Marr (Ed) 1998 Mass Media in Vietnam, Political and Social Change
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Political and Social Change Monograph 25 Mass Media in Vietnam David Marr Editor Department of Political and Social Change Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies The Australian National University Canberra 1998 © David G. Marr and the several authors each in respect of the papers contributed by them; for the full list of the names of such copyright owners and the papers in respect of which they are the copyright owners see the Table of Contents of this volume. This work is copyright. Apart from any fair dealings for the purpose of study, criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright Act, no part may be reproduced by any process without written permission. Enquiries may be made to the publisher. First published 1998, Department of Political and Social Change, Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, The Australian National University. Printed and manufactured in Australia by Panther Publishing and Press. Distributed by Department of Political and Social Change Division of Politics and International Relations Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies The Australian National University Canberra ACT 0200 Australia (FAX: 61-2-6249-5523) (email:http://coombs.anu.edu.au/Depts/PolSoc/psc-home.html) National Library of Australia .Cataloguing-in-publication entry The Mass Media in Vietnam ISBN 0 909 524 327 Contents Contributors iv Preface v Introduction, David Marr 1 1. Media in Vietnam and The Structure of Its Management, Russell Hiang-Khng Heng 27 2. Economics-Related Periodicals, Chu VanLam 54 3. Creative Writers and The Press in Viet Nam Since Renovation, Ho Anh Thai 58 4. Voice of Vietnam Radio, Past, Present, and Future Prospects, Nguy en Long 64 5. Making Live Radio in Vietnam, Ngo Phuong Dung 73 6. Instant Noodle Propaganda: Vietnamese Television in The Late 1990s, Jan Forrester 78 7. The Changing Face of Vietnamese Cinema During Ten Years of Renovation 1986-1996, Ngo Phuong Lan 91 8. Law, the Press and Police Murder in Vietnam: The Vietnamese Press and the Trial of Nguyen Tung Duong, Mark Side/ 97 9. Understanding the World Outside: Vietnamese Translations of Foreign Social Science Publications, David Marr& Mark Side/ 120 10. Reporting Vietnam: True Confessions of a Foreign Correspondent, Peter Mares 146 Index 164 Contributors Chu Van Lam Editor, Thoi Bao Kinh Te Viet Nam (Vietnam Economic Times). Institute of Economics, Hanoi. Fo 1Tester,Jan Regional director of a five year Australian government-funded media training scheme in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia. Media consultant for UN agencies in Southeast Asia. Ms Forrester first worked in Vietnam as part of the Department of External Affairs team which opened the Australian Embassy in Hanoi in 1973. Heng, Russell Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore. Political and Social Change Department, Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, Australian National University. Ho Anh Thai Journalist for Tuan Bao Quoc Te (International Weekly). Writer of numerous novels, short stories and critical essays. Mares, Peter Correspondent, Australian Broadcasting Corporation, Hanoi 1993-1996. Currently presenter of Asia Pacific Program for ABC, Melbourne. Marr, David Professor, Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, Australian National University. Ngo Ph uong Dung Associate of the Embassy of Sweden, Hanoi. Participant in Voice of Vietnam live-to-air training project. Ngo Ph uong Lm1 Member of the Vietnam Film Council, the Department of Cinema, and the Feature Film Censorship Council, Hanoi. Nguyen Long Correspondent and presenter, Radio Voice of Vietnam, Hanoi. Postgraduate student, University of Technology, Sydney. Side/, Marie Lecturer in Law, College of Law, University of Iowa, Iowa City, USA. Director of Ford Foundation programs in Vietnam, 1992-1995. iv Preface In October 1998, Le Kha Phieu, General Secretary of the Vietnam Communist Party, warned a conference of publishers and other media executives that the profit motive was causing them to veer away from political issues, and general commercialisation of the mass media was threatening to undermine revolutionary 1 cultural traditions. Some of those present must have smiled ironically at this call for more politics, recalling the times when editors and journalists had been sacked or even imprisoned forexpr essing controversial political opinions. Of course, Mr Phieu was not calling for political disputation, but rather a return to extensive, enthusiastic propagation of the Party line, instead of devoting so much attention to violence, crime, sex, scandals and superstitions - all of which had been offli mits to the Vietnamese mass media only a decade ago. Quite simply, the Party line was being ignored because it did not sell papers or air time. This is the first book in English to describe the dramatic changes taking place in Vietnam's mass media. It is not so much about the specific content of newspaper articles, radio broadcasts, feature films or TV programs, but rather the transformations in organisation, financing, technology, work behaviour and audience expectations that have occurred over a remarkably short period of time. Much of today's mass media practice in Vietnam will be familiar to western readers - the intrusive advertising, tabloid style, chequebook journalism, bargain basement video movies, TV soap operas and live sports coverage. However, because all this is new to Vietnam, we have included some material about earlier mass media conditions, otherwise western readers will wonder what all the fuss is about. Difficulties encountered in producing this book offer some measure of how sensitive the Vietnamese authorities remain on issues relating to the mass media. For most of 1996 it was uncertain whether or not Vietnamese editors, journalists, producers or media administrators would be permitted to take part in a conference scheduled for the end of the year in Canberra. Officials of Vietnam Television in both Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City seemed especially wary. Approaches to the Vietnamese ambassador and even a senior Communist Party official responsible for the mass media proved ineffective. In the end we did manage to secure the participation of a number of well informed individuals from Vietnam, as well as closer to home. The conference proved a lively affair, participants eventually revised their papers, and editing for publication proceeded with the delays and complexities normally associated with such an academic endeavour. Three individuals unable to attend the conference were invited to submit additional chapters. As reported by Reuters, 9 October 1998. v I would like to thank Adam Fforde, Russell Heng, Peter Mares and Thaveeporn Vasavakul for timely advice and liaison with relevant Vietnamese institutions and prospective workshop participants. At the workshop we benefited from papers presented by Tran Thi Tam and Robert Templer which ultimately did not make their way into the book. Nguyen Dien and Pham Thu Thuy offered professional translation and interpreting assistance. Hoang Oanh Collins provided invaluable help with general correspondence, organising, and preparation of the book for publication. Maxine McArthur skilfully copy edited and indexed the final text. Kris Brown solved several computer problems and assisted with cover design. Beverley Fraser gave expert production advice and supervised final printing and distribution. We are grateful to the Australian Agency for International Development, the Ford Foundation, and the Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies for providing the financial and personnel resources without which it would have been impossible to put on the conference and produce this book. David G. Marr vi INTRODUCTION David G. Marr In 1907, a song exhorting people to read daily newspapers circulated in Vietnam. According to the anonymous author each reader could thus find out what was happening in the world, tell others, change lives, and help the country become strong and 1 prosperous. More fundamentally, the songwriter linked the printed page to veracity: Truth is the medicine that cures ignorance and darkness, Truth is the remedy to overcome hunger and cowardice. Within months, the patriotic literati who eagerly promoted such ideas were either in colonial jails or toning down their rhetoric drastically, but the Vietnamese love affair with the printing press had just begun. Enthusiasm fortypeset newspapers and books was provoked by the sheer novelty of the medium. For centuries, Vietnamese literati had been accustomed simply to the exchange of pen-and-ink manuscripts or the occasional woodblock compendium. The Tale of Kieu, Nguyen Du's extraordinary 23,000 character epic poem, written about 1810, was subsequently carved onto 180 woodblocks, printed on rice paper, bound and 2 distributed during the early 1870s. The nearest thing to a mass medium was the woodblock reproduction of drawings, featuring images of gods, fertility symbols, classical Chinese expressions, folkheroes, and key scenes from epic poems or popular 3 dramas. Far more commonly, however, information circulated by word-of-mouth. Poetry was memorised and recited as a form of popular education and entertainment. Itinerant theatre troops timed their arrival in particular towns and villages to the calendar of festivals and religious observances. From the early 17•h century a few printed books carried in by western missionaries and merchants attracted attention at court, but it was the western cannons, muskets, navigation equipment and charts, and assorted luxury goods that Vietnamese rulers