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<\/div><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\nTwitter introduced labels<\/a> for state media and government accounts on\nAugust 6, 2020, with the goal of \u201cproviding people with context so they can\nmake informed decisions,\u201d according to a company announcement of the policy at\nthe time. The announcement said the company would begin, in the interests of\n\u201ctransparency and practicality,\u201d with the five countries comprising the UN\nsecurity council: the US, UK, France, Russia, and China, before expanding to\nmore countries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As for which\nmedia would be labeled \u201cstate-affiliated,\u201d Twitter said these would be outlets\nwhere the state exercises control over editorial content. \u201cUnlike independent\nmedia, state-affiliated media frequently use their news coverage as a means to\nadvance a political agenda,\u201d Twitter wrote. The company made clear that the\n\u201cstate-affiliated\u201d label would preclude organizations such as the BBC in the\nUK, and National Public Radio (NPR) in the US, which receives some federal funding<\/a> but maintains strict editorial independence\npolicies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As the\nlabelling process was implemented, in consultation with independent experts on the Twitter Trust and Safety Council<\/a>, certain individual employees at Chinese state\nmedia also received this label. Prominent among them was Hu Xijin<\/a> (\u80e1\u9521\u8fdb), the Global Times<\/em> editor-in-chief known for his outspokenness\non social media, both inside and outside China<\/a>. Hu seemed to notice soon after the new\npolicy that Twitter users were less interested in what he had to say. On August 14<\/a>, 2020, a week after his Twitter account was\nlabelled, he tweeted that he no longer saw the same level of growth in new\nfollowers that he was used to \u2013 and he had noticed people unfollowing him. \u201cIt\nseems Twitter will eventually choke my account,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As it\napplied the new label, Twitter also said it would no longer amplify or\nrecommend state-affiliated media accounts or their tweets. This means that\nTwitter accounts like that of China Daily<\/em>, the state-run English\nnewspaper, no longer feature at the top of search results when users search the\nservice with keywords like \u201cchina daily,\u201d which amounts to unpaid promotion of\nsuch accounts. This followed a 2019 policy by which the company restricted the purchase of advertising<\/a> by \u201cstate-controlled news media entities.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n For many\nbusinesses, advertising services on Twitter, through tools like \u201cQuick Promote<\/a>,\u201d are an important way to boost engagement,\nincreasing followers and website traffic. But Chinese state media and diplomats\nhave also seen platforms like Twitter and Facebook as essential channels in getting\nglobal audiences to hear official state narratives, and redress what China\u2019s\npropaganda officials regard as a serious deficit in what they call\n\u201cinternational discourse power\u201d (\u56fd\u9645\u8bdd\u8bed\u6743), and what they\nregard as a key aspect of China\u2019s \u201ccomprehensive\nnational power<\/a>\u201d (\u7efc\u5408\u56fd\u529b). <\/p>\n\n\n\n Borrowed\nBoats<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n China is\nbroadly seen by CCP leaders as lacking in \u201csoft power,\u201d a concept introduced to international relations theory\nin the 1980s<\/a> by\nAmerican political scientist Joseph Nye, and which in 2007 was incorporated\ninto China\u2019s political report<\/a> to the 17th<\/sup> National Congress of\nthe CCP through the phrase \u201ccultural soft power\u201d (\u6587\u5316\u8f6f\u5b9e\u529b). Leaders essentially see the country\u2019s lack of soft power, or its\n\u201cdiscourse deficit\u201d (\u8bdd\u8bed\u8d64\u5b57), particularly against the strength of\nWestern media and governments, as having a serious impact on China\u2019s\ninternational ambitions. <\/p>\n\n\n\n While\nChina\u2019s government has tried to address this \u201cdiscourse deficit\u201d by pouring\nhuge resources into the international development of state media<\/a>, and into a broad campaign of public diplomacy<\/a>, its cultural and media products have had limited appeal<\/a> abroad. Looking to bolster his country\u2019s\nimage, and to balance against international criticism, president Xi Jinping\nurged state media in 2013, during an August meeting of propaganda ministers\nfrom across the country, to \u201ctell China\u2019s story well\u201d (\u8bb2\u597d\u4e2d\u56fd\u6545\u4e8b<\/a>). This catchier propaganda notion has now\nessentially supplanted talk of soft power, to become the central catchphrase\nencompassing a modernized notion of what the CCP has long called \u201cexternal\npropaganda\u201d (\u5916\u5ba3). In fact, Xi spoke in his 2013\naddress<\/a> of \u201cinnovating external propaganda methods . . . that\nintegrate the Chinese and the foreign.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n But despite\nChina\u2019s massive external media investments, reaching foreign audiences has been\ndifficult, and so these same outlets rely on Western social media to share\nChina\u2019s viewpoints. They have been aggressive in making sure they have a big\naudiences \u2013 or at least appear to have them \u2013 on major platforms like Twitter.\nSome Chinese state media have spent millions of yuan to expand their base of followers\non both Twitter as well as Facebook, as tender documents show<\/a>. A government notice published in August 2019<\/a> showed that China\u2019s top internet control\nbody, the Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC), had a one-year agreement\nwith the People\u2019s Daily<\/em> for the latter to promote information about\nChina on Facebook for 5.8 million yuan, or just over 800,000 US dollars. State\nmedia have also been suspected of buying followers<\/a> on social media networks. <\/p>\n\n\n\n China\u2019s use\nof Twitter has long been viewed as problematic<\/a>, particularly given the banning of Western\nsocial media platforms inside China, and restrictions on the use of domestic\nChinese platforms by Western news outlets and foreign diplomatic missions.\nState outlets like China Daily<\/em>, which joined Twitter in November 2009,\njust five months after the network was banned in China<\/a> following riots in the northwestern city of\nUrumqi, have been given relatively free reign to espouse Beijing\u2019s viewpoints\non Twitter, Facebook, and other services outside China. Western news outlets\nand foreign diplomatic missions<\/a> in China operating accounts on Chinese\ndomestic social media platforms such as Weibo, a popular microblogging service\nlaunched in the wake of the Twitter crackdown, have frequently been censored or\nblocked outright.<\/p>\n\n\n\n China has\nalso been accused of abusing its official presence on these platforms. In\nAugust 2019, Twitter said<\/a> it had \u201creliable evidence to support that .\n. . . a coordinated state-backed operation\u201d was pushing out misinformation\nregarding protests in Hong Kong, and suspended some 200,000 accounts.\nSubsequent actions announced in September 2019<\/a> and June 2020<\/a> removed thousands of other accounts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In 2020,\naccounts run by Chinese media or government actors actively promoted conspiracy theories<\/a> on the origin of the virus that causes\nCOVID-19. ProPublica in March reported on more than 10,000 fake or hijacked accounts<\/a> that promoted Chinese government viewpoints.\nMeanwhile, Chinese nationals who use VPNs or other tools to jump the firewall\nand tweet messages going against the government\u2019s viewpoints can face prosecution<\/a> by the authorities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n With Beijing\nseeming more assertive than ever in its effort to change how its actions are\nviewed in other countries, Twitter isn\u2019t the only company that has increased\nits scrutiny of Chinese media. A number of newspapers around the world that\npreviously carried paid inserts from state propaganda outlets like China\nDaily, <\/em>another favored way of utilizing Western channels to reach broader\naudiences, have recently stopped the practice. They include the New York\nTimes<\/em>, the Washington Post<\/em>, The Telegraph<\/em><\/a>, and several Australian media<\/a>. Newspaper inserts are just one of many \u201cborrowed boat\u201d methods<\/a> that China has employed in an effort to get\nits message out to audiences in the West and elsewhere in the world. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Splitting\nDifferences<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Our research\nsuggests that Twitter\u2019s new labelling policy has to some extent curtailed the\nability for Chinese state media to reach audiences outside China. But Twitter\u2019s\nmove has also elicited criticism for painting all Chinese media with the same\nbrush. Long-time readers of CMP, which has tracked Chinese media development\nsince 2004, will be aware that the media landscape in China has changed\ndramatically since the 1990s, with the emergence before the new millennium of a\nnew generation of more market-oriented media. In many cases, media affiliated\nwith the Party-state, such as commercial spin-offs of Party-run publications at\nthe provincial and city levels, pursued a more daring brand of professional\njournalism against the formal constraints of the media control system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Through the\n2000s, these media often challenged official narratives with strong reporting\nfrom the scene of breaking news stories, such as the 2008 Sichuan earthquake<\/a>, or through in-depth or investigative reporting<\/a>. And while Chinese media have faced a far\nmore difficult professional environment since 2012, owing to more determined political controls<\/a> and a digital transformation that has\nfundamentally changed the commercial environment, it should be recognized that there\nare still marked differences between media outlets \u2013 and not all are simply\npropaganda organs. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Fang Kecheng<\/a>, a former journalist and now assistant professor of journalism and communication at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, says that, in principle, it is not a bad thing to help social media users better understand the content they are viewing. But Twitter\u2019s current label, while not strictly inaccurate, lacks important context. \u201cThere is simply no private newspaper or TV station in China,\u201d he says. \u201cBut media outlets like Caixin<\/a> are significantly different from Party mouthpieces like the People\u2019s Daily<\/em>.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n A prime\nexample of the complex phenomenon of journalism undertaken within constraints,\nand with state affiliation, Caixin was launched in 2010 by Hu Shuli (\u80e1\u8212\u7acb), a respected journalism veteran<\/a> who for many years ran Caijing<\/em>\nmagazine, a commercial business publication that distinguished itself into the\n2000s with heavy-hitting investigative stories, such as its series on the 2003\nSARS epidemic. Hu remains Caixin\u2019s publisher, and has a strong team of\njournalists that continue to pursue tough stories in a difficult environment.\nIn March 2020, for example, the outlet called into question the official\nCovid-19 death toll figures being released in the city of Wuhan. In 2016,\nCaixin even spoke out directly<\/a> against the CAC after it ordered the\ndeletion of a critical article. Such open criticism of official censorship is\nrare in China.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Caixin is a\ncommercially operating media outlet. Like all media in China, however, it must\nhave some affiliation with the state through a so-called \u201csponsoring\ninstitution,\u201d or zhuguan danwei<\/em> (\u4e3b\u7ba1\u5355\u4f4d), responsible for maintaining the CCP\u2019s ultimate control over the press\nsystem. The sponsoring institution\u201d overseeing Caixin<\/a> is the Chinese Literature\nand History Press (\u4e2d\u56fd\u6587\u53f2\u51fa\u7248\u793e), a publishing house\noperated by<\/a> the General Office of the Chinese People\u2019s\nPolitical Consultative Conference (CPPCC), a political advisory body. <\/p>\n\n\n\n It is important to recognize that media like Caixin, while also state-affiliated, can have room for critical and investigative journalism, Fang says. He suggests Twitter could refer users to a third-party website with detailed information. It might be possible, he says, for social media companies to commission such a site. At present, there are no reliable expert sources for a more detailed understanding of how various media operate. YouTube, which began labeling<\/a> \u201cnews broadcasters that receive some level of government or public funding\u201d in 2018, links users to Wikipedia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In a written\nresponse to CMP, Twitter said it defines state-affiliated media as \u201centities\nthat are financed and\/or editorially controlled by a state or government\nauthorities. This control can be exerted through self-censorship or direct\npublication of information per the directive of the government.\u201d The statement\ncontinues, \u201cWe think it is important for people on Twitter to know when they\u2019re\nseeing media of this nature so that they can draw their own conclusions.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The\nconclusions many users are drawing, our analysis suggests, are leading them to disengage\nwith Chinese media across the board. Just a handful of labeled accounts\nreceived more attention from Twitter users after labels were applied.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Tweets from\nChina Xinhua Sci-Tech, which shares \u201cscience, space, health and environment\nnews from Xinhua News Agency,\u201d received more likes but also fewer retweets.\nTweets by Sixth Tone<\/a>, an English-language online magazine under\nthe state-owned Shanghai United Media Group that like Caixin can sometimes go\nout on a limb in covering more in-depth stories, were liked 6 percent more but\nalso retweeted a third less. Party newspaper Guangming Daily<\/em> was a rare\nChinese news outlet to \u2014 barely \u2014 improve in both categories.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Some\naccounts labeled \u201cChina state-affiliated media\u201d can still pay to promote their tweets\nbecause they fall under the exception for outlets focusing on entertainment,\ntravel, or sports. According to Twitter\u2019s Ads Transparency Center, XinhuaTravel<\/a>, Xinhua\u2019s XHSports<\/a>, as well as PDChinaLife<\/a>, PDChinaSports<\/a>, and ChinaScience<\/a>, three accounts run by People\u2019s Daily<\/em>,\nare all still able to promote tweets. Possibly as a result, some of these\naccounts saw relatively big changes \u2014 both positive and negative \u2014 in the\nnumber of likes and retweets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Though these\naccounts do not engage in the most overt kind of propaganda, their tweets still\noccasionally espouse Chinese government standpoints, such as that Taiwan is unequivocally part of China<\/a>, or promote propaganda projects such as the China International Import Expo<\/a> or the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao bridge<\/a>. They also tweet about China\u2019s COVID-19 diplomacy<\/a> and spread alternate versions<\/a> of where the virus may have originated.\nTwitter\u2019s state media ads policy<\/a> states that, \u201cIf the content is mixed with\nnews, any advertisements will be prohibited.\u201d But, according to the company,\nthe above-mentioned accounts are not in violation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Another\noutlier was the Twitter account of iPanda, a product of state broadcaster CCTV\nwhich almost exclusively shares cute photos and videos of giant pandas. Both\nlikes and retweets were up by more than 50 percent. Twitter confirmed that the\naccount is allowed to advertise, but that it hasn\u2019t since at least August 6.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The takeaway,\nit seems, is that China\u2019s most reliable soft power trump card is the adorable antics\nof its bamboo-munching black-and-white bears.<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n NOTE ON METHODOLOGY:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n We looked at\nTwitter accounts belonging to media companies that are labeled \u201cChina\nstate-affiliated media\u201d by Twitter and have more than 50,000 followers. Because\nTwitter declined to give a full overview of such accounts, our list (attached\nbelow) might not be complete. The only deliberate exclusion from our sample was\n@XHIndonesia, a local Xinhua account, which, despite some 65,300 followers, did\nnot receive enough engagement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We scraped\nthe numbers of likes and retweets of all Tweets by these accounts, between June\n17, 2020 and September 25, 2020. Using August 6, 2020, as a breakpoint, the\naverage engagement performance of Tweets before that is seen as a baseline. To\nrule out potential influence of outliers (e.g. Tweets receiving unusually high\nengagement), these were taken out when calculating the average engagement\nmetrics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Our analysis\ndoes not necessarily prove causality. The drop in shares and likes could also\nhave other causes \u2014 for example, because fewer news events that happened in\nChina following the labeling managed to grab readers\u2019 attention. It also does\nnot take into account any changes in follower numbers over the surveyed period,\nor differentiate between the effects of Twitter\u2019s various policy changes. Not\nall engagement might be organic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n LIST OF\nACCOUNTS:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n @caixin A review of official Chinese media accounts on Twitter indicates that engagement with the accounts has dropped since the US-based social media platform began labeling them as state-affiliated. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":1120,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-46721","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-going-global"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/chinamediaproject.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/graph-2cTwitter.png\")
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<\/div><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
@CCTV
@cgtnafrica
@cgtnamerica
@cgtnarabic
@cgtnenespanol
@CGTNOfficial
@cgtnrussian
@ChinaDaily
@chinaorgcn
@ChinaPlusNews
@ChinaScience
@Echinanews
@globaltimesnews
@Guangming_Daily
@ipandacom
@PDChina
@PDChinaBusiness
@PDChinaLife
@PDChinaSports
@PDChinese
@PuebloEnLnea
@shanghaidaily
@SixthTone
@thouse_opinions
@XHespanol
@XHJapanese
@XHNews
@XHscitech
@XHSports
@XinhuaChinese
@XinhuaTravel
@yicaichina<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"