Seeking Truth in International TV News: China, CGTN and the BBC

This book puts CGTN (formerly CCTV-News) and the BBCs international television news head-to-head, interrogating competing truths in the exacting business of news reporting.

Written by a media scholar and former long-serving BBC News journalist, Seeking Truth in International TV News asks if Chinas English-language television news programmes are little more than state propaganda, and if the BBC can be viewed as a universal news standard to which all other broadcasters should aspire. Over 8 years of Xi Jinpings rule, it investigates how the international TV news channels of CGTN and the BBC reported on Chinese politics, protests in Hong Kong, disasters, China in Africa, and insurgency and its suppression in Xinjiang. The comparison reveals uneven editorial imperatives at the Chinese broadcaster and raises questions about the BBCs professed tenets of balance and impartiality. It also illustrates how Chinese journalists commit small acts of journalism that push the boundaries of information control.

A rigorous analysis of reportage from the two channels, this book will be relevant to scholars of global media, journalism, international relations and public diplomacy. It will also interest those in academia, the media and international affairs who want to examine the nature of news and soft power in a comparative context.