Page 118 - Feasibility Study of New Media Technology on Constructing Online Public Sphere

Feasibility Study of New Media Technology
on Constructing Online Public Sphere

meaningful era’ (Xu, 2004, N.P.). This shows that the incident was not only a milestone

for defending the rights of migrant worker, but also a landmark event that showed the
power of online public opinion in Chinese society. The last sentence in Sun Zhigang’s
epitaph is ‘Promoted the development of the Chinese legal system at the cost of a
16
young man’s life, a citizen who deserves to be memorialised’ (Liu, 2003, N.P.) . This
shows the negotiation space between the government and the public changed from

barely zero to enlarged possible interaction.

5.3.1.1 The landscape of traditional media: from the government-oriented propagan-
da pattern to the commercialised pattern

Before 2003, the traditional media occupied the leading position for disseminat-
ing information. A feature of traditional media in China was the elitist trend in content
production and the domination of communication channels in which the editorial de-
partment acted as the gatekeeper for content production. All media channels, including

print, radio and television media, was all under the control of the official media man-
agement departments; the Publicity Department of the Communist Party of China and
the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television of the Peo-
ple’s Republic of China. If individuals who were not members of the editorial depart-

ment wished to express opinions to society, the only approach was traditional media
channels.
In the Sun Zhigang case, four major newspapers covered the incident: the South-
ern Metropolis Daily, the Yangcheng Evening News, the Guangzhou Daily, and the

Nanfang Daily. In general, the Southern Metropolis Daily has been marketised and lib-
eralised to a large extent during the media reforms. Nanfang Daily is government-ori-
ented. The other two stay neutral.
The Southern Metropolis Daily, as the leading commercial media in Guangzhou,

was the first newspaper that engaged in the Sun Zhigang case, covering it both in hard
copy and online. It also opened a hotline for readers to express opinions, grievances and
dissatisfaction towards the authorities. Motivated by the petition from the legal schol-

16 Translation provided by the author.

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