From commercialization to conglomeration: The transformation of the Chinese press within the orbit of the party state

This paper examines the trajectory of Chinese Communist party-controlled press commercialization in China and discusses the active role of the Chinese state in incorporating market-based press forms and practices into the existing press structure. Although market-oriented press developments in the past 2 decades have created a dynamic mass appeal sector catering to the urban middle class, it has also inadvertently led to a fragmented and decentralized press structure that undermined core party organs and their capital accumulation. Consequently, the party engineered a market rationalization campaign and pushed for press conglomeration. Both are aimed at enhancing political control on the one hand and facilitating press capitalization on the other. These developments are not only counter-intuitive to laissez-faire notions of free markets versus state control, but also have profound implications for emerging class and power relations in China.