China’s Message Machine

Issue Date October 2020
Volume 31
Issue 4
Page Numbers 59-73
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For more than a decade, the Chinese government has been on a mission to reshape the global news environment. It has invested heavily in several platforms to communicate its messages to global audiences. China’s Xinhua News Agency is a crucial part of that effort. In addition to being the main domestic news agency, Xinhua produces content in several languages for audiences around the world. Using machine-coded content analysis, this article describes and analyzes the main features of Xinhua’s messaging from 2015 to 2020. It finds evidence that Xinhua adjusts its messages for different audiences to suit Beijing’s preferred strategies.