Television reform in the era of globalization: New trends and patterns in post-WTO China

Taking China’s accession into WTO as a key point, this article attempts to investigate the manner in which two important market-oriented television policies have been made in China, namely ‘Separation of TV program Production and Broadcasting (STVPB)’ and ‘Broadcasting Consolidation and Reorganization (BCR)’. In addition, it also tries to examine how these market-oriented policies have been implemented with Chinese characteristics and how they have influenced the operation of Chinese broadcasting market. In this article, it argues that television reform with Chinese characteristics is very likely to provide favorable conditions for the co-existence or co-operation of politics and market. In particular, it suggests that the effectiveness of Chinese state’s control power has not been weakened but strengthened with its adoption of market-oriented reform in post-WTO period. Under such circumstances, the future of Chinese television is less likely to evolve into a free competition mechanism, but more likely into a pattern in which the state-owned media capitals achieve rapid growth and dominance through the process of market-oriented reform, and private and foreign ones have to choose for collaboration or even dependence upon the former.