Econ_Sep_22

The Economist

September 22nd 2018

China 39

EW countries have invested more man-hours in suppressing

awkward facts than China. Internet censors employ more

foot-soldiers than some armies. Propaganda officials are so strict

that, lest instructions faxed to newsrooms leak, they issue some

orders to squelch stories by telephone, to be recorded by hand.

Yet the rules do not bind all equally. The

Global Times

is a jin-

goistic tabloid that tackles topics shunned by rivals, even though

it is a subsidiary of the Communist Partymouthpiece, the impor-

tant-but-turgid

People’s Daily

. In July it reported that Liu Xia, the

widow of the Nobel-winning dissident Liu Xiaobo, had left for

Germany. Recently it has ignored orders to downplay tensions

with America and has offered defiant candour about Xinjiang, a

restive western region turned police state. There is mounting evi-

dence that hundreds of thousands ofMuslims fromXinjiang’sUi-

ghurminorityhave been sent to re-education camps for such acts

as public prayer or reading history books. Even as Chinese

spokesmen denied the camps’ existence, the

Global Times

, in its

English-language edition, acknowledged “counter-terrorismedu-

cation” amongXinjiang residents andwork to “rectify” the think-

ingof imprisoned extremists.Whether thewayXinjiang is runvi-

olates human rights “must be judged by whether its results

safeguard the interests of themajority in the region”, said the

Glo-

bal Times

inAugust. Its editor, HuXijin, tweeted that Xinjiang had

been saved frombecoming “another Chechnya, Syria or Libya”.

Strikingly, rather than claiming thatWestern journalistsmisre-

port Xinjiang, the

Global Times

prefers to troll them, accusing for-

eign correspondents of hoping to “profit” from negative China

coverage, while asserting that theWesternpress is “nowhere near

as influential as it once was” and gleefully noting Mr Trump’s at-

tacks on “fake news”. If that sounds familiar, it should. This popu-

list, nationalist age suits the

Global Times

and its Trumpian in-

stinct that the best defences are brazen ones: coolly conceding

opponents’ factswhile attacking theirmotives and standing.

It is not fashionable in China to take the

Global Times

serious-

ly. Mention it at dinner with Chinese intellectuals and fireworks

follow. They deplore its sabre-rattling towards Taiwan and Japan,

and its deep reservoirs of grievance (thisweek the paper peddled

a largely confected tale accusing Swedish police of brutalising

some rowdyChinese tourists). In2016 a retiredChinese ambassa-

dor compared it to an angry toddler. Xiang Lanxin of the Gradu-

ate Institute of International and Development Studies in Gene-

va, a former

Global Times

columnist who left because of its

nationalism, has written that it would be a “great shame” if his-

tory were to equate the tabloid with

Der Stürmer

, a hate-filled

Nazi rag. On Weibo, a microblog site where Mr Hu has 15.7m fol-

lowers, critics call him “Frisbee catcher”, ie, a lapdog chasing sto-

ries tossedhisway. Foreigndiplomatswonderwhether the paper

floats trial balloons for party hardliners, or simply pursues profit.

Asked that question at his office, in a drabblockon the

People’s

Daily

campus in Beijing, Mr Hu suggests a bit of both. “If the

Peo-

ple’s Daily

and the Central Publicity Department don’t like me,

theycanassignme elsewherewith just one order,” he says. Yet his

paper lives offcirculation and advertising, so “the partyand read-

ers are both my gods.” The paper’s Chinese edition sells 1.5m

copies a day, says themanagingeditor, Yao Li. The English edition,

launched in 2009, claims sales of 120,000. Its foreign reports are

often by correspondents from the

People’s Daily

and Xinhua, the

state news agency. Some hawkish commentaries are written by

military and government officials under pseudonyms.

Before Mr Hu writes editorials, staff collect views from “pres-

tige, mainstream” experts and officials. Pressed on whether he

tests messages for those in power, he frowns, trying to answer

precisely. For, to give him credit, Mr Hu is exceptionallywilling to

talk to outsiders, on social media and in person. His articles may

reflect how officials “truly feel”, he says, though such thoughts

may not represent government policy. The paper tries to push

controversial topics in a way that might coincide with leaders’

thinking. “The knack is knowingwhenwould be a good time.”

The paper is profitable. “Ifwemake ten yuan, we give the

Peo-

ple’s Daily

three yuan and 50 cents,” saysMs Yao. MrHu has a po-

litical mission, too: to nudge the party to be more transparent for

its own good. The youngMr Hu tookpart in the Tiananmen prot-

ests in 1989. Mention of that tumult is taboo in the Chinese press

but

Global Times

has written about it, in defence of the govern-

ment. Noonewill say the armywas right to kill hundreds inorder

to end the unrest, Mr Hu murmurs. “The words cannot even be

uttered.” He calls the military action a tragedy caused by student

naivety and government inexperience. But afterwatching the So-

viet Union’s collapse and covering Yugoslavia’s break-up as a

war correspondent, he came to admire strongCommunist rule.

In answer to Pilate’s question

Mr Hu’s candour is selective, notably when tackling domestic

news. “In Chinawhat is truth?” he asks. “Micro-truth” is whether

a particular incident happened. But his “macro-truth” is that the

media must guide the public to see that its interests and the

party’s are fundamentally aligned. “China is so vast, ifwe report

on corruption every daywewon’t see the end to it.”

Twenty years ago liberal papers like

Southern Weekly

pushed

at censors’ boundaries. Today propaganda officials grant a rare li-

cence toMr Hu, and indeed sound positively fond of him in priv-

ate. His pugnacity is catching. On September13thLi Xiaojun, from

the State Council Information Office, told reporters at a

hu-

man-rights meeting that Xinjiang had to send extremists to voca-

tional “training centres” because the West had failed to tackle Is-

lamic extremism. “Look at Belgium, look at Paris, look at some

other European countries,” Mr Li scolded, sounding like the

Glo-

bal Times

come to life—or like aman using a propaganda line test-

ed onWestern critics byMr Hu. Frisbees can fly twoways.

Trial-balloonist or troll?

The curious role of theGlobal Times, China’s tabloid attack-dog

Chaguan