A Study On The International Media Agenda Of Chinese Internet Corporate Social Responsibility

As the representations of Chinese Internet companies,Alibaba,Tencent and Baidu are listed among the top Internet companies worldwide.However,they have been facing criticisms on their fulfillment of social responsibility by the western media.How do the western media built the agenda of the Chinese Internet corporations' social responsibility;how do different stakeholder discourses appear in the western media,are two core research questions addressed in this paper.This paper examines the core concept of Corporate Social Responsibility(CSR)by dividing the social responsibility issues into diverse types towards the community,customers,employees,shareholders and suppliers,according to the stakeholder theory.By choosing relevant reports during 2015 to 2017 covered by four western media(The Wall Street Journal,The New York Times,die Süddeutsche Zeitung,das Handelsblatt)on three Chinese Internet companies(Alibaba,Tencent,Baidu)as examples,this paper conducts analysis on stakeholder agenda and their discourses in these reports combining quantitative approaches and case studies guided by the agenda building theory.It is to be highlighted that consumers are the most salient stakeholder in the western media.The tones of the overall western media are balanced,which reflects the fact that the western media is critical,yet not blindly adopts a negative tone.However,the reports present a specific negative tone on certain issues such as consumer-related product quality,product safety,and employees' health and safety.Media agenda can be influenced by governments,corporates and other stakeholder.This paper shows that various stakeholder discourses have diverse concerns and stances.Chinese Internet corporates' discourses are most frequently quoted by the western media.Especially the entrepreneur leaders of these companies such as Jack Ma and Pony Ma are influential.This indicates that Chinese Internet companies are taking an active role in shaping the media agenda.