At the height of the protests in Tiananmen Square in 1989, a group of students paraded through Beijing with a banner reading "Thank you, BBC." Foreign radio stations -- and the BBC World Service, in particular -- were one of the few places where demonstrators were able to get any reliable information. It was graphic evidence of the influence of the BBC World Service.
Fast forward 18 years and the World Service in China is facing an uncertain future. Frustrated by the Chinese government's tactics of blocking its short-wave radio broadcasts and Web site, World Service management is to "reallocate" its resources in a wholesale review of its multimedia services for China.
No one is predicting a closure -- 10 of the World Service's other foreign language services were shut down last year -- but staff past and present fear any watering down of its Chinese proposition will send the wrong signals to China and the rest of the world.
"I think the BBC needs to think carefully about what it's doing," one former Chinese service producer said.
"Yes, there is a big technical conundrum over getting the Chinese-language product to the audience. But whatever the audience research figures may say, the BBC does have a significant, almost intangible, presence in China. There is a distinct awareness and nervousness among officials and those in positions of power. You can sense an almost audible recoil on the other end of the line when you ring people up, asking for interviews," the producer said.
"So given that the Chinese government is making efforts to tighten media control, what kind of signal are you sending out if you cut back the Chinese service?" the producer said.
The BBC is not the only media organization to be frustrated in China, one of the world's fastest growing economies and host to next year's Olympic games. Rupert Murdoch revealed at the 2007 Media Summit in New York that he was switching his attention from China to India.
"China is immense [but its government] is not opening it up yet," said Murdoch. "[India] is a working democracy with rule of law. We find it most exciting."
The World Service currently broadcasts about four hours of output a day in Mandarin, split roughly equally between news and features programming. It also broadcasts news bulletins in Cantonese.
But awareness of the BBC has dwindled in China in recent years, presumably as a result of government filtering. The radio station has a Chinese audience of about 850,000 -- 0.1 percent of the population. Its Web site, BBCChinese.com, gets 8 million page impressions a month despite being heavily blocked. Listening online is as popular as listening via short-wave radio.
However, the corporation has been encouraged by its English learning site, which is growing rapidly with 13 million page impressions a month.
The latest changes to the World Service are not restricted to China, with the Russian-language service also being scrutinized by management. This comes a year after Bush House axed 10 foreign language services, part of a shift in emphasis in which more resources were pumped into a new Arabic TV channel, which is due to launch this autumn. The World Service's Thai-language arm was closed just months before a military coup in the country last September.
But some World Service staff claim management is preoccupied with reaching a Muslim audience at the expense of other parts of the world.
"The World Service is becoming the BBC Islam service," one journalist said.
It is a claim rejected by World Service management.
"It is right to view the Middle East as an important priority, but to concentrate all your resources there is short-sighted because it is clearly not going to be the only significant axis around which world affairs revolve in the next few decades," a former producer said.
"At the other end of the spectrum, away from politics, many Chinese might feel miffed at the suggestion that the BBC appears to be downgrading the country's importance at a time when everyone else seems to be moving in the opposite direction," the ex-producer said."Parallels with the world of business suggest that if you have a position in the China market, you don't cut back, hoping to regain your foothold at some point in the future."
Further details about the changes to the Chinese service are expected within the next two weeks. Sources said BBC management wanted to act more strategically in order to reach a bigger audience.
"In the past they have tried to use softer material in the hope that would slip through [the government restrictions]. It has worked in some markets but not in others," a source said.
But World Service sources have indicated that the reorganization will see the axe fall on features output -- music and lifestyle programming -- rather than news and current affairs. A World Service spokesman said the latter would remain "sacrosanct" in the imminent shake-up of the Chinese service.
"The Middle East, China, Russia and the wider Islamic world are among the key priorities for the BBC World Service," he said in a statement.
"In a fast-moving international media marketplace with rapidly changing technology and audience demands, BBC World Service constantly looks at its services to ensure they are relevant, have the right mix of services, offer value for money and, importantly, have impact with audiences," he said.
"The principles that underpin and shape our thinking are that news and current affairs are important and any possible changes will be designed to enhance the impact of our multimedia services for each language service," he said.
World Service director Nigel Chapman recently met with union representatives. The Chinese service employs about 39 journalists -- 49 people in total, according to the National Union of Journalists (NUJ) -- and some job losses are thought to be inevitable.
Pierre Vicary, one of the NUJ's two lay officials at the BBC, said the Chinese service had undergone a number of organizational changes in recent years.
"Clearly, as a union representative I would not be happy with any job cuts," he said. "But if the strategy is finally clear and the service is properly resourced, then security for 35 people is better than the existing uncertainty for 39."
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