Ideologies of crime news in China in an era of commercialization

Abstract

In the literature researchers don't agree whether news content in China in an era of media commercialization still functions to promote the dominant ideology of the ruling Communist Party. The thesis is a theoretical discussion of ideology, ideological hegemony and its evolving nature, with the consideration of Chinese situations. The theoretical discussion concludes that the dominant ideology in China is changing with the demands of a changing world, and so is media's representation of ideology. With some explorative data of crime news on three domestic and non-domestic news web sites to illustrate the theoretical discussion, the author of the thesis finds that in an era of media commercialization the ideological influence still plays a bigger role than the commercial influence in shaping crime news content of domestic media. Moreover, ideological messages are distributed through crime news in such subtle and indirect forms as the selection of official news sources, the frequent indication of the death penalty, the positive presentation of the police, and the attribution of individual causes to crime.