September 12, 2013
By Eric Fish

For years, sections of Chinese state media have tried to convince the public that the “biased Western media” (because apparently they all fall under one umbrella) is out to cause China’s collapse by demonizing it through wholly-negative reports.

Recently, Xinhua News Agency President Li Congjun reiterated this sentiment by saying, "Some hostile Western forces and media do not want to see a prospering socialist China and target the spear of Westernization, separation and 'color revolution' at China."

He continued, “[They] use their powerful dissemination abilities to massively play up the 'China threat theory' and the 'China collapse theory', creating rumors to attack and vilify our country and party which harms our interests and national image.”

Predictably, Li’s remarks weren’t accompanied by any evidence or actual examples. Attacking ill-defined conspiracies tends to be easier than targeting the actual facts presented by specific organizations.

But this attitude isn’t relegated to just Chinese state media. The Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post recently ran a commentary by a non-Chinese author named Chandran Nair entitled “Distorted View of China Overlooks its Many Positive Achievements.”

Nair actually did what state-media rarely does and provided an example to prove his point – an issue of The Economist that features on its cover a Chinese dragon breathing fire on the Earth entitled “The World's Worst Polluter.”

“It betrayed deep-rooted ideological biases and did its readers a great disservice,” Nadir wrote. “It was, in too many ways, what has become the quintessential ‘China story’ - one that emphasizes the nation's huge and growing impact on the world but chooses only to highlight its negative aspects - from environmental and foreign policy issues to investment in Africa, it would seem Beijing can't do anything right.”

He went on to echo the common complaints that on various issues like pollution, corruption and ethnic tension, China has actually seen remarkable achievements - which are ignored by Western media.

Had Nadir actually looked inside that issue of The Economist he found so unbalanced, he would have seen that the very first sentence of the cover story said, “China is the world’s worst polluter but largest investor in green energy.”

The article talked about China’s enormous pollution problems, but also its impressive environmental achievements and how Chinese investment in renewables “puts others to shame.”

There’s a common belief that “Western media” outlets must be beholden to the prevailing political ideologies of their respective countries; and that negative reports about China indicate not a desire to uncover truth and address problems that domestic media can’t report on, but attempts to undermine China’s rise.

But when one actually starts to look at the details rather than largely-manufactured connotations associated with the “Western media” umbrella, the “distortion” and “wholly-negative” narratives start to crack. A few quick Google searches show that literally everything Nadir listed as a Chinese achievement that’s been ignored by Western media has, in fact, been covered extensively by Western media.

Of course, as in any media, there are biases. There are tabloids and even reputable outlets prone to running sensationalist nonsense about China. But for every “Western” pundit touting the “China Threat” or “China Collapse” theory, there’s another touting a theory like “China is a Meritocracy” or “China’s political system is superior to Western democracy.” And if something genuinely unfair is presented about China, Western media outlets have shown no restraint in pouncing on it.

When monologist Mike Daisy stitched a series of sensational lies about his visit to a factory in China and was featured on This American Life, it wasn’t Xinhua or People’s Daily that exposed him as a fraud. It was a reporter from the American radio program Marketplace. This American Life then proceeded to devote an entire episode to retracting and apologizing for its error.

The majority of Western news outlets in China manage to put out fair reports that give voice to every side that’s willing to talk, in spite of a very inhospitable atmosphere toward foreign reporters. There are probably plenty who would disagree with that statement. If so, their stance would gain a lot more credibility if they’d just provide evidence that specific outlets are guilty of systematic one-sided distortion.