Could Chinese News Channels Have a Future in Latin America?

Abstract

China’s global media expansion has entailed the creation of a series of multilingual media outlets targeting different regions of the world. With Latin America being one of them, Spanish has arisen as a key language within China’s international media strategy. Nevertheless, as the region is also targeted by other competitors from Western countries and beyond, China faces serious challenges in both trying to convey its message and earning the approval and acceptance of audiences. By looking at how Latin American viewers perceive CCTV’s Spanish language channel (rebranded in 2016 as CGTN), compared to Russia’s RT and Iran’s HispanTV, this article seeks to evaluate what factors may be undermining the effectiveness of China’s international media strategy in this particular region and how this affects its soft power ambitions. This study is based on a series of focus groups conducted in Mexico and Argentina between September and October 2016, whereby participants were shown video excerpts from these broadcasters and encouraged to discuss an array of different topics. This paper shows that besides lagging behind in terms of viewership, CCTV-E faces multiple challenges such as changes in news consumption patterns, scarce availability and accessibility across Latin America, and issues of credibility and trust in the media. As CCTV-E faces competition from other broadcasters, its survival depends on how well it can align its services with the audiences’ needs and preferences, such as perceived objectivity and impartiality.

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