PERSPECTIVES Vol. 7, No. 2 (June 2006):79-98 LIN Dancing Beautifully, But with Hands Cuffed? A Historical Review of Journalism Formation during Media Commercialization in China 1 Fen LIN ABSTRACT This paper aims to 1) identify the current landscape of journalism in China and 2) investigate the historical trajectory of this landscape. The current journalism landscape features generational differences and regional variations in terms of journalistic values and behaviors. This landscape is associated with the process of journalism reform and media commercialization over the last three decades. The first stage, in the 1980s, was characterized by its strong political orientation and weak market power. Most key actors are Beijing-based. The reform process focused on commercialization in the 1990s, and apolitical journalism flourished. State control measures went from nationwide ideological campaigns to locally mixed measures in the early 2000s. Key actors were usually based in the South until cross-regional cooperation began in 2002. During the cyclic process of reform and reaction, journalism formation was shaped by the shifting dynamic between media, state and market in each of these different periods. INTRODUCTION Chen Xuedong’s day regularly starts around 3 o’clock in the afternoon. As a new graduate, he got a position as a city editor at a daily which “is doing well both economically and journalistically” (Informant #002). 2 He usually gets up around noon, eats breakfast at a time normal people might call lunch and then goes to the office for editorial meetings. Quite often he mockingly calls himself a “migrant journalist” since he doesn’t have housing and medical insurance. His view on journalism is quite straightforward: “Tell the truth, and try to be objective and fair. I am professional.” Using language popular among 7th generation journalists, he claims to be more apolitical than earlier generation journalists on the one hand, while on the other hand, he complains – on a professional level – about politics that pressure him to “dance beautifully yet have his hands cuffed.” Five levels above Chen’s office is Wang Jicheng’s. In his early fifties, Wang is the editor-in- chief of this newspaper. Having graduated from a party-run journalism school more than two decades ago, he’s worked as a lecturer in the journalism school, and then as a staff member in the propaganda department. His new post leaves him feeling alien in the profession he’s worked in all 1 Direct correspondence to Fen Lin, Department of Sociology, University of Chicago, 1126 E.59th St., Chicago, IL 60637. I thank Dingxin Zhao, Yang He, Amanda Conant, Sida Liu, Elena Obukhova, and the anonymous reviewer for valuable comments and help. Special thanks also to those journalists whom I cannot name here. 2 To protect interviewees’ confidentiality, all names shown in the paper are pseudonym. The interviewees’ IDs shown in the essay are also randomly assigned, thus the order of IDs are not associated with interviewees’ locations or positions. 79