Keyword – geopolitics

Révész, Ágota:

The framing of Coronavirus in Chinese domestic media – and what it reveals about China’s visions of a new world order

Domestic mainstream media in China (and also media exchanges with China) seem to be stuck in the frames of conflict and morality, supported by a focus on responsibility. Both China’s “moral superiority” and the idea of China being “responsible” appear most often in the explicit context of US vs. China rivalry. This serves as a background for China’s visions for the future. Here we find the combination of two traditions, that of ancient China and that of communist China: the concept of tianxia on the one hand, and a communist utopia on the other, complementing and supporting each other. While both of these imagined worlds are structurally open, they do have a political-intellectual-administrative centre, and China sees itself in this role in the new world order. This paper looks into the frames constructed by the official Chinese news media about China’s role in the context of a global challenge. Most case studies explore reactions by Chinese mainstream media to instances of Western (mostly US) communication (including the coverage of political statements), and analyse how Chinese authors interpret these for domestic audiences. It works with Chinese texts, a selection of comprehensive articles from online newspapers with the biggest reach and within a time span of ten weeks (February to mid-April 2020). An analysis of the framing of Coronavirus and China as its country of origin offers an insight into the perceptions of China’s role in the new world order. Its main focus is on how perceptions of global space and power relations changed during the initial phase of the Coronavirus pandemic.

Keywords: Chinese media, Coronavirus-pandemic, framing, geopolitics