National Interests And Media's International Coverage

This study analyzed the print media coverage of Sino-U.S. relations by Lianhe Zaobao from 1999-2006. The purpose is to examine the hypothesis that the inclination of Singaporean media's international coverage is driven by the preference of its national interests. The author has applied content analysis and other methods for international studies, and mainly explored and answered three questions: 1) Why is Zaobao inclined to favor China on certain topics? 2) Is the topic hypothesis effective? 3) What implications can be inferred from the conclusion?The conclusion can be viewed from three dimensions/levels:1) From the micro-level, the U. S. wants to suppress China's rapid growth, while Singapore does not support the containment strategy and values balance of powers, regional stability and integrating China into the international organization for trade and economic cooperation. This different strategic preference is the main cause for Zaobao's inclination to favor China on certain topics.2) From the middle level, the case study of Sino-U. S. relations coverage supports the hypothesis that the national interest orientation of Singapore is the main decisive reason for the inclination of Singaporean media's international coverage. To be specific, the mechanism of the inclination development of Singaporean media (Lianhe Zaobao) studied here can be generalized as follows: In sectors of security and trade, in which Singapore and China have shared interests, Zaobao is inclined to favor China. In ideological sector, in which the two nations have no common interest, Zaobao shows no inclination to favor China (and is even slightly negative). The common interests in security and trade did not lead to favorable reporting about China on ideological issues.3) From the macro-level, to encourage Singaporean media to report China more positively, China can exert some influence on security and economic matters, while on the side of ideology, there is still much difficulty not only in Singapore but also in western countries. To improve China's national image, not only communication skills should be applied, but also international relations study should be conducted to identify proper methods.