The Canadian cable and media giant Rogers Communication is facing growing criticism over its efforts to bring to Canada nine Chinese-language television networks from mainland China, dubbed the "Great Wall" package.
Critics say the channels, all state-run by the Chinese communist regime, are simply propaganda organs of the ruling communist party and would drown out homegrown and independent Chinese TV. Rogers, on the other hand, has lauded the stations for their entertainment and cultural programming, downplaying the propaganda element and saying the stations will offer Chinese-Canadians more choice.
Trying to Follow Phoenix
In its application to the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC), the now-defunct Canadian Cable Telecommunications Association (of which Rogers was a key player) said the channels offer everything from culture, fashion, and travel to Chinese opera and chess. A spokeswoman for the CCTA says the application was market-driven. There is no mention of political content or editorial policy.
And with good reason.
Rogers was successful in November in bringing another Chinese-language network, the Hong Kong-based Phoenix TV, to Canada with a similar approach. Phoenix is 9% owned by the Chinese government. But the station stressed in its application that it is independent from China's communist regime and simply wants to serve local Chinese viewers.
It was a line that the CRTC appears to have bought, as Phoenix gained its license and was on the air by the end of 2005. However, a feature article in last Saturday's Toronto Star tells a different story.
Phoenix head Liu Changle, the newspaper reported, is a former People's Liberation Army colonel and manager at the Communist Party's official radio station. His success, The Star said, has depended on the Chinese government.
"Let's face it, what he's showing are programs approved by the state," Leslie Chan, a professor of new media studies at the University of Toronto, was quoted by the paper.
"I think the Chinese government would like to show to the outside world that there is some opening up, that citizens may be allowed to some extent to question freely, but really this is an adjunct of the state machinery."
And now, with the Great Wall channels, the CRTC is faced with the state machinery itself.
While Rogers seems to be hoping the CRTC will accept these stations as entertainment- and culture-driven, the stations describe themselves differently.
Loyal Mouthpieces
The China Radio Film and Television Group, which oversees all nine of the applicant channels, describes itself as "an important mouthpiece of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) Central Committee, an important cultural battlefield for the CCP and our country."
China Central Television, which is among the nine channels, also describes itself as a mouthpiece of the communist party.
The application by China Central Television and the others to broadcast on Canada's airwaves is in line, then, with orders Chinese chairman Hu Jintao gave to a conference on Party propaganda and ideology in December 2003.
"You should continue to see the strengthening and improving of our propaganda exports as a strategic mission, one wed to the battle of propaganda and ideology," he said.
Other officials have echoed Hu's statements in speeches to China's media brass.
"Radio, film, and television propaganda overseas is an essential and critical part of our Party's foreign propaganda," Tian Jin, deputy director of the State Administration for Radio Film and Television, told a conference on overseas media strategy. "It is a global and strategic undertaking in service of the Party and the nation."
But in gaining access to foreign airwaves, the communist party seems to have learned overt propaganda won't work. That's why culture has become a cornerstone of the propaganda effort.
And it's not only with media.
Political Agenda Cloaked in Culture
The Chinese communist regime has organized a slew of high-profile cultural events in western countries over the last couple of years, including in Canada, with the propaganda agenda never far behind.
At first, culture and communism might seem like strange companions. After all, those familiar with China's Cultural Revolution of the '60s and '70s know that the communist party sought to destroy all vestiges of China's traditional culture. Religious believers, artists, scholars, and others were persecuted severely, millions were killed, and cultural relics were destroyed.
In recent times, though, the party has allowed a revival of Chinese culture—in form, that is. However, its tight grip on ideology has not loosened.
Former Canadian heritage minister Shelia Copps summarized the communist party's approach to culture at a forum at the University of Toronto last August.
"By replacing the ancient Chinese folk songs with odes to socialism, the CCP has cleverly built upon the history of Chinese culture only to promote a political agenda," Copps said.
"By creating a political climate which stifles creativity and discourages pluralism, the CCP has attempted to replace the 4,000 years of Chinese history with a 50-year history of political culture."
And recently, the CCP has been making big investments in promoting that culture overseas.
Culture Shock
A state-organized "China-France Culture Year" that ended in July 2004 included over 300 Chinese cultural events in France, according to state-run Chinese media. That included a parade in early 2004 in which 800 performers and reportedly many of the 7500 participants were flown in from mainland China.
Later that year, Chen Weiyuan, the editor of a government publication on foreign relations strategy wrote about the success of the activities in France.
"The success of the Chinese-French Cultural Year is quite an inspiration for our overseas propaganda work," Chen wrote.
"Taking the approach of cultural exchange in overseas propaganda will have a far-reaching and lasting effect and will be well received by the target nation […] Culture is a 'soft' component of our nation's power. Cultural diplomacy is a 'soft' dissemination of our nation's will. Compared with economical diplomacy and political diplomacy, cultural diplomacy is able to have our target audience unknowingly accept [our propaganda]. Such cultural infiltration through subtle influence cannot be underestimated."
And so the regime has tried to repeat its success.
A delegation of 500 Chinese performers was sent to tour Australia in the first few months of 2006 in what it billed as the "Greatest Chinese Culture Show in Australia's History."
A former diplomat in the Chinese Consulate in Sydney critical of the tour told The Epoch Times the event would likely cost 100 million Chinese yuan (about $US 12.5 million), adding that 150 million Chinese earn less than $US 1 per day. Chen Yonglin, who was the First Secretary at the Chinese consulate in Sydney until his defection in May 2004, said the event was actually the greatest propaganda event in Australia's history.
Rogers a Partner?
Back in Canada, the Chinese culture pitch seems to have gained Rogers's attention. The CCTA says Rogers has been the leading supporter of the Great Wall television package bid with CRTC. Rogers also sponsored a large concert organized by China Central Television at the Rogers Centre in January and has announced it will sponsor a large Chinese Lantern Festival at Ontario Place this summer.
The "Same Song" concert on Jan. 15 featured big name performers from mainland China. The main song in the concert, called the "Same Song," was included in a concert called "Ode to the Party" in June 2001 and is among 100 songs selected by the communist party for "patriotism education" among Chinese youth. It has also been a theme song in China's labour-through re-education camps to symbolize the successful "transformation" of Falun Gong practitioners—a process that is most often accompanied by extreme torture.
Four Toronto-area Falun Gong adherents said the song brought back painful memories of torture and abuse. They say they were forced to sing the song before receiving any meals and, when tortured into renouncing their beliefs, the song was sung by labour camp guards as a sign of victory.
An inside source told The Epoch Times that the concert was ordered by the 610-office, the communist party agency in China responsible for implementing the persecution of Falun Gong, who called on the Toronto Chinese consulate to make it happen.
A research group within the state-run news agency that provides content to the Great Wall networks and other state-run Chinese broadcasters, Xinhua, recently instructed its staff: "We should make friends with the dignitaries of foreign media. We should have intimate relationships with them, and execute well our foreign propaganda with their help."
Perhaps the communist authorities feel they have found a willing partner in Rogers.
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