Richard Fletcher-Cooke Esq
RESTRICTED
2
2 February 1987
Comment
2. This decision is intended to tighten central control over what
appears in print in China. There has been a fairly steady stream of complaints over the last year about the amount of "pornographic" ("yellow") material that was finding its way onto the streets. But this cannot be the sole, let alone the most important reason, for the decision. The new body will be very useful, in the current climate, for further restricting the airing of dissentient views, and the timing of the announcement was unlikely to be entirely fortuitous, and was probably intended as a further signal of the stricter rein that is to be applied to intellectual activity. In addition the numb of periodicals and publishing houses has burgeoned in recent and may well have slipped too far from control for the authorities comfort. A shake-up in the publishing world seems to have been going on for some time if I am to take at face value the inability of the State Publications Bureau to talk to me in recent months because of readjus ments in their leadership.
3. In some ways it is the responsibilities for the press that are th most interesting that the new Administration will have, especially that of "examining" (jiancha) the press. Quite what this means in practise is unlcear, but it does apparently imply some sort of censor ship function. Whey this power should be given to a state department when the responsibilities of the press as the mouth piece of the Part are being very much stressed, is again mysterious.
со
CC: DPA, Hong Kong
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