Professor Ben Liebman Speaks at Conference on New Media in China

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New York, October 15, 2009 – Before many judges in China hand down a verdict or pass sentence, they have to think hard about their decision.

 

But that’s not just because they need time to ponder how to best interpret the law. They also have to gauge the reaction their rulings will receive in the media, said Benjamin Liebman, Director of the Center for Chinese Legal Studies at Columbia Law School.

 

There are numerous cases in which media coverage pushes courts and the government toward outcomes. Such coverage is regarded as being a major factor in why Deng Yujiao walked free from a murder trial earlier this year, Liebman said during a presentation at a conference on New Media and Global Transformation held at the Law School.

 

Deng was a waitress at a karaoke bar who was accused of stabbing to death a Communist Party official who demanded sex. Her case became a cause célèbre after an initial media report went viral online and was “aggressively fanned by bloggers,” Liebman said.

 

Deng was hailed by many as a folk hero for defending herself. Public reaction reflected anger over the abuse of power by party officials, and that sentiment was reflected in sympathetic reports by state-run media. In the end, Deng was found guilty in June of “intentional harm,” but absolved of any responsibility because she was found to suffer from bipolar disorder.

 

“It’s pretty clear that Internet demands for justice and media outrage led to a quick resolution in the courts,” Liebman said.

 

But, he added, “Media influence can actually be very pernicious in China and forces courts to change outcomes and, in some cases, also to treat criminal defendants harshly,” said Liebman.

 

While Chinese judges are not prone to change a decision based on a newspaper article, Liebman noted they are nonetheless “worried about intervention from higher-ranking officials.” That, he said, is a valid concern given the control the state exercises over the media and the Communist Party being “extremely reactive to public opinion.”

 

That does not mean, however, that courts hold no sway over the media, Liebman said. Judges often require journalists to get approval before writing about cases, and some forbid newspapers from writing opinion pieces that differ from the court’s decision.

 

And courts are not afraid to go after journalists legally --- suing them for libel and slander. Those are cases the media often lose, as even truth is not always a defense. But Liebman believes the threat of litigation can actually be a good thing for media still trying to establish norms of professionalism.

 

 

“Now you see media paying less attention to deliberately one-sided reports, and paying more attention to train journalists to report accurately, and to retain notes and other evidence to support their articles,” Liebman said.

 

The Oct. 9 conference was sponsored by the Center, the Jiefang Daily Group, a government-owned publisher of newspapers and magazines in China, and Columbia University’s Weatherhead East Asian Institute.

 

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