Freedom of Speech Practice in China and Sweden - International News Reports Comparisons - Libya Civil War 2011 as a Case Study

Abstract

Freedom of Speech is a universal human right. Article 19 of the ICCPR (the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights) states that "everyone shall have the right to hold opinions without interference" and "everyone shall have the right to freedom of expression; this right shall include freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas of all kinds, regardless of frontiers, either orally, in writing or in print, in the form of art, or through any other media of his choice". China has a reputation that invests amount of resources building up media censorship system to control Chinese media; While Sweden claims that “freedom of speech” is the principles of Sweden media industry. In this research, the author will focus on both Chinese and Swedish newspapers reporting towards international news materials. The research question is “How Chinese newspaper differs from Swedish newspaper on reporting international news?” and the aim focuses the area of media comparison in different cultural backgrounds, and tries to find the differences in between. The theories of Freedom of Expression, intercultural communication and media studies are related in this research, including Propaganda model and Stereotypes, Globalization: media technology and social change, Media censorship studies. As case study, Swedish and Chinese newspapers reports towards Libya Civil War 2011 is used in the research - since it is one of the biggest news in the world this year, which brings great quantity of news articles for the research. In order to do data analysis, both quantitative research and qualitative research method are used in this paper. As the research result, the differences between Swedish and Chinese newspapers on reporting international news are quite clear – they have different article quantities; choose different news topics; express different political standpoints and have different reporting methods and news focus. Eventually, the contribution of this research can be in the field of media reporting comparison between different cultural backgrounds. Further research can be conducted in this area as well.