Media as promising tool for Sino-Africa relations

The FOCAC Beijing Action Plan outlined China’s cultural diplomacy in Africa. It positioned China and its commitment to Africa in a people-to-people exchange and cooperation framework with six areas of cooperation, set concrete objectives for the coordination of media in China and Africa on China-Africa issues. China-African relations can be promoted through different ways; it’s […]

The FOCAC Beijing Action Plan outlined China’s cultural diplomacy in Africa. It positioned China and its commitment to Africa in a people-to-people exchange and cooperation framework with six areas of cooperation, set concrete objectives for the coordination of media in China and Africa on China-Africa issues.
China-African relations can be promoted through different ways; it’s a common sense that media seemed to be the most important link between Chinese public and Africa. A survey by Global Times showed that nearly 72% of the informants got to know Africa through news report. Mass media is also a potential to drive social change. China is expanding media presence in Africa.
In 2006, the state-run China Radio International began broadcasting from Nairobi, Kenya, while Xinhua, the official press agency of the People’s Republic of China, now has over 20 bureaus across the African continent. Xinhua’s television station, CNC World, began broadcasting to African satellite and cable viewers at the start of 2011. In January 2012, the state-run Chinese Central Television established CCTV Africa. On 14 December 2012, China Daily, China’s biggest English-language newspaper, launched its first African edition.
Africans and Chinese have much in common in their dreams. My own understanding about “China-Africa” shared dream is an expression of “Soft Power” for both sides. The definition for Soft Power can be vague; to some extent it should avoid becoming a monolithic concept. Chinese academia distinguished American soft power from Chinese soft power. The former was considered hegemonic assimilation and cultural imperialism. The latter was based on a policy of peaceful rise and calls for the building of a harmonious world.
Unfortunately, China-Africa relationship has been largely defined by Western media. Most of them are groundless, more ironically, according to statistics, the imports of African raw material and oil for domestic development in the U.S is much higher than China, maybe because they have been doing it for so long that it is no longer news.
 At the same time, Chinese and African speakers were often absent at these talks. Due to various factors, some Africans learned about China mainly through non-Chinese channels.
The contact Africa has had with the West over the years has deep influence on how the average African presents his thoughts. Although the Afro-European cultural contact was not voluntary with Africa on the receiving end, its impact on African society has been profound and enduring. The linguistic bonds between the West and Africa encapsulate the West’s broader relationship with African countries. Now Chinese media is offering an alternative and coming into tension with traditional Western media and cultural hegemony.  
For Africans, understanding China’s social progress, cultural values and development models are crucial. China and Africa are both among the cradles of human civilization and have splendid cultural heritage. African cultures and traditional values, in essence, are close to their Chinese counterparts, convergence between African philosophies and Chinese philosophy provides the basis for mutual understanding between the two civilizations. On the other hand a proper understanding of Africa also can’t be achieved without knowledge of its language, culture and history. Relevant studies are important for eliminating misunderstandings caused by cultural and language differences.
Collaborations between media and academia should also be encouraged. Western media enjoyed a long history of African studies dating back to 19th century.
To break the longstanding Western monopoly, Chinese and African media should take a proactive move to promote the Sino-African relationship via objective coverage, to tell each other’s story in a mutual respectful and acceptable way. In that sense, a lot of common ground or topics ranging from poverty reduction, education and healthcare to the environment can be explored.
The initiative should be top-down and bottom-up, focusing on different society layers and receiving audiences. At the same time, both China and Africa could incorporate other non-conventional media into the framework. For instance, studies on literature, music and even cartoons should be explored.
Secondly, the collaboration between Chinese media and African counterparts will definitely create a new domain for mutual credibility. In terms of technical support, exchanging journalists, sharing information, capacity training and mutual trusts are capital assets, without which the above practices will prove to be vain. Establishing more stands on both sides getting each other’s primary source of information and sharing it, avoiding the third party interference and twisting will be very convincing and helpful to fight back the accusation of “the others”. Meanwhile media collaboration is beyond soft power itself and expanded to more outputs in an economic sense, which means this kind of collaboration, could be self-maintained and enduring within the framework of Sino-African relation.
I think it should also employ a peer review mechanism based in Africa, evaluate the effectiveness and receptiveness on the ground, how African societies perceive the manifestations of China’s presence on the continent as reflected in African media, to provide a more objective perspective for Sino-African relation.
Thirdly, media collaboration between China and Africa could be considered as a collaboration model within the framework of Sino-African relation since it is totally based on mutual development and non-interference, which construct the two pillars holding the ideological superstructure. Compared to the mainstream China’s economic and political diplomacy in Africa, China’s cultural diplomacy is a supplemental tool in the all-round China-Africa relations, but media co-operations have a substantial impact on it.
The co-operations include export of technology, economic cooperation, development aid, and knowledge dissemination, all of which provide African countries’ media the capacity to create its own discourse, also indicating there’s no East or Chinese oriented media model, but a genuine native African one. Both sides are actually exchanging their media philosophy instead of Chinese disseminating it.
More interestingly, China’s view of a dynamic Africa also contrasts sharply to the West’s doom and gloom analysis of Africa. Chinese and African media are also facing similar accusations from the west, domestic development challenges and so on. All these put both sides in the same camp providing a solid foundation for collaboration.
But there are several points worth mentioning. The success of media system means differently for both China and African countries with different political, cultural and economic landscape. The indigenous communication in Africa, its tradition and practices, cultural foundations of media philosophy should be carefully studied. It’s not appropriate to generalize the African media. Differences exist within each country; case study should be taken into account.
In conclusion, neither China nor Africa is perfect, both domestic and internationally. The Chinese tend to be rather too concerned about the good news, it’s impossible to win minds and hearts of everyone, this good or bad dichotomy will not be helpful for either side, maybe a more rational mentality is needed. There’s an old African proverb that says “If you want to go quickly, go alone; if you want to go far, go together.” Media collaboration is a promising field for Sino-African relations, but there is space for more efforts in the upcoming years.

Xiaomeng, Associate Professor and Vice Dean of School of Asian and African Studies, Beijing Foreign Studies University, delivered this paper at the seminar on China-Africa media cooperation in Nairobi on October 18, 2013.