The nature of public opinion on social media in China

The political implications of the Internet on China has drawn much interest. Without an effective government system of grievance address, Chinese citizens have directed their complaints first to the news media and then social media as de-facto petition offices. Without the vote in political elections, the Chinese have exercised their citizenship through onlooking, producing and sharing information, expressing opinions and discussing with each other, and mobilizing action about public issues online. The launch of Sina Weibo in 2009 and its rapid rise in popularity saw objectionable projects scraped and corrupt officials dismissed. In response, the Chinese state struck back with tightened control on uses and in early 2013 arrested some and terminated the accounts of other prominent users, while increasing its own use of social media. At the same time, Weixin, which has been popular since its launch in 2011, has introduced public accounts that publish posts to their subscribers, and allow them to comment on the posts. Many scholars have analysed these changes from the perspective of development of the civil society, formation of the public sphere, and change in state-society relationship. Recently, big data analyses have produced results about the type of topics discussed and network distribution of messages on social media spaces. Far fewer have investigated these changes as phenomena of public opinion beyond using the term as description. This is surprising as journalists and the Chinese authorities themselves tend to frame these changes as the rise of online public opinion, and the Chinese authorities have responded by building an industry of online public opinion research. Against this background, this paper aims to propose a conceptualization of public opinion on social media. Following Arnold’s (2007) (“Tönnies’ concept of public opinion and its utility for the academic field,” Javnost-the public, 14(2), 7-29) framework, it suggests the existence of mass sentiment, published opinion, public opinion, and opinion of the public on social media in China. It considers the expression of public opinion on social media, and conceives the articulation of online public opinion as a process of co-production—in contrast to articulation of “offline” public opinion as a product. Social media posts that communicate information, emotion, and action-indication, in addition to analysis and judgement, are considered relevant to the formation of opinion of the public. With reference to China’s weibo, a networked stimulus-response process model is proposed for the formation of public opinion on social media in China.China Studies Centre, University of Sydne

Exploring the second phase of public journalism

This paper examines the new forms of audience participation in journalism with regard to their possibility in achieving the goals of public journalism.2 A typology of five models of audience connections is proposed: (1) traditional journalism, (2) public journalism, (3) interactive journalism, (4) participatory journalism, and (5) citizen journalism. Identifying the higher goal of public journalism as engaging the people as citizens and helping public deliberation, I argue that the new forms of audience participation could further these goals only by infusing the value from and learning the techniques of public journalism. The concept of community, of public deliberation, past research on the Internet, and data obtained from my field study is drawn upon.Fulbright Research Counci

The Travelling Objectivity Norm: Examining the case of the first Chinese journalism handbook

This study investigates the significance of Xu Baohuang’s 1919 textbook Xin wen xue on the articulation of an objectivity norm in the early Republican-era in China. It addresses issues raised by cross-cultural or comparative analysis of journalistic norms. It also considers the need to maintain awareness of differences in the political and journalistic field in Republican-era China. Following Michael Schudson’s 1981 essay “The Objectivity Norm in American Journalism,” our analysis focuses on the articulation of the objectivity norm and looks for unique aspects of norm formation arising out of the Chinese context. As such, we see Xu’s role as more than importing an American norm into China. Rather he codifies and legitimizes a norm that has a distinct relationship to local issues and media practice. We argue that while Xu’s text articulates what can only be considered a nascent ideal, and not a fully matured objectivity norm, his work nevertheless codifies a new sense of news, and also a journalistic commitment to the cultivation of healthy public opinion

Networked Framing Between Source Posts and Their Reposts: An Analysis of Public Opinion On China's Microblogs

Retweeting a post on a social media platform is a part of a process of growing significance through which public opinion formation takes place. A ‘retweet count’ on, say Twitter or weibo, can be taken as a measure of user influence. The assumption is that when B retweets A’s message, B empathizes with A and wishes to disseminate the message more widely. But this assumption has hardly been tested and preliminary evidence suggests practices for retweeting on Twitter vary. Nor can retweeting practices on Twitter be assumed to apply on weibo. This paper makes the first effort to understand the practice of reposting on China’s weibo, focusing on the content of reposts in comparison to that of the original messages. A quantitative comparison is made of the frame [Entman, R. M. (1993). Framing: Toward clarification of a fractured paradigm. Journal of Communication, 43(4), 51–58; Gamson, W. A., & Modigliani, A. (1989). Media discourse and public opinion on nuclear power: A constructionist approach. American Journal of Sociology, 95, 1–37] of the source post of 21 cases, and their reposts. The posts and reposts all refer to the issue of officials being exposed for corruption on Sina Weibo. The study finds sound evidence of networked framing, in which reposters revised frames of the source posters while disseminating them. Although over half of the reposts merely republished the source post without added content, what emerged were new communicative functions, case definitions, and a diagnosis of the consequences of exposing the cases. However, different types of user accounts drew different reposting frames, which points to a consistent paradigm between the source accounts and the reposters. The results are important for understanding the mechanisms behind the formation of public opinion on weibo.Joyce Y. M. Nip’s research was supported by the Faculty Research Support Scheme of the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, the University of Sydney. King-wa Fu’s study was supported by the General Research Fund, Research Grants Council, Hong Kong (HKU 17402314H)

Assessing the Impact of Digital Alternative News Media in a Hybrid News Environment: Cases from Taiwan and Hong Kong

As consumption of mainstream news media declines and alternative news media proliferates, in this paper, we seek to assess the impact of digital alternative news media (DANM) in relation to mainstream news media (MNM). We examine the range of DANM, especially public Facebook pages, related to two large-scale social movements neighbouring mainland China as case studies of social movement media exerting maximalist effects. The assessment relies on academic sources, archival materials, descriptive social media metrics, and an original analysis of external content shared on public Facebook pages and groups using data collected from the Facebook Graph API. A six-dimensional scheme is proposed to guide the assessment. Sorting through and piecing together multiple sources, we arrive at a multi-faceted description, comparison, and analysis of the impact of DANM during two social movements

Challenging Official Propaganda? Public Opinion Leaders on Sina Weibo.

This article examines the prominence of various user categories as opinion leaders, defined as initiators, agenda setters or disseminators, in 29 corruption cases exposed on SinaWeibo. It finds that ordinary citizens made up the largest category of initiators but that their power of opinion leadership was limited as they had to rely on media organizations to spread news about the cases. News organizations and online media were the main opinion leaders. Government and Party bodies initiated a fair number of cases and, despite not being strong agenda setters or disseminators, were able to dominate public opinion owing to the fact that news organizations and online media mainly published official announcements about the cases. Media organizations also played a secondary role as the voice of the people. While individuals from some other user categories were able to become prominent opinion leaders, news workers are likely to be the most promising user category to challenge official propaganda.Faculty Research Support Scheme of the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, the University of Sydney. University of Hong Kong Seed Funding Program for Basic Research and the General Research Fund, Research Grants Council, Hong Kong (Project Code: 17402314)

Networked framing between source posts and their reposts: an analysis of public opinion on China's microblogs

Retweeting a post on a social media platform is a part of a process of growing significance through which public opinion formation takes place. A ‘retweet count’ on, say Twitter or weibo, can be taken as a measure of user influence. The assumption is that when B retweets A’s message, B empathizes with A and wishes to disseminate the message more widely. But this assumption has hardly been tested and preliminary evidence suggests practices for retweeting on Twitter vary. Nor can retweeting practices on Twitter be assumed to apply on weibo. This paper makes the first effort to understand the practice of reposting on China’s weibo, focusing on the content of reposts in comparison to that of the original messages. A quantitative comparison is made of the frame [Entman, R. M. (1993). Framing: Toward clarification of a fractured paradigm. Journal of Communication, 43(4), 51–58; Gamson, W. A., & Modigliani, A. (1989). Media discourse and public opinion on nuclear power: A constructionist approach. American Journal of Sociology, 95, 1–37] of the source post of 21 cases, and their reposts. The posts and reposts all refer to the issue of officials being exposed for corruption on Sina Weibo. The study finds sound evidence of networked framing, in which reposters revised frames of the source posters while disseminating them. Although over half of the reposts merely republished the source post without added content, what emerged were new communicative functions, case definitions, and a diagnosis of the consequences of exposing the cases. However, different types of user accounts drew different reposting frames, which points to a consistent paradigm between the source accounts and the reposters. The results are important for understanding the mechanisms behind the formation of public opinion on weibo.Joyce Y. M. Nip’s research was supported by the Faculty Research Support Scheme of the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, the University of Sydney. King-wa Fu’s study was supported by the General Research Fund, Research Grants Council, Hong Kong (HKU 17402314H)