Citizen Journalism: Global Perspectives

Reese and Dai, in Chapter 18, explore the role of citizen journalists acting as media critics-both against domestic and international media- arguing that the Chinese blogosphere is increasingly featuring posts and comments that in their view are a form of public deliberation. Nationalism, they argue, suits the interests of the Chinese government, which has given citizens free range in criticizing the Western media-attacking CNN for discrepancies in its coverage of the Tibet riots and negative framing of the Olympic Torch relay, for instance. Conversely, they demonstrate how citizen reporters also critique domestic professional journalistic principles, forcing action on issues that would otherwise have been ignored. In the context of globalization, they contend, these developments point to new ways of understanding social change.

Authors: Stephen D. Reese and Jia Dai

Despite Vietnam being listed as one of the 13 “enemies of the Internet” in 2006 by Reporters Without Borders, Nguyen (Chapter 12) argues that citizen journalism has “developed quite vigorously” there. Indeed, he illustrates how it has seen a spectacular rise in recent years, establishing a reputation for breaking news-often reporting events that would have been ignored by mainstream media as too controversial. In this way, citizen journalists are helping to create a realm of debate where the authority of the state can be called into question. The blogosphere has prospered, in Nguyen’s view, not simply because of technological advances, but also because of the governing regime’s “confident tolerance” in allowing such activities to take place.

Author: An Nguyen

Khiabany and Sreberny (Chapter 9) address questions of citizenship and journalistic professionalism in an authoritarian regime by exploring the re-inflection of a more Western conceptualization of citizen journalism in relation to Iran’s radically different political setting. The Persian blogosphere, they demonstrate, provides a space for trade unions, radical student groups, and women’s movements to voice their plight, which is otherwise ignored by the traditional, state-controlled mass media. They show how citizenship and journalism are both experiencing a revival through innovative and alternative forms of expression in response to the political context.

Authors: Gholam Khiabany and Annabelle Sreberny

In Chapter 7, Nip assesses citizen journalism’s response to the Wenchuan earthquake in southwestern China in May 2008. She reveals how citizen journalists were the first to report the earthquake both to a Chinese and international audience, providing eyewitness reports and expressions of personal emotion – grief, anger, and sympathy. Moreover, in a rare moment of openness under the Communist government, citizen journalists were also able to investigate and critique officials’ handling of the disaster. Such reporting did not completely evade
state censorship, however, and Nip further discusses new government tactics such as infiltration of citizen-generated content – that is, paying for people to post content supporting the government as a strategy to subvert opposition and manage this new form of public discourse.

Author: Joyce Nip