Established as a publication in 1993, its English version was launched in 2009. The editor-in-chief of Global Times was Hu Xijin until December 2021, who has been described as an early adopter of the "wolf warrior" communication strategy of loudly denouncing perceived criticism of the Chinese government and its policies.[9] The newspaper has been the source of various incidents, including fabrications, conspiracy theories, and disinformation.[note 1] It is part of a broader set of Chinese state media outlets that constitute the Chinese government's propaganda apparatus.[17][18]
History
Established as a Chinese-language weekly publication in 1993, an English-language version was launched on 20 April 2009 as part of a Chinese government campaign to compete with overseas media.[19][20][1]
In 2009, Hu Xijin, the editor-in-chief of both Chinese and English versions at the time, stated that he expected it to make a loss of 20 million yuan in its first year as an English-language publication.[21] In 2016, Hu said the Global Times was profitable but faced difficulties that would be familiar to other newspaper editors.[22]
The Global Times launched its Sina Weibo account in 2010.[23]: 303
The Global Times launched its US edition in 2013.[1] In 2016, it was reported that the English-language edition then had approximately 20 "foreign experts" who were involved with assigning stories and copyediting, "as long as the coverage [wa]s not about politics".[24]
In April 2017, the Global Times signed a personnel exchange deal with Sputnik, a Russian state media outlet.[25]
In 2020, the Global Times had total revenue of 176 million RMB and net profit of 24.5 million RMB.[23]: 304
In December 2021, Hu Xijin announced that he would be stepping down as editor-in-chief.[9][27]
As of at least 2024, the Global Times has a daily circulation of over 2 million copies.[23]: 303 It has consistently been regarded as one of China's top media brands.[23]: 303 It employs approximately 500 journalists in more than a 150 countries.[23]: 303
Editorial stance
The Chinese-language version has been known to have a pro-Chinese Communist Party (CCP) slant, attracting a nationalistic readership since its inception in 1993.[21][6][28] It has also been described as "conservative"[29][30] and ultranationalist.[31] When launched in 2009, its editors claimed that the Global Times' English-language version took a less nationalistic stance than its Chinese-language counterpart.[32]
Sources both in mainland China and abroad have said that the Global Times is not generally representative of the Chinese government's political positions, while the People's Daily is considered more representative.[33][34][35] Others have stated that the Global Times' editorial stance has been viewed as channeling the views of the hardline faction of top leadership.[36] Some scholars have noted that Global Times' more nationalistic stance permits other official state-run media to appear more moderate in tone.[37] According to its former editor Hu Xijin, the Global Times publishes what CCP officials think privately but do not say publicly.[38] According to Asia Society, the Global Times is "not considered an authoritative source of insight into the views of the central leadership".[39]
Hu Xijin has been described as an early adopter of the "wolf warrior" communication strategy of aggressively hitting back at criticism of the Chinese government.[9] His departure in December 2021, reportedly due to Beijing "strengthening the paper's political guidance", was (according to The Diplomat) connected to efforts of toning down overly confrontational rhetoric, following a deterioration of China's international reputation and CCP general secretaryXi Jinping calling for improvements in the country's international communication at a May 2021 CCP Political Bureau session.[9]
Journalist Joshua Kurlantzick wrote in 2022 that the Global Times "has taken approaches like the provocative, argumentative, and conspiracy-minded Russian outlets, mixing nationalism with efforts to mock the United States and other countries". He added, "Outside China, Global Times has used its uber-hawkish editorials and its top editor's skill at sparking controversies to make it relevant on social media internationally, in part because its content elicits responses from foreign officials and opinion leaders."[25]
Australia
In 2016, the Global Times referred to Australia as a "paper cat" in relation to the South China Sea, and a former "offshore prison" in relation to an Olympic champion Mack Horton calling out rival Sun Yang as a drug cheat (in reference to the country's former status as a British penal colony).[40][41]
Hong Kong
In May 2016, the Global Times ran a boycott campaign denigrating Hong Kong pro-democracy singer Denise Ho for allegedly advocating independence for Hong Kong and Tibet.[42][43] On 5 June, Lancôme cancelled a promotional concert by the Cantopop star that was scheduled to be held on 19 June in Sheung Wan.[43] Lancôme also added, in a Facebook post, that Ho was not a spokesperson for the brand.[44] The Tibet allegation appeared to have stemmed from Ho's May 2016 meeting with the Dalai Lama.[43] The cancellation drew a heavy backlash in Hong Kong.[43][42] Some Lancôme shops in Hong Kong were shut down during the protests.[45]Listerine, another brand that Ho represents, retained the singer despite the fact that the Global Times also criticized that company hiring Ho as its public face in Hong Kong.[43]
In the early stages of the U.S.-China trade war, the Global Times' coverage of the disagreements between the two countries focused narrowly on trade issues.[23]: 303 Following the December 2018 arrest of Meng Wanzhou in Canada, Global Times increasingly discussed the trade war as part of a possibly developing new Cold War between the U.S. and China.[23]: 303
Richard Burger, a former editor at Global Times, alleges that in the wake of the 2011 arrest of Ai Weiwei, the Chinese staff of the Global Times were ordered by the Chinese Communist Party to conduct an "astroturfing" campaign against "maverick" Ai Weiwei.[57]
Fabricated quotes
In October 2015, Roderick MacFarquhar, a China expert at Harvard University, spoke at a conference on Marxism in Beijing. He said that Chinese leader Xi Jinping's talk of the so-called Chinese Dream was "not the intellectually coherent, robust and wide-ranging philosophy needed to stand up to Western ideas." The Global Times reported his speech as saying that the "Chinese Dream" would "make great contributions and exert a positive impact on human development." MacFarquhar said that the paraphrasing was a "total fabrication". The line was later removed by the newspaper from its story.[10]
In 2018, the English edition of the Global Times acknowledged "counter-terrorism education" in Xinjiang, even as Chinese spokespeople denied the existence of the Xinjiang internment camps. The Economist noted: "Strikingly, rather than claiming that Western journalists misreport Xinjiang, the Global Times prefers to troll them, accusing foreign correspondents of hoping to 'profit' from negative China coverage, while asserting that the Western press is 'nowhere near as influential as it once was' and gleefully noting Mr Trump's attacks on 'fake news'."[3]
In 2019, the Global Times was criticized for perceived bias in its portrayal of Uyghurs and of disinformation campaigns regarding the Xinjiang internment camps, which led Twitter to ban it and other state-sponsored media outlets from ad purchases.[58][59][60] In 2021, ProPublica and The New York Times reported that Global Times was part of a coordinated state campaign to deny human rights abuses in Xinjiang.[61]
In May 2022, the Global Times said that a Canadian sniper who volunteered to fight in defense of Ukraine had "accused the Ukrainian army of inadequate weaponry, poor training, heavy losses, profiteering and desertion", citing a report by Russian state media outlet RT. The fact-checking website Polygraph.info found that RT and the Global Times had cherry-picked a report published by the Canadian newspaper La Presse to make the claim.[68]
Fake news about protest in Belgium
On 23 June 2022, the Global Times claimed that thousands of protesters marched in Brussels condemning NATO's aid for Ukraine during the Russian invasion of Ukraine on 20 June. However, the protest was aimed at inflation as well as high costs of living; no evidence was found that it was linked to NATO. The Belgian Ministry of Foreign Affairs condemned the claim as disinformation.[69][70]
In March 2024, the Global Times repeated false Russian claims that the United States was behind the Crocus City Hall attack.[72]
Reception
In China
In May 2016, the Global Times was criticized domestically by the Cyberspace Administration of China for "fabricating" news on the US, the South China Sea, North Korea, and Hong Kong, and "disturbing" the order of the cyberspace.[11]
In September 2018, The Economist wrote that it was "not fashionable in China to take the Global Times seriously", with a retired Chinese ambassador in 2016 comparing it to an angry toddler, along with Chinese intellectuals who deplored "its sabre-rattling towards Taiwan and Japan, and its deep reservoirs of grievance".[3]
In September 2016, the Global Times published an article, titled "Singapore's Delusional Reference to the South China Sea Arbitration During the Non-Aligned Movement Summit". Stanley Loh Ka Leung, then Singapore's ambassador to China, criticized the article as fake news. Loh also asked the Global Times to publish in full, in both English and Chinese, a letter he wrote to the newspaper's then editor-in-chief, Hu Xijin containing evidence which debunked the Global Times’ assertions. Loh pointed out that Global Times did not attend the meeting and China was not a member of NAM. Hu refuted the ambassador by saying that the Global Times' reports were reliable and based on information from people who attended the meeting, without publishing the letter that Loh had requested to be published.Loh's letter was widely carried by reputable international newspapers like the Straits Times and South China Morning Post, forcing Global Times to eventually publish Loh's letter online. This was the first time that Global Times published a clarification by a foreign Ambassador.[13][14][15][16]
In February 2023, the US-China Business Council (USCBC) released a statement refuting a Global Times article that claimed USCBC representatives had criticized the US Ambassador to China, Nicholas Burns. The USCBC said that the claims in the report were false and expressed appreciation for Burns' work in Beijing.[75]
Organization
Global Times is published by the People's Daily News Agency, which also publishes People's Daily.[39]Global Times has a public opinion research subsidiary, the Global Times Research Center.[76]: 124
^Huang, C. (2016). "Conservative popular journalism, public diplomacy, and the search for an alternative Chinese modernity: Revisiting the global times". In Gao, Jia; Ingram, Catherine; Kee, Pookong (eds.). Global Media and Public Diplomacy in Sino-Western Relations. Routledge. doi:10.4324/9781315584904. ISBN978-1-4724-4398-4.
^ abcdefgMao, Lin (2024). "From Trade War to New Cold War: Popular Nationalism and the Global Times on Weibo under Xi Jinping". In Fang, Qiang; Li, Xiaobing (eds.). China under Xi Jinping: A New Assessment. Leiden University Press. ISBN9789087284411.
^Wo-Lap Lam, Willy (2015). Chinese Politics in the Era of Xi Jinping: Renaissance, Reform, Or Retrogression?. Taylor & Francis. p. 93. doi:10.4324/9781315719368. ISBN978-1-317-51577-7. ... conservative Global Times contended that "China cannot emerge from its preordained inferiority if it merely imitates the Western discourse."
This list is incomplete. This list does not include English-language newspapers in Hong Kong, nor does it include Portuguese-language only newspapers in Macau. It does not include any newspapers in the current/post-Chinese Communist Revolution Republic of China area (Taiwan), nor in Taiwan under Japanese rule.
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