Creative Industries in China: Art, Design and Media
... This role is especially prominent in the context of regional development, where cultural organizations can stimulate local economies, create employment opportunities, and promote tourism (Scott, 2000). In China, where cultural heritage and contemporary artistic endeavors are deeply intertwined, the strategic management of arts and culture is seen as a key component of regional economic strategies (Keane, 2013). ...
... Cultural events such as art festivals and exhibitions serve as major draws for tourists, creating a ripple effect that benefits local businesses, from hotels to restaurants. In China, cities like Beijing and Shanghai have harnessed their rich cultural assets to become major international cultural hubs, contributing significantly to their economic prosperity (Keane, 2013). ...
... These findings are consistent with previous studies that suggest cultural organizations act as catalysts for economic development, particularly in urban settings where tourism is closely linked to cultural activities (Keane, 2013). In cities like Shanghai and Shenzhen, the establishment of cultural districts has also been shown to enhance the city's reputation, attracting both tourists and investors, thereby boosting regional growth. ...
This study explores the role of arts management in regional economic development within major Chinese cities, including Beijing, Shanghai, and Shenzhen. Cultural organizations—such as museums, theaters, and galleries—contribute significantly to local economies through tourism, job creation, and the enhancement of cultural branding. Using a qualitative approach, 18 semi-structured interviews with arts managers and policymakers selected based on their influential roles in cultural organizations across these cities. The interviews were analyzed using thematic analysis, which identified key themes including the economic impact of cultural organizations, the influence of government policies, challenges in arts management, and the role of cultural tourism in fostering regional growth. The findings reveal that while government policies play a pivotal role in supporting cultural organizations, providing crucial funding, tax incentives, and infrastructure development, concerns remain about the long-term sustainability of funding due to shifting political and economic priorities. Additionally, arts managers face challenges related to balancing artistic goals with financial viability, particularly as the sector becomes increasingly competitive and technology-dependent. Key challenges identified include securing stable funding sources, adapting to digital technologies, talent retention, and maintaining artistic integrity amid commercial pressures. The study highlights the need for diversified funding models such as public-private partnerships and alternative revenue streams and suggests further exploration into the role of smaller cultural organizations in rural regions to promote inclusive regional development. Practical recommendations include developing strategies to enhance financial sustainability, investing in digital capabilities, and formulating policies that provide long-term support for the cultural sector. Overall, the research contributes to a better understanding of how effective arts management can drive regional economic development and offers practical recommendations for strengthening the sustainability of China’s cultural sector.
... Within this sector in China there are currently three main categories: art, design, and media (Keane, 2013). The art facet of the field deals with economic value that can be created through the arts; design includes technology design such as software and speaks to innovation in industry, creative clusters, and the creative class; and media is an area that encompasses the means of communication and attendant platforms. ...
... Conservative politics, fractures between urban and rural society's access to contemporary art, and ideological frameworks all were challenges to contemporary art's development (Lü, 2014). Nevertheless, the art market prospered as a result of economic openness, and Chinese artists gained international fame in the early 2000s (Elzen, 2008;Keane, 2013). Private art museums, born as a solution, tried to find their identity and function as a part of the creative economy. ...
... Since the early 2000s, China's interest in the creative industries has escalated as it focuses on upgrading worldwide demand from inexpensive goods to higher-cost products and services (O'Connor and Gu, 2006;Keane, 2013). This opportunity is a "policy window" for the creative industries, wherein creative clusters are viewed as valuable for the development of the economy. ...
... As one of the most rapidly expanding creative and digital marketplaces worldwide, China has experienced a significant development in Internet industries, and accordingly, many academic studies have been conducted on different creative and digital industry sectors in China (Chow 2017;Fung 2016a;Hesmondhalgh and Baker 2011;Keane 2013;Lin 2019aLin , 2019bWen 2017). Since its Reform and Opening in 1978, particularly since 2001, when China joined the WTO (World Trade Organization), China has witnessed an increasingly rapid development of the creative and digital industries, which was seen as fundamental for economic development, and China's soft power (Keane 2013;Wen 2017). ...
... As one of the most rapidly expanding creative and digital marketplaces worldwide, China has experienced a significant development in Internet industries, and accordingly, many academic studies have been conducted on different creative and digital industry sectors in China (Chow 2017;Fung 2016a;Hesmondhalgh and Baker 2011;Keane 2013;Lin 2019aLin , 2019bWen 2017). Since its Reform and Opening in 1978, particularly since 2001, when China joined the WTO (World Trade Organization), China has witnessed an increasingly rapid development of the creative and digital industries, which was seen as fundamental for economic development, and China's soft power (Keane 2013;Wen 2017). In particular, the digital platforms at the epicenter of China's prosperous digital economy, are regarded as a crucial part of the "Chinese Dream" of national rejuvenation (Keane 2016;Keane and Chen 2017;Wang and Lobato 2019), and China's outward-bound strategy that underpins China's ambitions of becoming a global digital power as a "digital empire in the making" (Keane and Yu 2019, 4624). ...
... Second, previous studies on platformization mainly draw from engineering, management, business, and economics, and may not adequately address the "State question" (Wang 2001, 36) during the platformization. This article suggested that the development of digital platforms in China is always linked to the State (Keane 2013(Keane , 2016Keane and Chen 2017;Wen 2017), especially its "soft power competition" in Asia and the global world (Sullivan 2014, 530). Therefore, this article demonstrated the specter of the state haunts the platformization of Chinese society, specifically the platformization of creative video commercialization. ...
With a special focus on the commercialization of creative videos, this article explores the research question of how digital platforms’ affordances simultaneously allow and constrain video producers’ commercialization activities in the platform era. This study adopts a case study design that focuses on the Chinese digital video producer Zheng Yun, founder of Zheng Yun Studio, using ethnographic participant observations and in-depth interviews. It explains how creative producers such as Zheng Yun struggle to survive in the context of intensified platformization and how they benefit from the digital platforms by employing various commercialization mechanisms, including the Revenue Sharing Program (RSP), Embedded Product Placement (EPP), Franchise Chains, Agent-commission, and Crowd-funding. This research also demonstrates the asymmetrical power relationships between platforms and video producers, which prompt us to rethink the political nature of platforms and the diversified nature of platformization in the digital platform age.
... This difference can be reflected in the media industry. Culture has become so lucrative in the Chinese media field in recent years that it has led many people to invest in the field of art and cultural media phalanx [9]. In media products, producers consider the public's favorite direction. ...
... These jobs can be added to large new media companies like TV and film. Moreover, such companies need skillful aesthetic talents to help create more excellent works [9]. According to Chinese culture, media development, art, and culture have always been controversial topics, while people produced media products as traditional Chinese culture can influence politics and the market. ...
... Although CI is a freely used concept in the policy area in Turkey, CI is far from turning into a policy area. It should be stated that in terms of Turkey's cultural policies or development goals, there is no comprehensive approach similar to China's (Keane, 2013) or South Korea's (Binark, 2019) holistic perspective, which designs CI as a tool to spread soft power to the world. Unlike countries such as the UK (Higgs et al, 2008), Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Taiwan, South Korea and Singapore (Flew, 2005) and China (Keane, 2013), which incorporate CI into their national innovation strategies, CI policies in Turkey seem to be less specific and less coordinated. ...
... It should be stated that in terms of Turkey's cultural policies or development goals, there is no comprehensive approach similar to China's (Keane, 2013) or South Korea's (Binark, 2019) holistic perspective, which designs CI as a tool to spread soft power to the world. Unlike countries such as the UK (Higgs et al, 2008), Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Taiwan, South Korea and Singapore (Flew, 2005) and China (Keane, 2013), which incorporate CI into their national innovation strategies, CI policies in Turkey seem to be less specific and less coordinated. ...
The Creative Industries [CI] have become an increasingly popular political and academic discussion topic in the world over the past three decades. In Turkey, it is a concept that has come to the fore recently and is the subject of relatively few academic publications. Although it is noteworthy that the studies on the subject in Turkey have started to enrich, especially in the last five years, it is quite optimistic to say that a solid discussion ground has been established. In the field of public policy, there are many efforts that explicitly or implicitly refer to the idea of CI. On the other hand, it seems that CI are not defined as a holistic and coordinated policy area. In the light of the presumption that the potential changes created by CI, especially its social effects, are handled without questioning, it can be stated that the relations of unique cultural values to sectors have become complicated. This study is a compilation made in order to lay the groundwork for the realization of original studies on the creative sectors, to add dimension to the CI discussion and to draw attention to policymaking on this issue.
... The state not only wants to "profit" from information and culture, but also seeks to control and shape it. Demonstrated by many studies on Chinese media (Keane, 2013;Lin, 2019;Sun, 2010), Chinese authorities have been eager to promote its national imagery to wield Chinese "soft power" 2 on the global stage on the one hand, while they expect a conforming culture that ensures social stability and national unity on the other. These two threads of national discourse function as the fundamental baselines that all media platforms and creators must comply with in their everyday practice. ...
... 2. Coined by Nye (1990), soft power has been a popular term in international diplomacy, and cultural export has been touted as its key element. This term was embraced by the Chinese government in the early 2000s and soft power became one of the prime objectives of developing the cultural economythrough the "going-out of Chinese culture" (中国文化走出去 zhongguo wenhua zouchuqu; Keane, 2013 ...
This chapter introduces the specificities of the Chinese wanghong economy and its implications for the existing spatial relationships in Chinese contemporary society. Though not immune to the state’s cultural censorship and regulation, the wanghong industry fits into the Party State’s agenda of restructuring the economy and boosting employment. The well-established ICT infrastructure propels the booming platform economy, which together facilitate a maximum incorporation of individual creativities and labour from disparate social sites into the network of wanghong economy. While not necessarily promising a secure career and life for creators, this mixed reality of empowering and precarity contributes to a kaleidoscopic landscape of wanghong culture. The vernacular aesthetics underscore the “unlikeliness” of wanghong culture, which may often be deemed as “inadequate”, “unfulfilling” and even “unacceptable” in the context of the Chinese legacy screen culture and the offline social locations. The network effects of wanghong economy thus transform the local space of places into “the space of flows”, in which local lives, identities and values all become potential sources for creativity and monetization of the wanghong production. The unlikely aesthetics of wanghong culture become desirable to creators and their online communities, serving as an imagined alternative to the tedious/normative everyday work and identities in the offline places.
... China has been offering advertising art design courses, especially for jobs such as graphic designer, digital marketing and multimedia producer. (Keane, 2013). This course generally encompasses acquiring the technical skills needed to work in Adobe Creative Suite with insights into market trends and client demands. ...
Background: Introducing feminist pedagogy and digital innovation in advertising art design into programs is a key factor in making creators socially responsible. However, China's rigid curricula for higher vocational education and prevailing cultural conservatism do not aid the implementation of feminist education practices. Aim: To understand how feminist pedagogy can be integrated with digital innovation in Chinese higher vocational and technical education's advertising art design program. Method: A survey method with 350 participants from students with advertising art design majors was included. Findings: Relatively low levels of feminist innovation and ideology are reported with relative progress in educational theories and theory application teaching. The study showed how feminist pedagogy improves students' competencies, indirectly, to produce more inclusive and gender-sensitive content in digital advertising, denoted as IGSDA competence. These competencies include critical thinking, creative confidence, and teamwork. However, a resistive syllabus, lack of technical expertise, and the broader cultural and political resistance form significant barriers to integrating the process. Conclusion: The findings highlight that feminist pedagogy offers the dual potential of tackling gender sensitivity while providing important professional skills. Practical implications include curriculum change, faculty training, and the use of digital tools to bridge the gap between the theories of feminist pedagogy. Despite limitations such as reliance on survey data and statistical analysis, it laid the foundation for future studies for understanding the long-term effects of feminist pedagogy on student outcomes and industry practices.
... This genre, which combines traditional Chinese art techniques with modern materials and innovative methods, reflects a unique blend of cultural heritage and contemporary creativity. The evolution of mixed media art in China has been shaped by various historical, social, and political factors, leading to a rich diversity of expressions and interpretations that resonate with both local and international audiences (Gladston, 2014;Keane, 2013;Mirra, 2022). The study of material usage, aesthetic language, and spiritual orientation in contemporary Chinese mixed media art is essential for understanding how these elements contribute to the overall connotation and meaning of the artworks. ...
... The link between heritage and creativity economy was not immediate, 2 yet today plays a growing role (Keane, 2013;Keane, 2016;Galloway and Dunlop, 2007;Li, 2011;Fung, 2017). A wealth of discourses and practices around creative entrepreneurship, economies and heritage innovation today converge in what has been summarised as the 'creative or orange economy seeking to unleash the productive potential of heritage, culture and creativity' (Buitrago Restrepo and Duque Márquez, 2013). ...
Heritage processes are today increasingly entangled with multiple forms and discourses of creativity. Connections between creativity and heritage form part of a new consensual authorised discourse, where creativity and (heritage) entrepreneurship are projected as mutually beneficial in a win-win scenario, while co-existing with ever-more visible practices of destruction and loss. Challenging the celebratory narrative, the article unpacks the less visible political, economic, cultural and social processes underpinning the heritage–creativity nexus. This is necessary in order to confront and analyse the domination of space, place and history in the context of depoliticised neoliberal forms of governance. Juxtaposing the contradictions of authorised heritage discourse within the hegemonic politics and profitability in the neoliberal creative economy, we propose a critical anthropological approach centred around the decreativity of contemporary practice.
... Li, 2021;Tomasic, 2023). The design principles of Jin Opera's cultural and creative products contain practical design concepts for life, emotional design strategies based on consumer demand, the law of formal beauty that highlights aesthetic value, and artistic symbol construction inheriting cultural connotations (Han & Zhang, 2023;Keane, 2013) with the design of the Jin Opera cultural and creative products as the center. This innovation is hoped to promote the better continuation and development of Jin Opera culture in the new era. ...
Jin opera is one of the well-known local operas in China, commonly known as Shanxi opera. It is also known as Zhongluo opera because it originated in central Shanxi. Jin opera has a long history of culture, and its costumes and patterns are unique visual elements of totem culture. It is to promote the culture of Jin opera and to integrate and develop the culture of Jin opera into public life. Based on the four principles of practicality, emotionality, formal beauty, and artistry of Jin opera, cultural and creative products were proposed by Jin opera scholar Ren Nanan as the design concept to analyze and reorganize the colors and patterns of Jin opera costumes. By analyzing and applying the design principles and concepts of Jin opera costume culture, we analyze the design and feasibility of cultural and creative products of Jin opera culture from three aspects: color, pattern, and program rules, and provide ideas and concepts for the design of cultural and creative products of Jin opera culture, so that its culture can be accepted and loved by young people. Jin opera is one of the most precious traditional arts in China. With the emphasis on cultural inheritance, the role of cultural and creative design is receiving increasing attention, and the artistic and creative design incorporating visual elements of Jin Opera will become increasingly sophisticated.
... At the same time, China was being integrated into the world economy and therefore needed "cultural security" and "soft power" (Keane 2013). After joining the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2001, China needed to build a more robust national media culture to successfully compete with foreign media; to that end, the government more actively pursued the promotion of China's cultural industries, a key component of cultural reforms in the 2000s. ...
This essay surveys the scholarship on Chinese cultural politics in the reform era and argues that popular culture is a crucial realm where politics is manifested, shaped, and challenged. Based on an overview of this literature, this essay finds that Chinese popular culture remains subversive despite evolving political rule and changing socioeconomic structures. Meanwhile, the state has kept up with popular culture and managed to dominate various cultural spaces ranging from television, film, literature, music, and comedy, to celebrities and public discussions on morality. The studies reviewed here collectively illustrate a fragmented yet vigorous popular culture that actively responds to changing political and socioeconomic conditions, challenging while also reinforcing how political power is received at the grassroots level. To explain the simultaneous advancement of state control over popular culture and the cultural creativity in popular expression, this essay proposes a framework centered on authority to capture and forecast the dynamics of power struggles in popular culture. To create, compete for, and manifest authority is a key mechanism of cultural power, and it can reveal the contentions among political, market, and traditional cultural forces.
... Working in tandem with the General Administration of Sport, the Ministry of Culture launched a series of policies to address the objectives of 'transformation' and 'upgrading.' These policies are key to China becoming a cultural and industrial force, combating the 'wolves from the west' and radiating China's cultural power to the world (Keane 2013). ...
The field of electronic sports (eSports) is thriving worldwide but has received limited attention as a cultural and creative industry (CCI). This study is the first to employ three layers (productivity, robustness, and niche creation) of the business ecosystem (BE) to systematically examine the flourishing eSports sector and its development as a CCI-BE. It also maps out the dynamic and emerging stakeholders that have contributed to the eSports ecosystem. We conducted content analysis combined with observations, fifty interviews with elite stakeholders, and analysis of financial and investment data. We found that the development of eSports as a CCI-BE reflects great potential and precarity. First, the business agenda of the media conglomerate Tencent aligns with the ‘cultural confidence’ slogan proposed by the government, thus ensuring the robustness and stability of the eSports ecosystem. Second, municipal governments, local real estate developers, and eSports tournaments are increasingly interconnected and their contemporary business models and innovation activities in the eSports industry have co-evolved. Third, the role of real estate developers remains nascent without the ability to coordinate and co-evolve with the eSports value chain. eSports may provide a novel converging territory for contemporary cultural and creative industries/traits in the Chinese digital society.
... Despite the fact that the development of the creative industries follows a unique trajectory for emerging markets, there is little information on the topic of creative industries. Some Asian countries, such as Korea, Singapore, and China, have long been driving the development of the creative industry (Keane, 2013). In addition, developing countries such as Kazakhstan are also interested in developing the creative sector of the economy. ...
The creative industries sector is snowballing, and many developing countries see it as a tool for national and local development. Given the regional specificity, political narratives adopted in developed countries may not apply in economies under transition. This paper aims to evaluate the current state of creative business in emerging countries such as Kazakhstan. Adopting the design of a qualitative method, 34 semi-structured interviews were conducted with entrepreneurs and owners of small and medium-sized businesses in Kazakhstan’s creative industries. The Nvivo 10 qualitative data analysis software was used for processing the data. The interviews help to understand better the factors affecting the development of the creative industry. In general, results indicate insufficient support from government agencies, lack of accessible resources to support entrepreneurs (65% of respondents used their capital, while 17% of them were forced to apply for loans from a bank), information availability, and skills shortage. Shortage of skills is also related to the creative brain drain in Kazakhstan. One of the main problems is access to materials and technology since most of the resources are foreign-made and imported. AcknowledgmentThe authors appreciate the grant funding for young scientists Scientific and (or) in the years 2020–2022 the MES science project number AR08052483 “Creative Industries: methodological aspects of classification and quantitative measurements in the Republic of Kazakhstan” in the framework of the budget program 217 “Development of science”.
... Some scholars also consider these shows as "a symbolic subversion of state ideology" that simultaneously reinforce "the concentration of symbolic power in the hands of media" (Meng, 2009;Zhao, 2018). Commercial experimentation with these shows was quickly contained by the state, as the case of Super Voice Girl, Party officials and state media criticized this show as "the vulgar inclination of entertainment programs" (Miao, 2011: 101), it destroyed the pedagogical role of media (Keane, 2013). Oppositely, officials started to encourage celebrity shows that portray the traditional values. ...
This study explores the discursive construction of Chinese women in the Chinese reality show Sisters Who Make Waves, with a special focus on the discursive shifts and their relevance to the wider discourse of and about Chinese women. The analysis is carried out on two levels: the discursive construction of Chinese women in the said reality show and its recontextualisation across other discourses including in the public sphere and semi-private opinions of Chinese women.
This research discusses the discursive construction of Chinese women in the Chinese media field and the discrepancy between “top-down” and “bottom-up” discourse. The project uses a multi-layer theoretical framework situated in media and society, gender and media representation, celebrity culture and digital labour to explore the discursive construction of Chinese women. The study applies to the reality show as the primary context, media perceptions as the recontextualising context, interviews with female employees in the Chinese internet industry as the secondary context. In order to investigate the arguments and discursive strategies in different contexts, this study employs a multilevel model of the Discourse-Historical Approach (DHA) in Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA).
The findings discover that the said reality show focuses on the topos of age and the topos of beauty. These two main topoi cause different representations of social actors in Chinese media perceptions. As the representatives of female digital labour, the female employees in the Chinese internet industry construct three discursive strategies of self and relate their self-perception to those of other women. Furthermore, the study implies the discursive shifts in the discourse on Chinese women. This thesis contributes to understanding the discursive construction of women in the Chinese context, particularly the media and gender representations in the Chinese hybrid media system. In addition, this study stands outside the Western world and expands the understanding of the topic in a non-western setting.
... However, it would be an oversimplification to suggest that such principles have become a dominant force in guiding China's museum practice or wider approach to international exchange within the cultural industries. The complex relationship between China's policy networks and the market have created a party-controlled framework that maintains a tight grip on the production of cultural products (see Chang 2009;Keane and Chen 2019;Keane and Zhao 2014;Keane 2013). Conversely, within this framework there exists a local narrative that allows for state authorities at the provincial or district level to cultivate entrepreneurial activities, implementing centrally driven agendas based upon their own loose interpretation of government policies (Keane 2001; Shelach-Lavi 2019; White and Xu 2012). ...
The transition from a centrally planned economy to a market economy with socialist characteristics has had a profound effect on China's cultural industries. This paper adopts a case study approach to illustrate the challenges that have shaped the administration of public museums as a consequence of China's economic reforms. By drawing upon an example of cross-cultural collaboration between Western cultural institutions and China's Nanjing Museum (南京博物院: nanjing bowuyuan), we uncover the tensions that exist between China's cultural policy preferences and the encroaching values of the market economy. In doing so, this article contributes towards a richer exposition of the local practices guiding cultural management, reflecting the broader challenges endemic among China's cultural industries. Primarily, we seek to illustrate how market imperatives have influenced local practices, creating a context unique to China that deviates from the central tenets of neoliberal development and market management. [access the article at https://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/SK93ICMMHSWFDVA782PK/full?target=10.1080/10286632.2022.2045978]
... This will enable the goal of reinterpreting the culture of the past in a contemporary way, thus preserving its regional characteristics and developing a human-oriented cultural industry through experience based on the foundation of the Chinese humanities and humanistic ideology. As Keane (2013) indicated, this can be seen as the result of continuous efforts for change by the public officials who put the people first. They took risks, changed their management style, and emphasized on innovative technology and a human-friendly ideology, which is why various Chinese digital/emotional contents are gradually leading in terms of being widespread socially. ...
China’s cultural policy has shifted from a government-driven direction to a model centered on marketization development model. The economic value of culture has come to be seen as the main engine of growth for national development; moreover, cultural and creative industries (CCIs) have been strategically fostered. Here, in place of a unilateral top-down method imposed by the government, a marketization development model has been promoted to actively accommodate the policy discourse presented by cultural creators/consumers. China’s CCI policy discourse may indicate the policy direction necessary to develop itself into a cultural powerhouse. In this study, policy discourse is collected and analyzed for keywords of China’s CCIs from 2006 to 2020. Text mining and network analysis were performed, and the main results are as follows. First, it was found that China’s CCI policy discourse has been gaining traction; its centers appear to be found within large cities with rich cultural infrastructure, where major cultural projects are discovered and promoted, and Chinese culture is being globalized. Second, the items/contents of the Chinese CCIs are diversifying and developing into a human-friendly Chinese-style cultural and creative industry model that values experience. This should be noted to help guide the future direction of China’s cultural policy. Finally, it is necessary to adjust industrial concentrations and regional development imbalances because of the acceleration of industrial clusters in CCIs.
... Given the apparent lack of effectiveness of the various state-led initiatives when it comes to the dissemination of Chinese audiovisual media, it is somewhat surprising that so little attention has been paid, in the available literature, to the part that translation may play in the internationalization of Chinese audiovisual productions, with the majority of debates focusing on wider issues such as the film and television industries at large (Keane 2013(Keane , 2015, the financial repercussions and box office successes of Chinese productions abroad, as well as the sociocultural and political implications derived from such transnational exchanges (Su 2016;Keane 2019;Rosen 2020). This paper attempts to redress the balance by taking a closer look at the pivotal role of translation as an essential activity at the core of any internationalization strategy. ...
With the rapid development of digitization and the emergence of social networks and streaming platforms, audiovisual translation (AVT) has become one of the most prolific expressions of global communication in today’s society, able to overcome linguistic barriers when disseminating culture across the world. While audiovisual productions originally shot in English seem to be able to take full advantage of this situation, China’s domestic programs frequently encounter more challenges to make it overseas. Adopting a primarily translational approach, this paper borrows the concept of “cultural discount,” coined by Hoskins and Mirus (1988), to capture the notion that audiovisual productions are rooted in one culture and, therefore, may have diminished appeal among viewers from other communities. The study holds that the degree of cultural discount audiovisual productions may encounter when exported depends on numerous factors, which are explored through examples of recently localized films and TV series of Chinese origin.
... Responding to the aforementioned historical nihilism, a historical analysis will explain why the proprietary model did not work as expected in China. In the Maoist socialist China (1949China ( -1978, music and other cultural affairs (wenhua shiye) were regarded as created and owned collectively by the people with a prominent political role (Keane, 2013). The music scene is an extreme case during the cultural revolution (1966)(1967)(1968)(1969)(1970)(1971)(1972)(1973)(1974)(1975)(1976) when other genres of music were regarded as spiritual pollution and were largely banned except Yangban Xi, model operas. ...
Following the third copyright law amendment in China, this paper offers a timely contribution to the debates on the shifting policy, governance and industry landscape of the Chinese music industry. This paper conducts a historical and socio-legal analysis of the development of Chinese copyright law with regards to the music industry and argues that the Chinese digital music industry has developed to a stage where three business models collide, namely the cultural adaptation model, the renegade model and the platform ecosystem model. This paper draws on interdisciplinary literature and discourses from legal studies, business studies and cultural studies and provide new evidence of the much neglected autonomous development of Chinese copyright law on top of foreign pressure and the desired reforms to further integrate into the global market economy.
... Creativity has become an important indicator of modernity and national competitiveness in China and it now finds its way into popular discourse (de Kloet et al., 2019). The discourse of creativity arose in the west in the 1950s in the areas of psychology and education (see Keane, 2013). It was not until the late 1990s that it entered into policy discourse. ...
Entrepreneurs have become the driving force of China’s economy over the past few decades. With a rapid surge in the growth of digital platforms, and the success of China’s platforms outside China, the aspiration to be entrepreneurial is recognized and celebrated. Increasingly, women are benefitting from this entrepreneurial fever. However, behind the increasing number of emerging women digital entrepreneurs, is the struggle to gain recognition. Drawing on cases studies of female digital startups, the article investigates some of the dilemmas faced when women strive to develop entrepreneurial identities. The article problematizes distinctions between the entrepreneur in a general sense, the creative entrepreneur, and female creative entrepreneurs. Whereas an entrepreneur in China is often conflated with a business owner, the identity of the creative entrepreneur is more precarious and unstable. The article finds that besides the difficulty to sustain a creative-based entrepreneurial identity, the hyper-competitive and masculinist fields of digital entrepreneurship and technical fields, combined with traditional gender roles and family responsibility, results in a devaluation of female entrepreneurship.
... Mas se os dados são bem elucidativos em países economicamente mais desenvolvidos, eles são-no também no caso da China (Keane, 2013), onde existe uma evidente concordância e simultaneidade entre o crescimento económico global e o crescimento das exportações de bens culturais. De acordo com dados fornecidos pela Conferência das Nações Unidas sobre Comércio e Desenvolvimento (UNCTAD), em 2002 o volume de exportações de produtos culturais provenientes da China cifrava-se nos 32 mil milhões de dólares e, passados seis anos, ultrapassa a marca dos 84 mil milhões de dólares (a preços constantes) (United Nations, 2008). ...
Resumo O artigo propõe-se descrever e debater as propriedades constitutivas do campo social e económico das indústrias criativas. Situado nos interstícios entre a produção de bens e serviços e os universos simbólicos, o campo das indústrias criativas repercute um aproveitamento económico massivo das potencialidades derivadas da produção simbólica propriamente dita. Como se discutirá no artigo, daqui deriva um efeito replicador de criatividade a outros sectores da atividade económica, com benefícios multiplicadores no plano do crescimento económico, da criação de emprego e da própria integração económica internacional, mais especificamente com sua inserção nas redes de comércio internacional. A análise de dados nacionais e internacionais procura definir os traços macroeconómicos evidenciados anteriormente, complementada por uma discussão analítica final acerca de algumas das propriedades socioeconómicas deste sector.
... • Fostering collaboration and amalgamation strategies between local production companies to leverage their position to negotiate access to capital or dissemination deals. This is a strategy already fostered by the government in China (see Keane 2013). • Engaging more in international co-ventures and distribution deals with other independent players (as opposed to major corporations) that offer access to financial pools and markets from other regions without compromising control over revenue. ...
... Media in the PRC is shaped by an elaborate legal and regulated network run by organizations such as the Central Publicity Department, the Cyberspace Administration of China, the Ministry of Culture, and the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television (SAPPRFT). Through this network, the government seeks to promote 'core socialist values' as politically correct (Keane 2013) and to consolidate a 'positive energy' (正能量) policy. In June 2017, SAPPRFT issued the 'General Rules for Auditing Online Audio-Visual Programs', under which cultural products in China are evaluated by state bodiesand in some contexts, censoredrather than by commercial or other criteria (Sohu, 30 June 2017). ...
The online reality show The Rap of China has become ingrained in Chinese popular culture. However, since 18 January 2018, the hip-hop subculture in China has been censored by the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television. This study aims to analyse the cultural resonance of Chinese hip-hop, and to identify how hip-hop reflects the changing contours of ideology in Chinese digital youth culture. The study applies critical discourse analysis to lyrics of rap songs performed on The Rap of China by the show’s co-champions: PG-One and Gai; it conducts 52 semi-structured interviews with audience members to investigate how they interpret these lyrics, and presents a comparative analysis of PG-One’s and Gai’s raps on that basis. The findings suggest that Chinese hip-hop culture has its roots in the hybridized ‘real’ which is a globalized hybrid cultural product that modifies the Western genre of hip-hop with distinct Chinese notions of conflicting authenticity, centred around the representations of ‘jianghu flow’ with loyalty, struggle, and compromise.
The question of whether China can become a creative nation has been a topic of much debate in academic circles. The Chinese government has expressed its belief that China can develop a unique form of creativity to move the country from the periphery to the center of the global creative ecosystem. This perspective has led to a series of state-led trials and experiments, including the adoption of cultural and creative industries, creative clusters and cities, and the recent maker movement. This paper utilizes the center-periphery theory to analyze the emergence, development, and evolution of China’s maker movement, aiming to revisit the creativity issues in contemporary China. Based on three years of ethnographic research, the paper unpacks the maker movement at three interrelated levels: individual, organizational, and urban. Empirical data indicates that the transformation of China’s maker movement is characterized by commodification, formalization, and infrastructuralization processes. The tension between growth and development, and stability and control has turned the once grassroots maker movement into a contested creative hybrid. This paper challenges the conventional view that China is resistant to change and incapable of creativity due to institutional and ideological influences. It demonstrates how an alternative mode of creativity can emerge outside global creative centers and proposes a new perspective on China’s potential to become a creative nation.
This paper explores how photogrammetry and free, open-source software can be used to sustainably develop museum sector capacity to digitize and publish Vietnam’s cultural heritage online. This approach was developed and applied during a digitization project as a solution to overcome challenges experienced in Vietnam concerning a lack of human, technical and financial resources. This paper draws on findings from a co-designed action research project between RMIT University Vietnam (RMIT) and the Vietnamese Women’s Museum (VWM) that developed an approach to create 3D (3 Dimensional) digital artifacts of their Betel Nut Collection using free, open-source software and applying the technique of photogrammetry. The aim was to co-design and co-produce a sustainable solution focused on readily available and easy-to-use digital technologies. However, not all artifacts could be digitized using this method, which sheds light on the challenges and opportunities of digitizing cultural heritage in the Global South. Overall, this sustainable approach can be applied by other museums and cultural institutions and can be a way to empower museums in the Global South to digitize and digitally display cultural heritage artifacts.
This chapter delves into the linkages between industry development and urban regeneration programmes or models. In many projects in China and elsewhere, we could see the direct link between urban regeneration and industry development. Cities and urban areas are often regenerated based on the industrial structure, demand, and new operations that are embedded in their industrial development. Many cases of importing or injecting new industries lead to regenerating cities and urban areas with new infrastructure, new residents and workers, and new visitors. This chapter explores the case of urban transitions and the change process in the City of Kunming, Yunnan Province. Through a brief set of cartography analysis, the chapter demonstrates some of the key transitions in the local industrial sector and how they have impacted changes in spatiality and planning of the city, which then affects the city life experiences offered by the city and its surrounding areas. These examples are self-explanatory in showing transitions and their impacts on urban areas. Lastly, the nexus between local industries, local economies, and local urban life is discussed in further detail.KeywordsRegenerationUrban industryLocal industriesLocal economiesUrban experienceKunming
This chapter sets out some of the socio-historical contexts that gave rise to the increasing emphasis on entrepreneurship in the creative industries. It sees contexts as spatial, temporal, and discursive spaces, interconnected or woven together with other connected spaces or structures, which are linked to, precede, or follow other discursive spaces that also operate hierarchically both above and below the ones we exist in. They are, in essence, the ground of scalable and complex systems. From this perspective, contextual interconnections have an effect on the object that is located in that context. The rise of the notion of cultural industries, and from there, the creative industries, along with digitization, globalization, and neoliberalism as an ideological construct are discussed. Historical, social, cultural, environmental, and political contexts that gave rise to, and support, these ideas are examined. This chapter concludes with the idea that a multitude of innovators have capitalized on emerging markets, allowing them to experiment with new products and business models as corporations have strengthened their presence worldwide in a form of ‘glocalized’ activity.
In the past decade, the cultural projection of China has become increasingly important to the Communist Party of China (CPC) and to the state in terms of enhancing its soft power amid global competition. This chapter examines how China’s media institutions contribute to the construction of China’s contemporary identity, drawing on two case studies of CCTV-9 and China Global Television Network (CGTN). It uses document analysis, in-depth interviews and participant observation, to explore the gap between the cultural policy regime and its implementation in state media, taking into account the interplay between broadcasters, political bodies, producers and international audiences. In doing so, it reveals the tensions not only between political control and commercial imperative, but also between the national regulatory framework and the need for global engagement. It argues that the increasingly explicit political priority of promoting China’s national discourse globally entails an assertive diplomatic agenda toward nation branding, but market disadvantages and the uncertainty of audience reception challenge the policy pursuit for using its state media as a means for public diplomacy.
For China’s cultural sectors, maintaining ideological unity at home and improving national image abroad are now key objectives of recomposing contemporary national discourse as well as expediting their access to the global market. Cultural content, especially documentaries, has become a favourite format for China’s state-run media to ‘present an officially sanctioned view of history’ (Müller, Documentary, world history, and national power in the PRC: Global rise in Chinese eyes, Routledge, 2013, p. 1), given the power of narration figured in the discursive elements of factual production. Scholars are debating the public and global values geared towards assimilating cultural discourse to the political and diplomatic interests of the country. This chapter reviews the problems of ideological mediation and contestations in the digital communication spaces by interrogating the historical and contemporary arguments around China’s state-led communication network, its national cultural policy and its soft power initiative. In particular, it highlights state media’s engagement with national policy, and how they negotiate, thereby assessing the role of China’s media industries in the interconnected, competitive global cultural sphere.KeywordsPublic sphereNational discourseState mediaChina’s soft-power initiativeDocumentariesDigital globalisation
The rise of the gaming industry and the concerns related to its harms serve to reveal elements of the Chinese moral model of the entertainment and cultural market. This model includes an effort to channel creation in a morally virtuous sense: promotion of eSport, censorship on game contents, prevention of addiction by controlling children’s uses, and the medicalization of overconsumption. The patterns of the Chinese digital culture are thus shaped by a complex interplay of actors defining market norms. In this context, the issue of player protection takes on great importance, all the more so when the players are young and the gaming devices take on more and more immersive forms. However, the “gamblification” of gaming, including the monetization of games through gambling-like features (loot boxes, skins, etc.) and illegal betting on eSport matches, contributes to a high prevalence of gambling disorders. Paradoxically, China’s policy framework for gaming has contributed to the emergence of commercial practices and profit-driven game designs that are more harmful. Youth gaming is caught up in contradictions linked to government and business objectives that are difficult to reconcile with mental health concerns for young users.KeywordsGamingeSportConsumer cultureAddictionGamblification
Shanghai has become an economic center of China and the world, as well as a place where young urbanites connect the dots between its mythical past and its promising future. A city of influence with a growing art scene, striving creative industries, and millions of avid tech-savvy consumers, Shanghai is also a fashion capital in the making. The Gen Z, or digital natives born after the mid-1990s, are at the forefront of social, economic, and cultural transformations. Their behaviors, aspirations, and mobile identities are increasingly driving the worlds of fashion and luxury, in China and globally. This chapter examines Shanghai fashion through three dimensions: the physical, digital, and social dimensions. The fusion of physical and virtual places in a phygital world, and soon in the metaverse, combine with the fast-moving sociocultural environment of an emerging country to create opportunities and challenges for the fashion industry.KeywordsChinaShanghaiCreative and cultural industriesFashionGen ZIdentityTechnology
Speaking as a cultural historian and anthropologist, in this chapter I investigate into the entanglement of handwriting and technology in contemporary China, and the implications this has for Chinese brush writing. My reflection figures calligraphy within the changing urban environment and creative economy context of China. I inquire about challenges and opportunities for calligraphy to evolve within the ongoing transition towards a postliterate era. I discuss shifting perceptions of calligraphy, caused by the emergence of robotic calligraphy and new smartphone applications that are intended to offer users the experience of ‘writing’ calligraphy. However, I suggest that calligraphy has the potential to evolve in multiple ways, subjected to technology or coexisting with it. I outline important objectives for maintaining a balance between efforts to brand calligraphy within creative industries, preserve it as a significant part of Chinese heritage, and carry it into the future as a vital creative and spiritual practice.KeywordsCalligraphyPostliterate cultureTechnologyWritingCreative industries
This paper explores an expanding area of policy interest: the networks and collaboration mechanisms between universities and creative industries actors in cities. While much is known about such relationships in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM), they remain taken for granted and under researched in the creative industries. We argue that they are pivotal for different domains of research and policy, notably, cultural policy, higher education, innovation systems, and regional development. To that end, this paper aims to open up consideration of these relationships which we argue 1) stimulate innovation and 2) make broader contributions to local communities and economic regeneration via a creative economy approach. Using the Triple Helix framework, we explore university-industry-governemnt relationships and knowledge exchange mechanisms via a comparative analysis of two creative industries case cities: Shenzhen, China and Brisbane, Australia. Despite differences in certain important respects the two cities have both adopted creative industries policy frameworks. We found important differences between the cases in the roles and relative strength of the three sectoral actors. This study also shows a need for strategic incentives to foster collective capacity and governance interventions as a push to broker relationships that were not there before. Focussing on boundary spanning we also argue that cultural policy should have formal mechanisms and informal interactions to build a sustainable innovation ecosystem based on knowledge exchange.
Embora a China tenha se tornado um país bastante expressivo no campo político-econômico, poucos estudos são realizados no Brasil sobre o país numa perspectiva midiática. O artigo discute a indústria televisiva chinesa, a partir das recentes transformações causadas pela emergência do ambiente digital. Exploramos o caso da plataforma de vídeo sob demanda iQIYI, um dos maiores representantes do segmento. Ancorado na revisão bibliográfica, visamos contribuir com a desocidentalização dos estudos sobre televisão e sobre plataformas digitais. Concluímos que o Estado é um elemento-chave para se compreender as dinâmicas do mercado de SVOD na China.
The Wereldmuseum Rotterdam is planning to hold an exhibition on China in 2023 in which fashion and design are one of the exhibiting categories. In preparation for the event, the museum is proposing to use the cliché Made in China as a provocative title for the exhibition. A workshop with the museum curators was held in 2021 to question the materiality central to the stereotypes associated with the proposed phrase to inform the curatorial direction of the forthcoming exhibition. As a workshop contributor invited to address the inquiry, I have, in this article, examined the phrase itself and China as a place, heritage and concept. The country-of-origin effect of the “made in” label was taken to analyze the phrase. While the negative connotations of Made in China in the exhibition title might have an impact on the perception of the exhibition, two interlocking components—transcultural dynamics and a site of friction—arising from the labeling system constitute a curatorial concept within which Chineseness embedded in the museum fashion and design artifacts are the offspring of the typified multifaceted “China” exchange, connection, and transformation.
Cultural professionals in the art and cultural sector in Hanoi, Vietnam, are carrying out digitization projects and utilizing digital platforms, tools and applications in order to curate their own narrative on Vietnamese art and culture. This can help to counter digital orientalism by redressing the imbalance in the amount of accessible content online as well as control over the production and circulation of cultural content. An increase in the amount of digitized cultural content can help to engage local audiences and introduce a contemporary image of Vietnamese culture to an international audience. Today, Vietnamese cultural professionals are able to decide what to digitize, what to make publicly accessible and how to curate it online. This paper presents findings from a case study on Manzi Art Space, including a digital ethnography of an augmented reality public art project entitled ‘Into Thin Air’ and 20 interviews with art and cultural professionals working in Hanoi. The findings show how digitization allows cultural professionals to shape the narrative on contemporary Vietnamese art and culture. However, the findings also show there are particular challenges faced by cultural professionals in Hanoi, including lack of human resources, technical resources and funding as well as concerns around copyright law and government permissions. These challenges are hindering the ability to utilize new digital technologies.
A new generation of elites distinguished by their cultural endowments has emerged in China. Unlike the older generation of elites who signaled status through the display of wealth but shared similar tastes, the new generation of cultured elites has sophisticated, often Western-oriented “highbrow” tastes in their cultural consumption. By comparing the upbringings and the tastes of interviewees from various backgrounds, this study suggests a widening taste-chasm between the elites and the underclasses in urban cities. The social process behind this is argued to be the rapid formation of cultural capital in China, in which parental privileges accumulated in the market economy converted into cultural privileges in the new generation of new elites.
The nature of work in the art and cultural sector in Hanoi, Vietnam, is changing. The new generation of cultural professionals is harnessing digital technology to display art and cultural collections in innovative and creative ways. Digitization today is not only about creating ‘hidden’ digital archives but, instead, about curating digital art and culture experiences that are publicly accessible. This allows a way to preserve culture, which can be digitally displayed in a contemporary format. The paper presents findings from a case study on Matca Space for Photography (Matca), including semi-structured interviews, secondary data analysis, and a digital ethnography of Matca’s digital platforms. The current study highlights the challenges and opportunities associated with digitization in Vietnam. While there are challenges with digitization due to a lack of technical resources and human resources, using digital platforms can allow cultural professionals an agency to present Vietnamese art and culture to local and international audiences. This has the potential to redress the imbalance in representation and redefine digital orientalism.
This chapter builds on the core themes of the cultural, the creative, and the social by demonstrating how policies embodying distinctive Chinese interpretations of western concepts of cultural industries and creative industries have been deployed. Cleaving to a traditional view of cultural industries, China has developed a more assertive cultural nationalism, while at the same time embracing the industrial modernization offered by creative industries policies including intellectual property rectification and growing global brands. But it is China’s pivotal embrace of the full potential of digital platformization of economy and society that marks Chinese policy and governance as world leading—both for its integration of social amelioration objectives as well as a concerning level of social surveillance.
This chapter critiques the foundation of neoliberal capital formation theory, the neoclassical theory of investment, only to later highlight how China re-invented its own course of development. On its own, the system has proven explosive, while by the law of value, capital has to immiserate labour for profits. The real system is not a formal network between inanimate subjects proxying human relations, it is a historical system anchored in a historical subject organising social reproduction, always in line with the vested interest of the dominant class. The attempt here is to shed light on the interface of agency-policy, and social outcome.
This article compares the TV and cinematic versions of the Chinese 3D animation Boonie Bears in terms of their representations of media violence within the context of social concern, government regulation, and industry self-regulation. These works are particularly significant among domestically produced animation with respect to their effects on children of exposure to violent programming. The first part of this article examines physical violence and verbal abuse in Boonie Bears and Pleasant Goat and Big Big Wolf, the two most influential and widely watched animated TV series in China. The second part reviews the corresponding public criticism the above two works have received and the reasons behind it. The third part of this article analyzes how and to what extent the production company has reduced the degree of children’s exposure to media violence in cinematic Boonie Bears productions (especially the first two films), which have been deemed acceptable by the majority of potential audience members.
The first couple of years of the Bishan Commune were focused on large art festivals, called Bishan Harvestivals, that aimed to bring artists, academics and activists to Bishan to discuss rural issues. In this chapter, I analyze the large-scale festival machine as it landed in Bishan Village and the obstacles and dialogues it created. During this period the Bishan Commune changed its attention from a utopian endeavor focused on art and cultural issues to an incorporation of economic concerns in the Bishan Commune scheme. I argue that this change can be understood two-fold: as a result of heavy pressure from the authorities as well as the direct result of engagement with a local community of villagers very much preoccupied with the lack of economic possibilities. This can be seen, I argue, as a sign that the Bishan Project was entering into a “rural contract” with the local authorities, a “contract” that was necessary for the project’s continued existence.
This research studies how cultural consumption draws cultural distinctions in the most developed megacities in China. This research examines the pattern of music consumption to examine distinction—which types of music are used, how they are used, who are using them, and what are the sources of those tastes. Although some theories, such as the cultural omnivore account, contend that the rise of contemporary pop culture implies a more open-minded pursuit of taste, this research argues that popular culture draws distinction in new ways. Based on a 1048 random-sample survey and 21 interviews on music in China, this research shows how the penetration of foreign music into China has allowed it to become a form of cultural capital—highstatus cultural knowledge and dispositions that can be leveraged for social distinction (Bourdieu, 1984). This research pioneers in cultural capital research the use of MIRT, a latent trait method from psychometrics, to reveal the pattern of music taste. Those with high levels of cultural capital had more exposure to certain types of music such as classical music and selective foreign pop music, which requires knowledge and research to consume, accumulating in "tastes" which they deploy to measure others. Those with low cultural capital tend to follow the mainstream or are uninterested in these music types. In turn, the meaning of cultural capital in China is examined to show how taste is influenced by not only current socioeconomic differences but also the past, most notably the privileged childhood of those growing up in advantaged families. The rise of taste in China is traced to rising inequality under Reform and Opening which led to a diverging upbringing in the newest generation of Chinese. This research updates Bourdieu's theory of cultural capital, which has traditionally focused on elite highbrow culture, by demonstrating how the influx of global culture in a contemporary society has enabled the continuation of cultural distinction.
In Life Advice from Below, Eric C. Hendriks offers the first systematic, comparative study of the globalization of American-style self-help culture and the cultural conflicts this creates in different national contexts. The self-help guru is an archetypical American figure associated with individualism, materialism and the American Dream. Nonetheless, the self-help industry is spreading globally, thriving in China and other seemingly unlikely places. Controversy follows in its wake, as the self-help industry, operating outside of formal education and state institutions, outflanks philosophical, religious and political elites who have their own visions of the Good Life. Through a comparison of Germany and China, Hendriks analyzes how the competition between self-help gurus and institutional authorities unfolds under radically different politico-cultural regimes.
“This witty book charms its way through a very serious sociology of the seriously quirky field of self-help books. Read it for its fascinating pop-culture insights and you’ll come away with a deep understanding of contemporary sociological theory. Highly recommended.” - Salvatore Babones, University of Sydney
“Hendriks’ finding that Germany rather than China is more resistant to self-help gurus offers a powerful corrective to the assumption in much of the globalization literature that the greatest cultural divide is between the Anglo-Western European sphere and the rest of the globe.” - Rodney Benson, New York University
Chapter Three adds political and social context by demonstrating the role of discourses and institutions within heritage-making processes, mainly focusing on the Reform and Opening Period (post-1978). As discourses shape and are disseminated by institutions, we pay attention to the interaction between institutional and discursive developments. In this chapter, we show how institutions - both governmental institutions and societal organisations – contribute to the dissemination of the official Chinese heritage discourse, and how they, in turn, are shaped by it. Chinese heritage concepts, discourses and institutions have developed in constant interaction with developments at the international scale, particularly with the UNESCO. This interaction has resulted in the selective appropriation of heritage concepts and best practices, which has led to a diversification of what is considered “heritage” and how it is protected in China today.
Chapter Two discusses how the Chinese understanding and treatment of the past has changed over time, depicting the development from imperial times to Mao-era China. In doing so, the chapter pays particular attention to the cultural history of “heritage” over the last century. It finds that Chinese treatment of the past has been and continues to be characterised by cycles of destruction and creation in which new dynasties or governments use the past to legitimize their rules. Moreover, members of Chinese society have gone through cycles of antiquarianism – attempts of conserving and collecting the past – to foster a sense of identity during times of uncertainty. Today’s “heritage fever” in China can be seen as a part of this tradition. However, it differs due to the appropriation of UNESCO values and best practices, which has re-defined heritage as a public good, and “national heritage.”
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