A Study Of The Western Frontier Coverage Of The People’s Daily (1949-1966)

As a multifaceted field integrating historical,ethnic,religious,political,economic and peripheral factors,China’s frontiers have profoundly affected the unity and stability of the new China and the Chinese nation.Since the modern era,the western frontier areas,represented by Xinjiang and Tibet,have been subject to continuous fluctuations due to the internal and external influence of imperialism and the Kuomintang forces,thus sowing the seeds of instability and becoming an important factor limiting China’s development.The resurgence of "double panarchism" and separatist forces on the western frontier after the twenty-first century is a product of this background.The People’s Daily,an organ of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China,provided continuous and in-depth coverage of the western frontier during the seventeen years between the founding of New China and the Cultural Revolution.This paper reviews this reporting process from the perspective of journalistic history and attempts to explore the reporting style of the People’s Daily and its reporting characteristics,with a view to uncovering the interaction between the People’s Daily as a medium and other factors in society and its effect on the social development of the western frontier.Through historical research,textual analysis,and case studies,this paper compares the coverage of the western frontier over the past seventeen years and analyzes it in three periods: during the liberation process,before and after the Great Leap Forward,and under the turmoil of the frontier,according to the specific social context in which the coverage took place.The study finds that during the liberation process,People’s Daily mainly publicized the peaceful liberation of the frontier and broke down the historical barriers between the frontier peoples;before and after the Great Leap Forward,it mainly showed the new face of the western frontier and called on the frontier people to devote themselves to construction;under the frontier turmoil,it mainly exposed the truth about the Tibetan rebellion and fought for the discourse on Tibet-related public opinion.Under the sustained spatial and temporal communication,the People’s Daily’s coverage of the western frontier effectively promoted the unification of ethnic relations,mobilized the construction of the western frontier,and maintained the unity of the ethnic state.Based on this,the study finds four distinctive features of the People’s Daily’s coverage of the western frontier in the early period of the founding of New China: rich coverage topics,constructing a multi-dimensional frontier;diversified coverage methods,vividly cognizing the frontier;balanced narrative discourse,taking into account both positive and negative narratives;and a clear banner,standing firm on political positions.As a micro-sample of the social development of the new China,the western frontier and its people in the People’s Daily’s coverage of the western frontier not only provide a perspective on how the new China accomplished its self-discourse,but also make it possible to glimpse through it the trajectory of the construction of the new China’s ethnic relations and the development of the CPC’s ethnic work and frontier governance.The People’s Daily is not only a collection of social representations,but also an important carrier of political mobilization and communication.It transcends the constraints of physical media and becomes a "communication tool" linking the Party and the state with the western frontier and its people of all ethnic groups.It has not only made the concept of equality and unity among ethnic groups deeply rooted in people’s hearts,but also improved the social landscape of the western frontier in general,and made the Party and State’s governance of the frontier smooth and effective.