2. quantitative growth in
terms of media coverage, there is lack of knowledge on the real
issues that define the
relationship. In response, University of Witwatersrand (Wits) in
South Africa and
Tshinghua University in China initiated reporting projects
aimed at training jour-
nalists on the best approaches to report on China and Africa.
This study analysed all
the award-winning stories by using content analysis to inquire
into the issues and
narratives considered significant in defining China, Africa and
their relationship.
KEYwordS
Africa
China
constructive journalism
contra-narratives
Tsinghua University
Wits University
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22 Journal of African Media Studies
The study finds that there are differences in terms of issues and
focus of the stories
but this shows the diversity of the issues to be covered on China
and Africa. Most
significantly, the study shows that the stories from the two
3. projects used construc-
tive journalism narratives that cast new light on existing
stereotypes and explore
new controversies. Such narratives have the potential to create
better understanding
between the people of China and Africa but there is a need to
ensure training of more
media personnel to ensure sustainability of the initiatives.
introduCtion
Distortions in the media through the use of myths, stereotypes
and partial
facts have the potential to lead to misunderstandings and in
worst cases lead
to hate and conflict. A case in point is the television
advertisement in China
for Qiaobi laundry detergent that was based on a stereotypical
representa-
tion of people of African descent. The advertisement caught the
attention
of the international media and attracted critical comments for
reinforcing
the stereotypical representation of black people. On the other
hand, some
Chinese commentators blamed the western media for
‘magnifying racism in
China’ to discredit China and stir the emotions of Africans and
their leaders
(Anon. 2017). Outside these debates, the Chinese government
saw the poten-
tial damage that could arise from such distortions and responded
by issuing a
statement that reaffirmed the government’s commitment to
respecting people
of all descent and that China and Africa were ‘good brothers’
4. (Rajagopalan
et al. 2016). Extreme as the case might appear to be, it captures
the potential
power of media distortions to create misunderstandings,
mistrust and hatred.
The media have become an important window through which
people see
each other and understand events in other parts of the world. In
China and
Africa, the media have dedicated considerable time and space to
issues and
events from China and African countries. Despite the
quantitative growth
in terms of media coverage of China and Africa, the Wits
University China-
Africa Reporting Project (2015) observed that there is lack of
knowledge on
the ‘real issues’ that define the relationship and also widespread
use of stere-
otypes that distort news. Another observation is that the bulk of
the news
on Africa falls into two categories, namely, high-level
engagements reflecting
diplomatic relations and achievements in various areas of
cooperation and the
other category mainly reflected stereotypes on Africa
(Tshinghua 2016). Worth
noting is the use of the term ‘real issues’ by Wits University to
refer to stories
on Africa that are more people centred as opposed to those
based on high-
level engagements between Chinese and African officials and
companies, and
apparently this concern is also shared by Tshinghua University.
5. Against these observations, Wits University in South Africa and
Tshinghua
University in China initiated China-Africa reporting projects to
train journalists
on the best approaches to report on China and Africa and also
give awards to
journalists with stories that closely reflect the real issues. The
Wits Africa-China
Reporting Project (ACRP) is under the Journalism Department
at the University
of Witwatersrand (Wits) in South Africa. The project was
conceived in 2009 after
the realization that despite the growing economic, social and
political links
between China and Africa, journalism did not seem to be
adequately keeping
pace (Wits China-Africa Reporting Project 2015: 4). The project
is funded by
the Open Society Foundation and offers reporting grants,
workshops and other
opportunities to African and Chinese journalists. In providing
the resources to
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journalist, the project encourages collaborations to investigate
complex dynam-
ics and uncover untold stories, with an emphasis on people-
oriented perspec-
6. tives that illustrate the lives of the people of Africa at a time of
high Africa-China
interactions. On the Chinese side, the China-Africa Media
Coverage Research
Project was launched in 2016 under the Tshinghua University’s
Islaile Epstein
Research Center for Outward Communication. The two-year
project is funded
by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to train a number of
journalists on
sustained, deep and professional coverage of African non-
traditional issues
such as public health and agriculture (Tshinghua 2016).
The China-Africa Media Report Award is China’s first
international award for
journalists reporting on China and Africa. The collection and
selection process of
the stories was done by media experts from the media industry
such as Xinhua
News Agency and IFENG.com. The other judges were drawn
from Gates
Foundation and media scholars from Tshinghua University,
Peking University,
Renmin University of China, Communication University of
China and the
Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. After accepting
applications, 34 outstand-
ing stories were selected as outstanding in three categories
(Best Current Report
Award, Best Health Report Award and Best Development
Report Award).
The journalist training and awards initiatives show the
importance attached
to the need for media in China and Africa to go beyond
7. traditional narratives.
Questions that arise are on whether there are new journalistic
narratives that
are descendible in the award-winning stories in order to narrate
the true expe-
riences of China and Africa and at the same time push back the
enduring nega-
tive stereotypes. This study therefore seeks to comparatively
understand the
issues and narratives that are hailed as models in telling the
China and Africa
stories. This is significant in that the analysis of the award-
winning stories offers
a window to best view China, Africa and the China-Africa
relationship from
the perspectives of the two leading universities and their
sponsors. The study
compares and contrasts the topics or issues considered salient.
Further, the
study explores the narrative techniques used in the stories and
whether or not
the stories offer contra-narratives in the discourse on China and
Africa. Hence,
this study adds knowledge to the question of agency in terms of
Chinese and
African media roles in telling their own stories to the rest of the
world.
LitEraturE rEviEw
This section will focus on how Chinese and Africa media have
defined China
and Africa and their relationship. It is acknowledged that in a
global media
environment where there are limited boundaries to access
information, the
8. western media have remained a major player because of their
dominance in
terms of technological advancements and flow of information.
However, the
focus of this research is on Chinese and African media. In this
respect, it is
prudent to review the literature on African media representation
of China and
Chinese media representation of Africa. Thereafter, the concept
of construc-
tive journalism as an alternative journalistic approach is
explored to provide a
framework to further understand the award-winning stories
selected by Wits
and Tsinghua universities.
ChinESE mEdia rEprESEntation of afriCa
China has diverse local and international media. A number of
studies have
focused on the Chinese international media representation of
Africa but there
are few studies that have focused on Chinese domestic media;
hence, this
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Zhang Yanqiu | Simon Matingwina
24 Journal of African Media Studies
section will focus on research on Chinese international media.
In view of this
9. gap, this study uses stories published in both Chinese local and
international
media. One of the leading scholars, Xiaoling Zhang (2013), has
researched on
CCTV Africa (now CGTN Africa). The scholar analysed the
three programmes
on CCTV Africa, namely Africa Live, Talk Africa and Faces of
Africa. The study
reveals that Africa Live had more negative stories about Africa
while the other
two programmes had more positive stories. Another study by
Wang Xi (2012)
on how Chinese media represent Africa analysed text and
images of Africa
in Beijing News and finds that reporting about Africa was
negligible and the
negative images of Africa of poverty, disease and war were
featuring more in
text. The images were, however, more positive than the texts. A
similar study
was done by Ogutu (2011) but with focus on the Chinese
newspaper, China
Daily Africa, and reveals that voice presence in the articles was
mainly Chinese
although the stories were about Africa.
A similar study focusing on CCTV (now CGTN) by Gagliardone
(2013)
reveals that while there was a stated desire for CCTV Africa to
use ‘positive
reporting’ in telling the African story, CCTV Africa avoids
politically contro-
versial stories and focuses on more positive narratives, such as
Sino-African
partnership and friendship. In support, a number of scholars
highlight the
10. issue of self-censorship of journalists in their coverage of
controversial
issues (Wekesa 2013; Wu 2012; Yick 2012; Rhodes 2012).
However, Zhang
and Matingwina (2016b) advance that CCTV Africa uses
constructive jour-
nalism in narrating events in Africa based on the analysis of the
narratives
used in the content selected from three CCTV Africa
programmes. The
scholars argue that the deliberate efforts to sidestep
controversial issues
were a reflection of the constructive journalism principle of
avoiding focus
on problems but instead casting light on stories that explore
solutions to the
problems.
The Internet has become an important platform for international
commu-
nication and Shen (2009) conducted a study on Chinese Internet
users’
perceptions of Africans. The study of online perceptions of
Africa in China
reveals that Africans are represented as poor, lazy, sexist and
threatening.
The findings are supported by a similar study by Yinghong
(2011) in a study
on cyber racism. The study finds that Chinese discussions on
Africans have
shown blatant racialism against Africans. The studies are
insightful in their
focus on new media platforms that are growing in popularity.
However, it
is pertinent to note that while these studies show negative
perceptions of
11. Africans in cyber discussions, the characteristics of new media
such as
anonymity have the potential to encourage people to exaggerate
and express
extreme views. At the same time the views by these select
individuals cannot
be totally dismissed as they show the often unexpressed
sentiments of some
people.
The findings of the study are enlightening in that they show that
the
media in developing countries such as China have also
maintained the nega-
tive images of Africa that have been noted in western media by
a number
of scholars (Chidzonga 2016; Michira 2002; Mahadeo and
Mckinney 2007;
Mawdsley 2008). In addition, they show that Chinese media
largely focused
on Chinese sources and voices in narrating the events and issues
in Africa. On
the other hand, there is the argument that the approaches by
Chinese media
when reporting on Africa are in line with the tenets of
constructive journalism
that places emphasis on solutions and people-centred
approaches to news
gathering and reporting.
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12. www.intellectbooks.com 25
afriCan mEdia rEprESEntation of China
China and Africa have developed bonds of friendship and
cooperation that
historians have traced as far back as 1418, when Admiral Zheng
landed on
the shores of East Africa. Over the centuries, the relationship
has developed
like an intricate web with many strands of cooperation and
partnerships. The
evidence of this growing relationship is seen in increasing
volumes of trade,
state-of-the-art infrastructure projects such as the recently
commissioned
Standard Gauge Railway (SGR) in Kenya and investments in
agriculture,
mining and industry. The increased cooperation has also been
reflected on
the media front with establishment of Chinese media in Africa,
financial and
technical support to Africa media institutions and the increasing
presence of
China in the local African media.
China’s relationship with Africa has attracted a mixture of
favourable and
unfavourable images. Wasserman (2012: 1) observes that
China’s presence
on the continent is often viewed in stark binary terms as either
an exploita-
tive, predatory force or a benevolent, development partner. A
number of stud-
ies based on the media in Africa have reflected these
13. contrasting images in
the public and private media. A study by Mano (2016: 171)
notes that the
public media in Zimbabwe, The Herald, represented the
relationship between
Zimbabwe and China as beneficial while the privately owned
media such as
Daily News and NewsDay depict it as the reenactment of
colonization. The
findings are confirmed by Matingwina (2016) in a study that
shows that the
private media, Newsday, had more content (23.33 per cent) on
the negative
outcomes of the relationship than the public media, The Herald
(1.79 per cent).
Significant to note from the study is dominance of themes such
as economy
over themes on culture and people-to-people exchanges in both
the public
and the private media.
A study of African media framing of China based on
newspapers from
Kenya (Daily Nation), South Africa (Times) and Nigeria
(Punch) by Wekesa
(2015) reveals the combined finding that China is framed
foremost, more
pessimistically, second pragmatically and third, optimistically
from the point
of these newspapers. The scholar, however, notes that the
margin between
the three frame categories is not substantial and the three
newspapers seem
to be fairly balanced between optimism, pessimism and
pragmatism. The
study shows the two opposite views of China in the optimism
14. and pessi-
mism frames and adds a third view characterized by pragmatism
frames that
acknowledges the positives and negatives and seeks to get the
best out of the
relationship.
Worth noting from these studies is the traditional top-down
approach of
reporting issues with a focus on diplomatic relations, politics
and economic
related activities. While different perspectives are offered on
these issues, they,
however, do not offer much understanding of the real China and
its people
and rich culture and history to enable people in Africa to
understand the
people of China. It can be noted that the African media have
been polarized
on the sides of either defending China or attacking China.
ConStruCtivE journaLiSm aS an aLtErnativE journaLiStiC
ConCEpt
Against the literature on Chinese media representation of Africa
and
African countries and African media representation of China, it
is worth
reviewing constructive journalism as an alternative journalistic
framework.
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15. Zhang Yanqiu | Simon Matingwina
26 Journal of African Media Studies
The shortcomings of global media structures and traditional
journalistic
approaches have long been noted particularly in explaining and
narrating
experiences of the people in developing countries. The
MacBride Report (1980)
noted that in addition to under-representation of news from
developing coun-
tries, there were qualitative distortions in the media in both
developed and
developing countries. It is significant to note that while the
recommendations
of the MacBride Report were proffered in the context of the
unbalanced flow
of information between the developed and developing countries,
the insights
remain insightful to understand the media relationships between
developing
countries.
The qualitative distortions result in ‘highly skewed pictures of
reali-
ties’, with much coverage dedicated to crises, coups and violent
conflicts
(MacBride Report 1980: 149). The report elaborates on how
distortions of
news occur by identifying the use of inaccuracies or untruths to
replace facts,
use of slanted interpretations and use of random facts to form
the appear-
ance of a complete truth as some of the causes of distortions
(MacBride
16. Report 1980: 157–58). In response to these apparent
shortcomings, there
have been calls for the redefinition of news and alternative
forms of jour-
nalism. The MacBride Report noted that in developing
countries, there was
a need for expansion of the concept of news so that events and
issues are
given a broader context that ensures their accurate presentation
(1980: 157).
Baran and Davis (2010) note that one of the leading framing
theorists, Gans
(2003: 99), was among the proponents for what he called
participatory news.
The defining characteristic of this type of coverage was the
focus on how citi-
zens routinely engage in actions that have importance for their
communities
and seeks to report why events and statements described by
conventional
journalism took place.
Constructive journalism has emerged as an alternative
journalistic approach
with the potential to address the major shortcomings of
traditional journalism
approaches. Zhang and Matingwina (2016a) locate the roots of
constructive
journalism approaches to the normative tradition in view of the
observation by
McQuail (1987) that social responsibility theory imposes a
burden on media
practitioners to pursue new ways to service their communities
with news that
reflect their perspectives. The Constructive Journalism Project
(2015) defines
17. constructive journalism as ‘rigorous, compelling reporting that
includes positive
and solution-focused elements in order to empower audiences
and present a
fuller picture of truth, while upholding journalism’s core
functions and ethics’.
The definition brings out the element of empowering the
audiences through
adoption of a journalistic style that focuses on solutions without
violating the
core principles of journalism.
Constructive journalism has the potential to offer alternative
narratives
through a number of techniques and approaches that it employs
in news gath-
ering and news narration. Constructive journalism entails that
the media pose
questions that explore conflict and common ground or solutions
(Gyldensted
2011). It therefore demands that journalists and also media
scholars revisit the
fundamental question of journalism on how to narrate news. The
standard jour-
nalistic training is that a news story is narrated by answering
the basic 5Ws and
1H questions (Who, What, Where, When, Why and How).
However, construc-
tive journalism calls for adoption of the positive psychology
questioning model
developed by Tomm (1988) to complement the traditional
approaches to news.
According to the scholar, the four types of questions that can be
used by journal-
ists are linear, circular, reflexive and strategic.
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Complementing the questioning techniques are narrative
techniques
such as accomplishment, hero, solution and context (Gyldensted
2011). These
narratives form important frames to understand whether the
award-winning
stories from the Wits and Tshinghua reporting projects offer
new narratives
in telling the stories in China and Africa. However, a major
concern in the
discussions on constructive journalism is whether constructive
journalism will
replace investigative journalism. This is indeed an important
question and Ellis
(2014) states that ‘constructive journalism exposes the core
causes of problems
alongside emerging ideas and developments with the objective
of expressing
how change is possible and that each member of society has a
role to play’.
It can therefore be noted that constructive journalism will not
shy away from
all the controversial stories or omit some facts all for the
purposes of creat-
ing positive emotions, but it goes beyond all these narrations to
engage the
people to look at their circumstances and discuss how the
19. situation can be
improved.
It can, therefore, be noted that the top-down logic places
emphasis on
narrating stories from the viewpoint of the political leaders and
experts report-
ing on the successful engagements and supposed benefits for the
people. On
the other hand, the constructive journalism logic calls for
people-oriented
approaches to news, thus broadening the lens to view and
understand
China and Africa, and their relationship. These characteristics
also distin-
guish constructive journalism from established journalistic
approaches such
as investigative journalism. However, it is critical to point out
that constructive
journalism is not discussed in this article as better than any
form of journalism
but only as an alternative to complement existing approaches,
thus enriching
the ongoing news coverage of China and Africa by exploring
more solutions
and context.
Based on the literature reviewed, it worth interrogating the
award-winning
stories from the two universities with the view to seeking
answers to the
following research questions:
RQ1: What issues are given salience in the award-winning
stories?
RQ2: What narrative techniques were used to report on issues
20. in China
and Africa?
RQ3: What are the emerging alternative journalistic approaches
in the
award-winning stories?
mEthodoLogY
The study is based on the Trailblazers: The best of the Wits
China-Africa
Reporting Project (2009–14) and the Tshinghua University
China-Africa
Report Award (2016). The entire population or all the award-
winning stories
were selected for the study. As a result, the study used
seventeen stories from
the Trailblazers: The best of the Wits China-Africa Reporting
Project (2009–14)
and 34 from the Tshinghua University project. The sampling is
limited to the
award-winning stories on the basis that the selection process
had adjudged
them as the best in narrating stories from China and Africa;
thus, this provides
an important window to interrogate what issues and approaches
are used in
these stories.
Content analysis was used to create meaning from the data. A
number of
codes had to be developed for the different research questions.
On the ques-
tion of issues covered, eight categories emerged after analysis
of the content
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Zhang Yanqiu | Simon Matingwina
28 Journal of African Media Studies
(development, economy, diplomacy, military, resources,
immigration, health
and others). The ‘others’ category catered for all issues outside
the seven
stated. On the narrative techniques used to report on the issues
in China and
Africa, five categories were developed. The five categories are
Throw new light
to existing stereotypes; Backup the existing stereotypes; Draw
more attention to new
controversies; Offer no new perspectives to controversies; and
Raise the importance
of non-controversial issues.
In analysing the approaches used in narrating the stories, four
major
categories were used. The first is Traditional Top-Down
Narrative, which has
all stories that used the vertical flow technique where news and
events are
reported from the perspective of government officials and other
authoritative
sources. The second category is Stereotype, which has
oversimplified clichéd
images of China and Africa. Constructive Journalism is the
third category and it
22. has four narratives;
✓
Solution
: These are stories that discuss issues and proffer solutions from
the perspective of the people in a particular situation.
✓ Context: These are stories that are based on holistic coverage
of issues by
offering background and context.
✓ Hero: Stories that focus on people who overcame numerous
obstacles to
change their own circumstances and those of the people around
them.
✓ Accomplishment: Accomplishment narrative shows collective
achieve-
ments and interrogates whether lessons were learned from
problems that
might be life-changing.
The final category others included all stories falling outside the
23. main three
categories.
findingS
This section will focus on how the media have defined China
and Africa in a
global media environment where there are limited boundaries.
Salient iSSueS on China and afriCa
The selection of what is news is critical in focusing the
attention of the intended
readers and audiences on particular events and issues. Previous
studies have
shown the penchant for the bizarre or out of the ordinary when
reporting on
Africa and other developing countries. It was therefore worth
exploring the
issues that were considered salient in telling the stories of
China and Africa
from award-winning news reports from Wits and Tshinghua
universities.
Below is a graph that summarizes the salient issues.
24. The issue with the highest frequency for the Wits University
China-Africa
reporting project was resources with a frequency of (29.42%),
which contrast-
ingly has the lowest frequency for Tshinghua University-
selected stories. The
second highest frequency for Wits University is immigration
(23.53%) and,
interestingly, this was not covered at in the Tshinghua
University stories. The
third highest frequency (11.76%) has stories in the others
category, which
included stories on such issues as wildlife conservation, while
economy had
the fourth highest frequency (11.76). On the other hand, the
Tshinghua
University award-winning stories mainly focused on
development (32.35%)
and health (29.41%), which contrastingly had the lowest
coverage of 5.88%
each in the stories selected by Wits University. The other
salient issues for
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Tshinghua University award-winning stories are economy and
diplomacy,
with frequencies of 14.70% each.
Significant to note from all the issues covered is the absence of
issues such
as war, poverty and disasters that have in the past been the
major issues when
both international and Chinese media reported on Africa. This
shift suggests a
deliberate attempt to showcase issues that have in the past have
been under-
reported on China, Africa and their relationship. Another
significant observa-
tion from the data is the glaring differences between the two
universities in
terms of salience of issues. The differences in terms of salience
placed over
26. issues by the two universities are significant to note. While
there is no single
factor that can explain these differences, it could also be
attributed to the
nature of sponsorship. The Tshinghua University reporting
project is spon-
sored by the Gates Foundation while the Wits China-Africa
reporting project
is sponsored by the Open Society Foundation.
narrative teChniqueS uSed in StorieS on China and afriCa
After a detailed analysis of the issues covered in the selected
stories, it was
therefore worth exploring the techniques used to narrate the
issues. The graph
below explains the techniques using four categories, namely,
exploring exist-
ing stereotypes; exploring new controversies; non-controversial
but significant
to China-Africa; and others that did not fit into any of the
previous categories.
The majority of the Wits China-Africa reporting project stories
explored
27. new controversial issues in the China-Africa relationship
(47.06. %). Examples
of these types of stories include ‘Chinese ivory smugglers in
Africa’; ‘Sweltering
heat, golden dreams: Chinese galamsey in Ghana’ and ‘Chinese
herbal medi-
cine death sentence in Uganda’. Non-controversial issues have
the second
highest frequency (41.18%) while stories exploring existing
stereotypes and
offered new light had a frequency of 5.88% and those that
reinforced existing
Figure 1: Range of issues covered in the stories selected by
Wits and Tshinghua universities.
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Zhang Yanqiu | Simon Matingwina
30 Journal of African Media Studies
28. Figure 3: Journalistic approaches evident in the stories selected
by Wits and Tshinghua universities.
Figure 2: Narrative techniques used to tell stories by Wits and
Tshinghua universities.
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stereotypes also had a frequency of 5.88%. In contrast,
Tshinghua University-
selected stories placed emphasis on exploring existing
stereotypes (50%). The
stories with the second highest frequency explored non-
controversial issues
(35.30%). Stories exploring new controversies have 8.82%
frequency while
stories backing existing stereotypes have the least frequency of
5.88%.
29. emerging journaliStiC approaCheS in StorieS on China and
afriCa
How the stories of China and Africa are told is an important
consideration in
an inquiry on journalistic approaches to explore a better
approach to report on
China and Africa. All the stories were therefore put to the test
using four criteria
for narratives. Figure 3 above is a graph with the result.
The findings show that the large majority of the stories from the
two
universities have elements of constructive journalism, with
Tshinghua having
a higher frequency of 97.06 per cent, while Wits has 82.36 per
cent of the
stories using elements of constructive journalism. The Table
below details the
elements of constructive journalism used.
From the four constructive journalism elements, context was
mostly used
in the Wits University-selected stories (52.94%). It can be noted
30. that the tech-
nique was mostly used in stories that explored new
controversies, thus allow-
ing for story telling from a more holistic perspective. An
example is the story
‘Chinese companies going for gold in Zambia’. The story
explores the issue
of gold mining from different perspectives, thus bringing out
issues such as
conflict between workers and Chinese employers and the
resolution processes,
environmental damage concerns and efforts made by the new
Chinese mine
owners. In the end, the story also dispels the rumours that
Chinese workers
sent to Africa were prisoners by providing background on how
the rumour
started and then allowing locals who have worked with Chinese
to narrate
their own experiences. Other stories that use the context
narrative include
‘Chinese ivory smugglers in Africa’; ‘Sweltering heat, golden
dreams: Chinese
galamsey in Ghana’ and ‘Chinese herbal medicine death
sentence in Uganda’.
31. In all these stories, context is used to give background to
controversial issues
such as ivory smuggling, artisanal gold mining in Ghana and
illegal traders
of fake Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM). Other elements of
construc-
tive journalism used in the Wits University stories are solution
(17.66%) and
accomplishment (11.76%).
On the other hand, the Tshinghua University award-winning
stories
mostly employed solution narratives (49.05%), such as ‘China
develops
ark for vaccine storage’ and ‘Egypt seeks economic revival in
its predica-
Table 1: Constructive journalism elements used in the stories on
China and Africa.
Constructive
journalism
Wits frequency (%) Tshinghua frequency (%)