy Forward for the translation, which was published in In the Red: On Contemporary Chinese Culture by Geremie R. Barmé.)

Read more about Hexie Farm’s CDT Series, including a Q&A with the cartoonist.

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Post tags: hexie farm, Lei Feng, propaganda
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The more interesting points of the outline are:

- The spirit of the harmonious society pervades the document throughout. In line with rebalancing the inequality between rural and urban areas, public service-type culture is increased in rural regions, border regions and poorer regions. The document also echoes the emphasis on the core Socialist value system put forward in the Decision. It calls for sincerity and honesty in government, business and society, reflecting concerns about a moral vacuum in Chinese society and the increasingly strong reactions against corruption and abuse of privilege.
[...]
- There seems to be an increasing international bent to media policy. While the “marching out” projects have been steadily increasing over the last few years, this document now mentions that China will engage with its neighbouring countries for its cultural policy, particularly in border regions. It is too early to say whether this fits in a regionalization strategy, but it seems to be a new issue in this sort of context. Furthermore, the document states that China will use international organizations to push its cultural agenda at the global level. This might reflect China’s growing assertiveness, especially given the fact that the US seem to have given up on pursuing implementation in WTO case DS363 (China – Audiovisual). At the same time, the spirit of Hu Jintao’s recent article seems to be reflected in the juxtaposition between opening up to the outside world and maintaining national cultural security.

Read his full translation of the document here.

The aforementioned essay by President Hu Jintao calls on China to push back against a cultural and ideological “assault” from the West. An article in The Atlantic discusses the new Central Propaganda Department document and Hu’s essay and what they both mean for China’s uneasy relationship with Hollywood:

The dense plan proscribes a significant role for the state in directing the industry’s development. It also calls for creating a culture market and allocates special funds and other sorts of policy support to realize it. And, of course, China would like to have films and culture products that contain domestic intellectual property. In its most Orwellian moment, the plan’s language calls for strengthening official broadcasting media (read: propaganda) to proactively shape public opinion.

In short, China’s strategy here seems to suffer from a sort of ideological schizophrenia. The only certainty is that its unveiling is an implicit recognition of China’s enormous cultural deficit and an attempt to solve it. Indeed, China cannot even match its smaller Asian neighbors, such as Japan and South Korea, in cultural output, let alone the United States. Given its economic power, China punches far below its weight on generating creative output that also has mass appeal.

Such is the contradiction that Beijing is trying to untangle, hoping that a few deals with Hollywood can raise China’s global profile as a center of the creative industry.

On his recent U.S. visit, Vice President Xi Jinping agreed to grant Hollywood filmmakers greater access to the Chinese market. Partnerships between Chinese film studios and Hollywood have been increasing in recent years, though some in Hollywood have expressed concerns over efforts by Chinese companies to influence the movie-making to fall into line with the government’s projected image.

Read more about Hollywood and China, and about China’s external propaganda, via CDT.

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Post tags: cultural reform, external propaganda, film industry, hollywood, propaganda
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Officials will expand the use of government spokespeople, boost the overseas reach of state media, and further promote the use of microblogs to interact with the public, Wang Chen told reporters.

“In this new year, we will adopt an even more open attitude and even more forceful policies,” Wang said.

[...] Wang said news and information about government’s day-to-day activities as well as emergency responses would be expanded and systematized. Spokesmen would receive intensified training with an emphasis on obtaining first-hand information rather than simply passing on information from other departments, he said.

[...] Wang said the government would compel those opening new microblog accounts in Beijing and other major cities to use their real names and other information. The requirement would later be expanded to cover those with existing accounts, he said… “Our only purpose is to ensure the rapid, healthy expansion of the Chinese Internet,” he said.

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Post tags: Internet control, propaganda, transparency
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As the powerful Communist Party chief of Guangdong Province waited in an ornate conference room last week for the arrival of the new American ambassador, Gary Locke, the banter with his aides naturally turned to Mr. Locke’s Chinese roots. Mr. Locke had stopped in Guangzhou to talk to the party chief, Wang Yang, en route to a visit to his ancestral village.

Mr. Wang put a quick end to that topic. “He’s no hometown folk,” he told aides as they shifted in a reception line. “He should clearly realize he is an American.”

Just a few months ago, some Chinese media outlets were offering Mr. Locke as a role model for China’s stuffy political leaders — an American bigwig who flew economy class and shunned having a retinue of underlings, like those who attend to the needs of politicians here.

As Mr. Wang’s remark suggests, those days are over. Propaganda authorities, apparently worried that Mr. Locke makes Chinese leaders look out of touch, have imposed restrictions on media coverage of Mr. Locke, the former two-term governor of Washington State and commerce secretary, and the first Chinese-American ambassador here.

As the New York Times piece notes, the sometimes “lacerating” coverage of Locke in the Chinese state media continued this week with a Global Times report suggesting the diplomat has blurred the lines between his official business as a US government official and the commercial interests of his relatives.

See also ‘Why China Seems so Fascinated by US Ambassador Gary Locke,‘ on CDT.

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Post tags: diplomacy, Gary Locke, Global Times, Guangdong, propaganda, Wang Yang
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On Sept. 1, 1944, a radio signal was detected and captured on the western coast of the United States. Datelined “Yan’an, Xinhua,” it travelled more than 12,000 km from a small cave in west China.

The message was soon handed to senior officials in Washington, who learned the latest happenings in the war against Japan in China and changed their views on the situation.

By sending its first long-distance English-language radio signal, the Xinhua News Agency successfully made its overseas debut and started to communicate with the outside world.

Sixty-seven years later, a draft of Xinhua’s first radio message can be found in the archives of the Federal Communications Commission in Maryland.

At the same time, in the New York Times Square, Xinhua has bought space on a prominent billboard, flanked by ads for Coca-Cola and Samsung. The billboard features a LED sign, 60 feet high by 40 feet wide, that advertises Xinhua’s news services to visitors in the square.

The 80-year-old agency has moved from the caves of Yan’an to modern buildings in China’s capital, serving up a 24-hour stream of multilingual news and information in a wide variety of forms.

© Samuel Wade for China Digital Times (CDT), 2011. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: history, news media, propaganda, Xinhua
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The rendezvous and docking exercises between the two vessels are part of China’s effort to develop the technological and logistical skills needed to run a full space lab that could house astronauts for long stretches.

The next step, planned for 2012, will entail similar exercises with at least one mission carrying astronauts onboard, Wu told a news conference at the launch site in the Gobi Desert, according to a transcript on an official news website (www.china.com.cn).

“Next year, we will carry out the Shenzhou 9 and 10 flight missions, and they will also carry out rendezvous and docking tests with the Tiangong 1,” said Wu.

“According to the mission plans, at least one of the two flights next year will be manned,” she added.

© Samuel Wade for China Digital Times (CDT), 2011. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: journalism, Li Changchun, news media, party meetings, propaganda, public opinion
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