MEDIA INTERNATIONALIZATION IN CHINA - PROCESSES AND TENSIONS

The Chinese media have become more international by five major processes: (a) the offering of free goods, (b) regulated trade, (c) competition, (d) demonstration, and (e) cooperation. These processes interact and interconnect. Media trade, signal spillover, and direct satellite broadcasting create competitive pressure on the domestic media to imitate their foreign rivals and reinvent what they learn from them. The influence of foreign media culture in China is uneven and is contingent on the strength of ideological control at both the central and local level, as well as on the media's nature, geographical location, and degree of commercialization.