University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses

Chinese government’s role in crisis management: case studies of three major crises in recent years

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Chinese government’s role in crisis management: case studies of three major crises in recent years

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CHINESE GOVERNMENT’S ROLE IN CRISIS MANAGEMENT
-CASE STUDIES OF THREE MAJOR CRISES IN RECENT YEARS
by
Hui Zhao

A Thesis Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
MASTER OF ARTS
(STRATEGIC PUBLIC RELATIONS)

August 2009

Copyright 2009 Hui Zhao

ii

ACKNOWLEGEMENTS
I would like to express my sincere gratitude and appreciation to my thesis advisors
Professor Jian Wang, Professor Jerry Swerling and Professor Patrick James for their
expert guidance and mentorship, and for their encouragement and support throughout the
writing of this dissertation. I would like to thank Professor Bob Berger for his patient
proof reading and editing. I am also indebted to Professor Jennifer Floto for her guidance
and support during my two years’ graduate study. Last but not least, I would like to thank
my parents, Gui Ying Zhu and Ming Qiang Zhao, for giving me life in the first place, for
educating me with aspects from both arts and sciences, for unconditional support and
encouragement to pursue my interests. Without all of them, this dissertation could not
have been completed.

iii

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Acknowledgements ............................................................................................................. ii
List of Figures ......................................................................................................................v
Abstract .............................................................................................................................. vi
Chapter 1: Introduction ....................................................................................................1
Purpose ............................................................................................................................1
The Importance of the Government in Crisis Management .............................................1
Definitions .......................................................................................................................2
Method ............................................................................................................................6
Preview ............................................................................................................................7

Chapter 2: Benchmarks ....................................................................................................8
Benchmarks of Crisis Management .................................................................................8
Benchmarks of Crisis Communication ..........................................................................11
Transnational Applicability ............................................................................................17

Chapter 3: Structure and Role of the Chinese Government in Crisis Management .19
The General structure of the Chinese Government ........................................................19
The Role of the Government in Crisis Management ......................................................20

Chapter 4: The SARS Crisis ...........................................................................................23
Background of the Episode ............................................................................................23
The Government’s Crisis Management in the SARS Case ............................................24
Applying the Benchmarks to Crisis Communication .....................................................32

Chapter 5: The Sichuan Earthquake .............................................................................37
Background of the Disaster ............................................................................................37
The Chinese Government’s Crisis Management in the Sichuan Earthquake .................38
The Chinese Government’s Crisis Communication in the Sichuan Earthquake ............43

Chapter 6: The Baby Milk Powder Crisis .....................................................................51
Background of the Episode ............................................................................................51
Crisis Management in the Milk Powder Crisis ..............................................................52
Crisis Communication in the Milk Powder Crisis .........................................................56

Chapter 7: Discussion ......................................................................................................61
Weaknesses Exposed, Then China Does Better .............................................................61
Crisis Management: Consistencies and Differences among the Crises .........................61
iv

Crisis Communication: The Important Role of the Center ............................................66

Chapter 8: Conclusion .....................................................................................................72
Suggestions .....................................................................................................................72
Further Studies ...............................................................................................................77

Bibliography ......................................................................................................................79

v

LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1: Emergency Management Organization System in China 22
Figure 2: Emergency Response Gradations for Natural Disaster in China 22

vi

ABSTRACT
This thesis used media analysis to examine the role of the Chinese government in crisis
management. Through the comparison of the three major public crises in the past few
years, namely the 2003 SARS crisis, the 2008 Sichuan earthquake and the 2008 baby
milk powder crisis, the author sought to identify the consistencies, the differences and the
trends in the Chinese government’s application of crisis management and crisis
communication.

1

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCITION
1.1 Purpose
This thesis aims to examine the role of the Chinese government in crisis management.
Media analysis was used to analyze performance in three major crises in the last few
years, namely the 2003 SARS crisis, the 2008 Sichuan earthquake and the 2008 baby
milk powder crisis. By analyzing these three, the author hopes to offer some initial
insights into the field of crisis management in the world’s most populous nation, sketch
out some guidelines for action at a governmental level, and provide suggestions for future
research.

1.2 The Importance of the Government in Crisis Management
A crisis today tends not to be a discrete event, but a process unfolding as forces
interact in unforeseen and disturbing ways. Crises are increasingly characterized by
complexity, interdependence and politicization. Many social scientists, public officials
and corporate executives now share an urge to understand how and why crises occur,
what could have been done to avoid them, and what can be done to prevent them in the
future.
Previous studies of the interweaving of crisis management and crisis communication
have tended to focus on organizations in business settings. However, one can’t avoid
noticing the number of devastating public crises throughout the world, from earthquakes
and hurricanes to disease outbreaks. The occurrence of these crises shows that crisis
management is not only a determinant of survival for any organization, but also an
2

important issue for governments at a national level. Because of the sudden occurrence
and large-scale damage experienced in public crises, there is no single person or
organization that can manage and respond effectively. Thus, citizens expect the
government to deliver decisive action, instant relief and long-term leadership.
The Chinese government appears to be in stable control of the nation. But crises of
one sort or another presumably could shake that control and pose challenges even to the
powerful government in Beijing. So the government has worked, sometimes with limited
success, occasionally with substantial success, to develop systems of effective crisis
management. And success in crisis management will not come without effective crisis
communication in its many forms.
The following research questions are formulated for this study:
RQ1: What were the points of consistency and difference in the Chinese
government’s crisis management strategies in recent years? What elements caused
these variances? What worked, what didn’t?
RQ2: How did the Chinese government communicate in these public crises? Where
were there failures? What led to success?

1.3 Definitions
1.31 The Definition of Crisis
Crises are typically characterized by an escalating threat, short response time, and
surprise (Seeger, Sellnow, & Ulmer, 2003). These are further complicated by the
involvement of various parties possessing different and often opposing perspectives,
3

interests and motivations. Stressing the consequences of a crisis, Fearn-Banks defined a
crisis as “a major occurrence with a potentially negative outcome affecting an
organization, company or industry, as well as its publics, products, services or good
name” (Fearn-Banks, 1996). Emphasizing the urgency of decision-making, Paschall
defined a crisis as “simply a sudden, unexpected event that poses an institutional threat
suggesting the need for rapid, high-level decision-making” (Paschall, 1992). Coombs
defined crises as threats, “meaning that they actually do or have the potential to create
negative or undesirable outcomes” (Coombs, 1999). The Chinese term for crisis is also
often mentioned because it defines crises as a combination of both “danger” and
“opportunity” (Fink, 1986). In sum, crises come in various shapes and sizes. They have
magnitude, duration and culpability. The definition of crisis in this thesis integrates the
definitions mentioned above.

1.32 The Concept of Public Crisis
Public crisis is defined as an emergency situation under which national security,
societal stability, public order, and human lives and property are seriously jeopardized or
harmed, leading to major consequences that need to be handled urgently by public
decision-makers (Heath, 2004).
Public crisis includes regular crises like natural disaster, economic crisis, public
disease, terrorist attack, and special crises like coup and war. In China, examples of large
public crises have been SARS epidemic, avian flu, the Songhua River benzene spill, the
4

2008 snowstorm disaster and the high numbers of coal-mining accidents, plus the recent,
extraordinarily devastating Sichuan Earthquake.

1.33 The Concept of Crisis Management
Coombs (2004) defined crisis management as “a set of factors designed to combat
crises and to lessen the actual damage inflicted by the crisis.” Similarly, Pearson and
Clair (1998) defined crisis management as “the systematic attempt to avoid
organizational crises or to manage those crisis events that do occur.”
Regardless of what parameters are set in defining a crisis, and regardless of
differences in terminology among crises, emergencies, accidents or incidents, reality
dictates that organizations must take swift action to deal with problems once they occur
(Massey & Larsen, 2003).
Crisis management, in all its multi-disciplinary forms (Coombs, 1999), is the direct
intent to both divert a crisis in advance and to manage crisis once it has erupted (Pearson
& Clair, 1998). Most crisis management approaches are derived from the realization that
good performance in crisis management “means saving lives, financial resources, and
reputations and other valuable resources” (Coombs, 1999).

1.34 The Concept of Crisis Communication
Heath and Millar (2004) suggest that a crisis has two dimensions. The first
dimension, described above in section 3.3, is the technical/managerial, which recognizes
5

that a crisis imposes intense demands on the managerial choices, resources and technical
performance of an organization.
But the second dimension, no less important than technical performance, is
communication before, during and after the crisis. This element is called crisis
communication, and experience shows that it can be botched badly or can be carried out
expertly.
Crisis communication requires skillful and open weighing of the perceptions, needs
and expectations of the stakeholder groups outside and inside the organization. Effective
communication is essential to an organization’s recovery from a crisis. Not only can
crisis communication help control and bring an end to a crisis, it can create a more
positive reputation for the organization involved in the crisis (Seeger, Sellnow, & Ulmer,
2003). Crisis communication stresses the message-development-and-presentation part of
the crisis response. It underscores the role that information, framing and interpretation
play in the organization’s preparation for a crisis, its response to it, and its post-crisis
comments and actions.
Crisis communication should be a two-way information exchange, not simply a one-
way transfer to the public. As Shrivastava observed, crisis communication “implies not
only the transfer of information, but an exchange of information, underlying assumptions
and discourse aimed at reaching a common understanding of issues” (Shrivastava, 1987).

6

1.4 Method
This thesis used media accounts to reconstruct the Chinese government’s
performance of crisis management and crisis communication during the past decade.
Three major public crises, namely the SARS epidemic, the Sichuan earthquake, and the
baby milk powder scandal, were chosen for analysis. The SARS epidemic was chosen
because of the large scale of the outbreak, the transnational spread, and its carryover
impacts to public crises that followed. It served as a wake-up call for the Chinese
government to improve its crisis management and emergency response systems,
information disclosure system, legal framework, and accountability system etc.
The Sichuan earthquake was chosen because of the intensity of the earthquake, the
huge number of casualties, and the unprecedentedly swift response of the Chinese
authorities.
The baby milk powder scandal was chosen because of the large number of victims,
the wide range of products and brands involved, and the public concerns it raised about
food safety in China.
Media coverage, including both Chinese and foreign print outlets and online media,
was analyzed. More specifically, in the SARS crisis, most of the information came from
existing research monograph publications on SARS, such as SARS and the Rule of Law in
China, Local Management of SARS in China: Guangdong and Beijing, and SARS and
China's Political System. In the Sichuan earthquake and in the milk-powder crisis, the
information came from a wide range of leading newspapers and magazines, such as The
New York Times, Xinhua, The Wall Street Journal, China Daily, Associated Press etc.
7

News stories were located in the Lexis-Nexis and Factiva database by using the
keywords “earthquake,” “SARS” and “baby milk powder” in the time range of after the
date of the crisis until now. Some stories were also located in the online archives of
individual newspaper Web sites.

1.5 Preview
In the chapter that follows, the thesis sets up the benchmarks of crisis management
and crisis communications that are widely used in the discussions throughout the thesis.
In Chapter 3, the thesis introduces the structure and the role of the Chinese government in
crisis management. In Chapter 4, the Chinese government’s performance in the SARS
crisis is analyzed. In Chapter 5, the case of Sichuan earthquake is examined. In Chapter 6,
the milk powder scandal is studied. In Chapter 7, the thesis discusses the lessons the
Chinese government learned over the decade, and the consistencies, differences and the
trend among the crises. In Chapter 8, the thesis provided some suggestions for future
application and studies of crisis management at a governmental level.

8

CHAPTER 2: BENCHMARKS
Good crisis management and good crisis communication are so closely related that
they might be considered one body, in another sense twins. The tools of action that make
up crisis management need reinforcement with the tools of two-way information and the
openness of crisis communication or the effort likely will risk being ineffective.

2.1 Benchmarks of Crisis Management
Crises move through stages and accordingly are likely to require different strategies
throughout the life of a crisis. (Gonzales-Herrero & Pratt, 1996; Massey, 2001). Generally
there are three stages that an organizational crisis can be expected to move through: pre-
crisis, during crisis, and post-crisis. This paper mainly focuses on crisis management and
crisis communication at the “during crisis” stage.
I would propose that in public crises specifically-- those substantially involving
government responsibility -- the criteria of good crisis management should include the
following points at the minimum:

Benchmark A-1. Co-ordinate among all levels and departments of
government, including the military in natural disasters
Complex coordination is often required, especially to prevent the crisis from
developing secondary and tertiary impacts. Optimally, all levels and departments of
government agencies would be networked together, sharing data and information
accurately and with minimum delay. However, because of government fragmentation,
9

overlapping responsibilities, lack of inter-operable communication systems, and
interagency rivalries -- weaknesses that all too often characterize relations among
government agencies -- crisis management implementation will in many instances be
severely undermined.
Charles and Kim (1988) analyzed intergovernmental cooperation in times of public
crisis under the U.S. political system, a study also applicable to the crisis management in
other countries. They concluded that the three levels of government -- federal, state and
local -- must work together and complement each others’ roles to achieve successful
response and a full recovery for the community. When one or more link in this chain is
weak, action to address the crisis is slow and inadequate. The same can apply to other
nations with different political structures.
The military can play a positive role in natural disaster response, particularly when
the incident is of a large-scale (Pinkowski, 2008) or when specialized disaster relief is
required. An increased military response to disasters can shape the recovery experience for
survivors, reshape the role of the military, enhance presidential power, and fundamentally
recast the administration of public policy (Pinkowski, 2008). It is, therefore, essential that
the military coordinate well with other government agencies in a public crisis.

Benchmark A-2. Have in place advanced legal systems to deal with public
emergencies
The primary purpose of a state is to protect the lives and property of its people.
Therefore the state must have a crisis management system established in law to respond to
10

emergencies (Farazmand, 2001). Weber depicts an ideal bureaucracy as coming in the
form of an efficient and fair organization with laws and administrative regulations in place
(Weber, 1958). Legal frameworks can play an important role in clarifying the rights and
duties of individuals, communities and governments, serving as a bulwark of crisis
management. There is a need for jurisdictional clarity among levels of government in
responding to public crises.
The legal framework in public crises has at least four core elements: laws; the
competencies of those who make, implement, and interpret the laws; information critical
to those multidisciplinary practitioners; and coordination across sectors and jurisdictions
(Illinois Department of Public Health, USA, 2003).

Benchmark A-3. Set up and maintain in advance reliable communication
mechanisms for whatever agencies are responsible
According to Garnett’s review of the international literature, effective
communication among responders is crucial to handling crises successfully (Garnett,
1997). In this case the reference is to the technical means of communication, rather than to
the whole panoply of public-relations means that will need to be employed. Examples of
the technical means include communication channels such as television, newspaper,
telephone, SMS, radio and internet, and communication systems such as early warning
systems, information reporting systems, first response systems etc. At the peak of a crisis,
these technical means of communication become the essence of coping with a crisis
(Pinkowski, 2008).
11

Benchmark A-4. Establish and enforce accountability systems for
government officials
In a public crisis, the central actors are accountable to different publics with
divergent interests (Perry, 1983). To attain successful comprehensive disaster
management outcomes, each actor must cooperate with the others and complement their
requirements. Each level of government not only has its specific roles and
responsibilities, but also must share resources and activities with the other levels.
Because evidence of a warp in the public fabric first becomes noticeable from the bottom
up in most cases, the local government should logically be the first level to respond.
(Pinkowski, 2008). A major exception will be discussed in this paper.

2.2 Benchmarks of Crisis Communication
Gonzales-Herrero and Pratt (1996) argue that at the “during crisis” stage, the crisis
itself has already occurred; the communicative efforts at this point are designed to handle
the media, to develop crisis materials (i.e., position statements and responses to frequently
asked questions), to preempt negative publicity, and to communicate with stakeholders).
They argue that communication during the crisis targets particular audiences, obtains
third-party support, implements internal communications, and tries to control rumor-
mongering.
The “during crisis” stage is also referred to as “acute crisis stage” (Fink, 1986) and
“response stage” (FEMA, 1995). Fink indicated that the “acute crisis stage” in reality is
the damage-control stage: “Avalanche-like speed and intensity accompanies and
12

characterizes this stage” (Fink, 1986). In the acute-crisis stage, the ability to control speed
and direction of information flow can seriously influence the duration and resolution of
the crisis. FEMA (the Federal Emergency Management Agency), an agency of the U.S.
government tasked with disaster mitigation, preparedness, response and recovery planning,
has suggested that during the “response stage,” it is important to coordinate rapid, accurate
response and situation assessments to control an emergency (FEMA, 1995).
1

Benchmark B-5 Be ready to provide information quickly (Coombs, 2004;
Harvard Business Essentials, 2004)
The need for speed in crisis communication escalates as technology accelerates the
movement of information, thereby reducing the time a crisis team has for responding
(Barton, 2001). In some cases, key stakeholders learn facts from the media before they
have been officially notified, creating an aggravated situation for the responding
organization. If the crisis team does not supply the initial crisis information to the media,
some other groups will, and they may be ill-informed, misinformed, or motivated to harm
the organization. A quick response helps to ensure that hear the public hears the
organization’s side of the story (Coombs, 2004).
From the stakeholder’s viewpoint, a rapid response demonstrates that the
organization is capable (Darling, 1994; Maynard, 1993). Conversely, a slow response
makes an organization appear to be incompetent (Donath, 1984). Rapid response signifies
control, and the semblance of control is important to credibility.

1 Reference to FEMA’s guidelines on crisis management may elicit ironic responses. Given FEMA’s
notoriously poor performance during Hurricane Katrina, FEMA’s guidelines, which are accorded respect
within the profession, fall under the category of, “Do as we say, not as we did.”
13

The fact that information availability is limited should not prevent a rapid response.
In some crises, it takes time to collect and to process the necessary information. Large-
scale accidents, in particular, produce great confusion. It is acceptable for a crisis team
to appear before the media with an incomplete story. There is no sin in telling the media
that the crisis team does not know something but will provide the information as soon as
possible. It is better to have the spokesperson saying the cause or extent of damages is
still under investigation than to have stakeholders feel they’re being fed inaccurate
information (Coombs, 2004).

Benchmark B-6 Put people first (Harvard Business Essentials, 2004)
During a crisis, it is possible that government will find itself dealing with many
conflicting elements at the same time, such as negative publicity, economic needs, social
stability, public safety and health etc. Crisis is the time when government support is
most needed, and people must be the focus of that support. For ultimately, people are the
most valuable assets in a crisis. In the end, material things can be replaced. Reputation
and image can be restored. Economic losses can be recovered. People’s health and lives
are the most important of all.

Benchmark B-7 Be on the scene (Harvard Business Essentials, 2004)
Crisis and leadership are closely intertwined phenomena. Top people need to
arrive on the scene quickly. A physical presence sends a strong message that leaders
14

think the situation is extremely important. Their absence sends the opposite message
(Harvard Business School Press, 2004).
People experience crisis as threat and uncertainty, a grave predicament requiring
urgent action (Rosenthal, Boin & Comfort, 2001). It is a natural inclination in such
distress to look to leaders to “do something.” The presence of top leaders on the scene of
crisis has an emotionally soothing effect. As a leader, one can help people in crisis
manage their expectations by conveying, for example, that within what is possible, the
very best is being done. Messages such as this will help people maintain perspective and
tolerate uncertainty longer.
Competent emotional leadership also speaks to and about shared values, those
things that bind us as communities. And in order to do all these things, a leader has to be
highly and frequently visible. She or he needs to have the courage to be in interactions
with people, so that the public will feel cared about (Cohen, 2008).
Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani is a leader almost universally admired for
his handling of the crisis of 9/11. He stayed visible, and he was as close to the scene of
the tragedy as he could be. He communicated what he knew to be accurate information
as soon as he knew it. And he made sure that there was a steady stream of
communications from his chiefs of fire and police. He gave the people of New York,
and of the entire country, the sense that as dreadful as events were, their leadership was
functional, in control, and dealing with events as they unfolded (Cohen, 2008).
15

Giuliani writes, “While mayor, I made it my policy to see with my own eyes the
scene of every crisis so I could evaluate it firsthand.”
2

Benchmark B-8 Speak with one voice: consistency (Coombs, 2004)
The organization must deliver consistent messages to stakeholders, and a unified
response promotes consistency and credibility. The goal is to give the public “accurate,
coordinated, timely and easy-to-understand” information (Radvanovsky, 2006).
Consistency does not mean having just one person speak for the organization every time
there is a public statement. Rather, speaking with one voice means coordinating the
efforts of the official spokespersons and discouraging other organizational members
from becoming unofficial spokespersons (Seitel, 1983). A consistent message is more
believable than an inconsistent one (Clampitt, 1991; Garvin, 1996).

Benchmark B-9 Present a factually accurate and coherent account for
the situation and for its proper resolution (Heath, 2004)
A single attempt to mislead the media (and, by extension, the public), such as
withholding information or deliberate release of incorrect information, can be enough to
transform the atmosphere of a newsroom from welcoming to accusatory.
It is possible that during a crisis, all the facts will not come out quickly at the
beginning. However, it should not be misperceived as a justification for withholding
information until everything can be fully confirmed. Rather, during disasters

2
Jeff Janssen. “9/11 Leadership Lessons”. http://www.teamcaptainsnetwork.com/public/230.cfm
16

governments should release information about important developments as fast as
possible, but with the explicit caveat that the first report could turn out to have been
sketchy and that the spokesperson is in the midst of fleshing out, confirming, or
disproving such initial reports. There is a major difference between telling a partial story
because that’s all the government knows (advisable) and not telling what the
government knows because it has not yet been confirmed (not advisable) (Jack
Pinkowski, 2008). Therefore, concluded Braber, “The principal challenge facing public-
affairs officials during crises is to obtain and release accurate information without
causing unwarranted panic or complicating recovery efforts” (Graber, 2003). Granted, it
is not always easy to find the right balance.
Presenting factually accurate and coherent accounts for the event also helps to
counter rumors and speculation. A crisis creates an information void. Nature abhors a
vacuum. Any information void will be filled somehow and by someone. The information
void can become filled with rumor and speculation, not facts (Caruba, 1994).

Benchmark B-10. Commit the response system to information
transparency and openness (Coombs, 2004)
The openness of an organization is a multifaceted concept. Openness means (a)
availability to the media, (b) willingness to disclose information, and (c) honesty.
Availability means that a spokesperson will answer inquiries in a timely fashion,
immediately if the information is available. During a crisis, this responsiveness takes the
17

form of spokespersons or other crisis team members making every reasonable attempt to
respond to questions promptly. Reasonableness is an important qualifier (Coombs, 2004).
Sometimes the situation does not allow for an immediate response. When delays
are necessary, tell stakeholders why the question cannot be answered and when they
might be able to expect a response (Stewart & Cash, 1997). To let a request go
unacknowledged will risk damaging the stakeholder-organization relationship.
Communication with stakeholders is a two-way process.
A typical struggle in crisis communication is between the legal perspective, which
sometimes tries to mandate limited disclosure of crisis-related-information, and the
public relations perspective for full disclosure (Fitzpatrick & Rubin, 1995; Kaufmann,
Kesner, & Hazen, 1994; Twardy, 1994; Tyler, 1997). The disclosure debate raises the
question of honesty. A common recommendation for crisis communication is to be
honest and not lie to stakeholders. Stakeholders are angrier when an organization lies
about a crisis than when an organization has a crisis (Caruba, 1994). If limited
disclosure is imperative, the motivation must not be deception. In fact, an organization
should fully disclose any and all information about a crisis if there are risks of further
harm or even death resulting from the crisis. Limited disclosure should not be used as a
form of stonewalling (Coombs, 2004).

2.3 Transnational Applicability
The benchmarks of good crisis management and crisis communication mentioned
above are mainly based on Western theories and studies. However, because of the
18

transnational trend of crises in recent years, these benchmarks are also applicable to
China, though it has different political, economic, and cultural settings. The
transnational trend of crises means the original source of the problems at hand may
continue to be local or national, but the immediate and long-term impact of disasters
and crises to come could span countries and continents. The trigger to an international
crisis may derive from three interrelated perceptions that are generated by a disruptive
event. These are perceptions by a state’s decision maker(s) of
(1) higher than normal threat to one or more basic values,
(2) finite time for response, and
(3) heightened probability of involvement in military before the threat is
overcome (Brecher, 2008).
As the analysis in this paper proceeds, it will be argued that China has had some
poor performances in crisis management and communications in the past decade, but
also has taken charge in a forceful way in one very important crisis and managed it
effectively and admirably – a textbook case of good crisis management and
communication.

19

CHAPTER 3: STRUCTURE AND ROLE OF THE CHINESE GOVERNMENT IN
CRISIS MANAGEMENT
3.1 The General Structure of the Chinese Government
Power within the government is divided among three bodies: the Communist party,
the state, and the People’s Liberation Army. All positions of significant power in the state
and in the army are occupied by members of the Communist Party, which is controlled by
the Politburo Standing Committee of the Communist Party. That committee makes all
decisions of national significance.
The primary organs of state power are the National People’s Congress (NPC), the
president, and the State Council. The National People’s Congress, though it is in session
for a limited time, is the highest organ of state power. It meets annually for about two
weeks to review and approve major new policy directions, laws, the budget, and major
personnel changes. Its powers include delegating authority and supervising other
governing organs.
The State Council of the People’s Republic, namely the Central People’s Government,
is the highest executive organ of state power and administration. The State Council is
composed of a premier, vice-premiers, state councilors, ministers in charge of ministries
and commissions, the auditor-general and the secretary-general. The premier of the State
Council is nominated by the president, reviewed by the NPC, and appointed and removed
by the president. Other members of the State Council are nominated by the premier,
reviewed by the NPC or its Standing Committee, and appointed and removed by the
president.
20

The Central Military Commission of the People’s Republic is the highest state
military organ. It commands all the armed forces. The chairman of the Central Military
Commission is elected by the National People’s Congress. Other members are decided by
the NPC and its Standing Committee on the basis of nomination by the chairman.
Local government is structured in a hierarchy on four different levels. The village
level is at the grassroots and is not considered part of the hierarchy. So local government
begins with the township, county, prefecture (or municipality) and advances through the
province as the geographical area of jurisdiction increases. Each level in the hierarchy is
responsible for overseeing the work carried out by lower levels of the administrative
strata.

3.2 The Role of the Government in Crisis Management
The crisis management system is expressed as “one office and four committees”: that
is, the Emergency Management Office of the State Council at the national level, and
corresponding organizations with regard to four public security areas -- the National
Committee for Disaster Reduction to manage natural disasters, the National Committee
for Work Safety to manage industrial accidents, the National Committee for Patriotic
Health to manage public health, and the National Committee for Integrated Management
to manage other aspects of public security.
3

The national-level Emergency Management Office (EMO) provides a framework for
a comprehensive emergency management program that directs planning, preparation,

3
Shi, Peijun & Liu, Jing & Yao, Qinghai & Tang, Di & Yang, Xi. (2007). Integrated Disaster Risk
Management of China.
21

response and recovery.
4
The Emergency Management Office serves as an inter-agency
liaison for all emergency management and national security activities through the State
Council, striving for integration of all programs, systems, assets, capabilities, training,
and response mechanisms. Permanent emergency management organizations have also
been established in place of temporary organizations to coordinate departments at the
provincial and ministerial levels. By the end of 2005, emergency response offices had
been set up by health departments in 27 provinces, autonomous regions and
municipalities across China.
5
A number of cities, including Shanghai, Nanning and
Shenzhen, have also begun operating emergency response centers.
6

The four committees are made up of a vice president or a committeeman of the State
Council of China as committee director, a minister or vice minister from the main related
ministries as an administrative vice director or vice director, and the vice ministers from
corresponding crisis management organizations in line with the national level.
7

4
“Shanghai Sets up Emergency Response Center,” People’s Daily, Oct. 13, 2004. And, see the
website of Nanning City Emergency Response Center, www.nncerc.com; “Shenzhen Prepares
for Emergencies,” Shenzhen Daily, March 17, 2005.
5
“Health Ministry Urges Timely Report of Emergency Response,” Xinhua News Agency, July 14,
2006.
6
ZhongKaibin. (2007). Crisis Management in China. China Security (p.90-109). World Security Institute.
7
Shi, Peijun & Liu, Jing & Yao, Qinghai & Tang, Di & Yang, Xi. (2007). Integrated Disaster Risk
Management of China.
22

Figure 1: Emergency Management Organization System in China
As for natural disaster emergencies, as prescribed in “State Emergency Response
Planning for Natural Disaster”: according to the degree of disaster loss, the Ministry of
Civil Affairs adopts a four-grade response system. The more severe the situation is, the
higher the level of government response and decision-making.
8

Figure 2: Emergency Response Gradations for Natural Disaster in China

8
Shi, Peijun & Liu, Jing & Yao, Qinghai & Tang, Di & Yang, Xi. (2007). Integrated Disaster Risk
Management of China.
23

CHAPTER 4: THE SARS CRISIS
4.1 Background of the Episode
In late 2002 and the first half of 2003, the disease SARS (severe acute respiratory
syndrome) struck Asia and North America, with lethal effect. By July 2003, when the
World Health Organization (WHO) finally considered the disease to be under control,
7,442 people in 32 countries had been infected, with 916 deaths.
9
On average, SARS
kills about 15 percent of those who contract it, but the fatality rate varies greatly by age:
While children tend to have mild symptoms, SARS kills most of those over age 60 who
contract it.
10

The first person known to have contracted the disease, in November 2002, was a
man in Foshan, a city in China’s Guangdong Province. The patient died soon after, and
no definite diagnosis was made of the cause of death. On Feb. 21, 2003, an infected
Chinese doctor, 63-year-old Liu Jianlun, carried the virus to neighboring Hong Kong,
where he attended a wedding and spread it to several other visitors at the Metropole
Hotel; some of them later carried it to Vietnam, Singapore and Canada. WHO traces
more than half the SARS cases worldwide to Liu, who died in early March. With what is
now known about the disease, health- care providers like Dr. Liu with extensive
exposure to SARS would be quarantined and forbidden to travel. But no such guidelines
existed then.

9
World Health Organization. (2003). Summary table of SARS cases by country, 1 November 2002-7
August 2003. (2003). Retrieved March 28, 2005, from
http://www.who.int/csr/sars/country/en/country2003_08_15.pdf

10
Update 49 - SARS case fatality ratio, incubation period, World Health Organization, 7 May 2003. URL
Accessed 17 May 2008.
24

There was a period from mid-February to mid-April when understanding of SARS
began sketchily and imperfectly to accumulate in several places in China, but insight
was not clear enough to spur effective action on a broad scale until about April 13. Even
then it took another week before the government sprang into full action.
In March, one of WHO’s top infectious disease specialists was infected by SARS in
Hanoi and died. When WHO recognized that there were similar cases in Hong Kong and
rumors of more cases in China, it declared a Global Alert for the first time in WHO
history.
On April 20, finally cognizant of the seriousness of the epidemic, and with another
week behind it of massively underreporting SARS in the capital, China dramatically
switched tracks. Beijing Mayor Meng Xuenong and the nation’s health minister, Zhang
Wenkang, were sacked. Systems were set up to improve reporting and control of SARS.
Since then, China fought the epidemic forcefully. The effort paid off.
In May and June, the epidemic leveled off and started to decline. In early May, the
average number of new cases per day was 151; in mid-May, it was 45; by late May, it
was 14; and from June 1 to now, it has been almost zero.

4.2 The Government’s Crisis Management in the SARS Case
The SARS Crisis should be divided into two phases: The first phase was from
November 2002 to April 19, 2003, an inattention and cover-up phase which was marked
by restricting access to information, being slow to report the number of infections,
downplaying the dangers of the disease, and keeping a lid on the media. The second
25

phase extended from April 20, 2003, to June 2003 – the period of effective and
transparent management of the crisis, a period of quick leadership changes, and
intervention by central and local levels of government. The turning point was a press
conference on April 20, 2003, run by Vice-Minister of Health Gao Qiang.
In this section, the benchmarks of good crisis management set up in Chapter 2 will
be used to analyze the performance of the Chinese government in the SARS crisis.
• Regarding the benchmark “Coordination among all levels and departments of
government, including the military in natural disasters”
In the first phase, the bureaucratic integration between central departments and
local ones was poor. There was a strong inclination on the part of the Guangdong
authorities to want to treat SARS as merely a local problem. In part, this inclination was
due to the political and economic dynamics of Guangdong. The concern of local officials
was that news of SARS would affect the flow of investments and tourists into the
province, which would have a significant impact on its economic performance. Partly, it
was due to a local perception that SARS could be brought under control. At that time, the
number of people who had died from the outbreak was negligible compared to the
numerous others who had succumbed to influenza and respiratory problems in the winter-
spring period.
Moreover, poor bureaucratic integration could explain the government’s slow
response to SARS. In this case, a fragmentation of responsibility existed between the
party’s Department of Publicity
11
and the Ministry of Health. Not only do the two

11
The name of this department has been changed from Department of Propaganda to Department of
Publicity.
26

departments belong to different organizational branches, but there has been an inherent
conflict of interest between the two. The Department of Publicity, being the party’s
mouthpiece, had a predominant say over how information pertaining to SARS was
managed. The interest of the Department of Publicity is not to divulge news which could
impact negatively on the party’s image. The Ministry of Health and Guangdong Bureau
of Health, as organs under the State Council, were compelled to work within the
parameters set by the party in general and specifically by the Department of Publicity
when dealing with information on SARS. So the Department of Publicity should share
responsibility for the spread of SARS (Zheng & Fook, 2004). It should be noted that in
the wake of SARS, this fractured relationship has been addressed in a corrective manner.
A third source of poor co-ordination was that, during the SARS crisis, there was a
lack of information sharing among military and civilian hospitals. In Guangzhou, after
Jan. 31 several military hospitals treated SARS patients. Apparently the military had
been well aware of the infectiousness of the disease and implemented effective and safe
treatment regimens. However, civilian hospitals in Guangzhou did not share in this
valuable information. As a result, SARS patients infected scores of medical workers in
several large hospitals in Guangzhou in February (Lai, 2004). Such a dichotomy
between the military and civilian authority seriously impeded efforts to contain the
spread of the disease.
But then in the second phase of the SARS story, shortly before and after the
Politburo’s decision to fight SARS, several national ministries issued directives to their
branches, urging them to take measures to prevent the spread of the virus. On April 14,
27

the Ministries of Health, Finance, Railway and Transportation and the Bureau of Civil
Aviation jointly asked their local branches and local governments to look out for
passengers suspected of SARS at terminals, isolate and treat them, and sanitize these
places. The following day, the State Administration for Quality Supervision, Inspection
and Quarantine, together with the Ministry of Health, issued an announcement, stepping
up the health inspection of people crossing the border. On the same day, the Ministry of
Health ordered all local branches to report SARS statistics each day.
After mid-April, the central leaders finally took the lead in enforcing and
coordinating SARS management among bureaucratic agencies, among provinces, and
between provinces and Hong Kong. The Politburo Standing Committee ordered localities
to treat SARS as one of the most important tasks. On April 23, the State Council formed
a command center for preventing and curing SARS. Vice Premier Wu Yi, who took over
as health minister on April 20, was appointed as director. A fund for preventing and
curing SARS, totaling 2 billion yuan, was established on April 23.
12
The national
government sent out inspectors throughout the country to supervise local efforts and
implementation.
Under central leadership and pressure, many localities formed a coordinating
agency to handle SARS and local leaders took charge personally. Hospitals were
mobilized and equipped as permitted by local resources, transportation hubs were
inspected and sanitized, and suspect patients were detected and, in many cases, received

12
“Uniformly coordinating the nation’s prevention and curing: China established a command center for
fighting the infectious disease”, posted at http:// www.zaobao.com on 24 Apr 2003, accessed on the same
day.
28

immediate treatment. In a couple of months, SARS was brought under control (Lai,
2004).
• Regarding the benchmark “Have in place advanced legal systems to deal with
public emergencies”
China enacted its law on Prevention and Control of Infectious Disease in 1989. The
law establishes principles and policies of the central government about epidemic
prevention and treatment. According to the law, governments at all levels were to have
the responsibility to prepare and implement plans for the prevention of infectious
diseases. Health departments at all levels should monitor and administer the work of
disease prevention and control. Persons in charge and personnel working on disease
prevention and control should not conceal information or lie (Article 22). When there is
an outbreak of infectious disease, the government in the locality should immediately
prevent and cut off the vector. The 1989 law and related measures should have applied to
the SARS case from the very beginning, but that was not what happened (Zou, 2004).
In the second stage, once China went to battle against SARS, the law began to have
its effect. On April 30, an announcement was made jointly by the Publicity Department
of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), the Ministry of Justice
and the Ministry of Health that the whole country should mount a fight against SARS in
line with the 1989 law.
Significantly in May 2003, China enacted new regulations on public health
emergencies, the first of a kind for China. The regulations aim to establish a prompt and
effective emergency response mechanism. The regulations establish early warning,
29

monitoring and reporting systems. Upon an emergency happening, the State Council
should establish a national command headquarters, consisting of relevant departments
from the government and from the army. It would now be required that provincial
governments should report emergencies to the Ministry of Health within an hour. It also
provides that any individual or organization has the right to report emergencies and is
entitled to accuse governments of not performing their duties according to law.
Contingency plans should be prepared both at the central and provincial levels.
Governments and officials will be held responsible for hiding or delaying emergency
information or giving false information. The regulations establish a system for
publicizing emergency information as well. During the second stage SARS, information
was published every day.
• Regarding the benchmark “Set up and maintain in advance reliable
communication mechanisms”
The belated and weak response of the Chinese government toward the disease in
the early months illustrates two profound problems in the information transmission and
communication mechanisms.
Information asymmetry hampered the fight against SARS. The Chinese regimen of
information has two characteristics: information asymmetries manifest themselves first in
favor of low-level bureaucrats, and secondarily in favor of the state.
Higher levels of the party and the government bureaucracy rely heavily on lower
levels to report various types of information, including local disasters, diseases, and
outstanding problems. This gives local officials and lower-level bureaucrats an edge over
30

their superiors in information. On the other hand, the Chinese state -- not unique among
world governments -- has been suppressing sensitive information. This gives the state an
edge over the common people in information concerning the political, economic and
social state of the country. This practice has two critical drawbacks. First, the public can
take action to prevent disaster only when it is informed. Informing the public may lead to
certain public panic in the short run, yet may induce it to behave in a rational fashion over
a protracted period to avoid the disaster. Should the state suppress the information
regarding a pending crisis and eventually fail to prevent it, the populace will be alarmed
over the state’s performance. The state may lose credibility and even legitimacy (Lai,
2004).
Clearly, China needs to develop a system that encourages cross-sectoral
collaboration to provide comprehensive, integrated solutions. This is not just a problem
related to SARS; too few if any local administrations have in place an effective crisis-
response network, something that the Ministry of Civil Affairs was concerned about even
before the SARS outbreak. All too often different ministries or localities work in their
own interests to undermine national policy. In October 2003, Wu Yi complained that
some local governments had still not carried out central government directions for
formulating emergency plans (Saich, 2004).
• Regarding the benchmark “Establish and enforce accountability systems for
government officials”
At the first stage of SARS management, the local government in Beijing and
apparently the health minister suppressed news about SARS, purportedly in order to
31

assure smooth waters for high-level National People’s Congress (NPC) and Chinese
People's Political Consultative Conference (NPPCC) sessions. Later on these officials,
along with hospital officials, seem to have put forward understated statistics on SARS.
The hospitals might also have wanted to ensure that patients would keep coming to them,
and publishing the news would have hurt their business (Lai, 2004).
Then, the tone of things changed. When hiding from the truth ended, national
leaders applied administrative control to cope with the runaway epidemic. The central
leadership ordered cadres to act forcibly on SARS, held them responsible for the
outcome, and penalized ineffective senior officials. A green light was given for all
localities and institutions to punish disobedient and incompetent officials in SARS
management.
On April 13, Premier Wen called on officials to take decisive and effective
measures to contain SARS. On April 17, State President and Party Secretary Hu Jintao
chaired a Politburo Standing Committee meeting. The meeting stressed that fighting
SARS was an important task and that leaders at all levels should command the fight and
should disclose truthful statistics about the epidemic. On April 20, the two ministerial-
level officials, namely the public health minister and the Beijing mayor, were removed
from their posts, apparently for inability to keep SARS under control. The Politburo
decision on April 17 and dismissals of these two senior officials amounted to a call for
urgent action as well as a stern warning to all bureaucratic, provincial and local leaders.
32

Subsequently, thousands of cadres from provincial level down to village level were
relieved of their posts or disciplined over SARS
13
(Lai, 2004).
The new regulations on public health emergencies imposed legal liabilities on
persons deemed to have broken the law. The regulations set forth five types of
punishment on government officials if they concealed or delayed reporting or lied. It was
particularly provided that during the emergency period, those who spread rumors, raised
prices, cheated customers, and disturbed social and market order would be punished
(Zou, 2004).
As a result of central pressure and legal regulations, national ministries and all
localities quickly switched into high gear to manage SARS; disclosed more reliable
statistics; isolated patients and suspected victims; and tried hard to stem the spread of the
disease. In return, the central government became better informed about the epidemic
situation in the localities and could better handle the crisis (Lai, 2004).

4.3 Applying the Benchmarks to Crisis Communication
• Regarding the benchmark “Be ready and determined to provide quick and decisive
response”
It seems certain that Guangdong authorities knew about the disease by early January
at the latest. However, there was silence until Feb. 11, when after outbreaks in Zhongshan
and Guangzhou, a press conference was convened in a feeble effort to allay public
concern. On Feb. 3, the Guangdong health department issued a notice on “preventing and

13
“How to form enduring mechanism to reward and punish cadres in unusual circumstances”, posted at
http://news.xinhuanet.com on 26 Jun 2003, accessed on 10 Oct 2003.
33

treating the unclear pneumonia” and demanded that the illness be managed temporarily as
B-type infectious disease.
14
By early February, the authorities in Beijing were being made
aware of the situation in Guangdong. The Guangdong party committee and the provincial
government filed a report to the Ministry of Health on Feb. 7, and on Feb. 9 the ministry
sent Vice-Minister Ma Xiaowei to investigate. Thus officials in the State Council
certainly knew about the situation by this time, if not before. Citizen concern expressed
through the rapidly expanding new technology of instant messaging forced the
Guangdong leadership to make some kind of public acknowledgement. But the response
was to acknowledge that while there may have been a problem, it was not serious and
there was no longer anything to worry about.
Thus, while it is clear that central leaders must have known about the disease in
February, the initial response was very slow. The delay turned out to be fatal.
• Regarding the benchmark “Put people first”
In the initial phase, the Chinese government’s handling of the SARS crisis
demonstrated that putting people first was not the top priority for the government.
Instead, economic benefits, short-term social stability and some officials’ positions in
the government seemed to take precedence over public health and safety.
• Regarding the benchmark “Be on the scene”
Top leaders were relatively late on the scene. It was not until April 7 that Premier
Wen himself visited the center of the epidemic. He criticized the military for not
reporting on SARS cases and called on people to start telling the truth. On April 13, while

14
Class B diseases, the second most serious category, under China's Law on the Prevention and Treatment
of Infectious Diseases, include 25 ailments such as viral hepatitis.
34

Hu Jintao was visiting Guangdong, Wen oversaw an emergency meeting of the State
Council and warned that the country’s economy, international image, and social stability
might be damaged, and that “the overall situation remains grave.”
• Regarding the benchmark “Speaking with one voice: consistency”
The initial spokespersons in the press conference on Aril 3, 2003 were Health
Minister Zhang Wenkang and Beijing Mayor Meng Xuenong, who were later replaced by
Vice-Minister of Health Gao Qiang and acting Beijing Major Wang Qishan. Due to the
initial cover-up, spokespersons were not speaking consistently, which greatly tarnished
the credibility and trust of the government in the public opinion.
• Regarding the benchmark which calls for committing the response system to
information transparency and openness
On March 15 the World Health Organization (WHO) issued its first global
warning about SARS, but the Propaganda Department instructed the Chinese media not
to report it. On March 26, the authorities admitted that SARS was being dealt with in
Beijing hospitals, but the news was restricted to a small mention on inside pages of
newspapers and contained the upbeat view that “imported atypical pneumonia in our city
has been effectively controlled.” On March 28, China finally informed the WHO that it
would classify SARS as a category B disease, meaning that from now on provincial
authorities were obliged to notify central authorities of any cases. On April 2 the WHO
issued an advisory warning people against travel to Guangdong and Hong Kong. The
impact of SARS had become too hard to ignore.
35

On that day, Wen Jiabao presided over a meeting of the State Council Executive
Committee that heard a report from the Ministry of Health that SARS had “already been
brought under control.” This misleading report may explain why Minister Zhang
Wenkang was eventually dismissed, because it subsequently became clear that the
disease was far from under control.
A retired army doctor, Jiang Yanyong, knew that in one Beijing military hospital
alone (No. 309) there were 60 patients, including seven who had died. He faxed CCTV
and Phoenix TV from Hong Kong with his complaint. The information was ignored but
given to Der Spiegel and Time magazine. They put it on their Web sites, resulting in a
deluge of critical articles in the foreign press that were read by educated urban Chinese or
were translated into Chinese and circulated. It was becoming increasingly difficult for the
Chinese authorities to maintain that everything was under control.
Things began to change. On April 7, Premier Wen himself visited the Chinese
Center for Disease Control, and while the message for public consumption was positive,
it seems that he criticized the military for not reporting on SARS cases and called on
people to start telling the truth. On April 13, at a national meeting on SARS prevention,
Wen said that although the situation was “under effective control,” it remained
“extremely grave.”
The new sense of urgency and the notion that a new approach had to be taken was
confirmed at a key Politburo meeting on April 17. This meeting marked a watershed in
senior leadership response to SARS. Effectively, it acknowledged that China had been
lying and called on officials to report regularly to the public (daily reporting actually had
36

begun on April 1), not to delay reporting and not to cover up the situation. It also called
for greater international and local cooperation and for exchanging reports on experience
in limiting the disease. The following day, it was reported that a new task force had been
set up to oversee SARS work, now under the leadership of Beijing Party Secretary Liu Qi,
a Politburo member (Saich, 2004).
In the second phase, for awhile the media were allowed to report honestly about
SARS and the massive government efforts to control the epidemic, thus helping the
government regain control over public information about the disease. Prior to April 20,
rumors spread by mobile phone text messages and the Internet were the main sources of
public information. This contributed to public panic and anger with the government. Even
in China, information control is impossible in the electronic age. Misinformation or
concealment will be judged harshly. China’s leaders appear to have recognized that they
were quickly losing the SARS battle in the court of public opinion. As a response, they
loosened media controls, at least temporarily (Kaufman, 2004).
A press conference run by Vice-Minister of Health Gao Qiang on April 20, now
taking the place of the axed Zhang and Meng, was a public turning point in the Chinese
leadership’s attitude to dealing with SARS. Gao acknowledged that work had been
lacking and that the fragmented jurisdiction over medical facilities in the capital had
meant that accurate information had not been collected. Later, Wang Qishan was
appointed as acting mayor of Beijing. On April 30, he conducted a news conference that
was screened live on television giving the impression of a new-style, straight-talking
modern leader (Saich, 2004).
37

CHAPTER 5: THE SICHUAN EARTHQUAKE
5.1 Background of the Disaster
The 2008 Sichuan earthquake, also known as the Wenchuan earthquake, occurred at
14:28:01.42 CST on May 12, 2008, in Sichuan Province, hitting with a Richter
magnitude of 8.0M and 7.9M.
15
The epicenter was in Wenchuan County, 80 kilometers
west-northwest of Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan, at a depth of 19 kilometers.
16
As of
July 21, 2008 at 12:00 CST, official figures counted 69,227 persons as confirmed dead,
374,176 injured and 18,222 listed as missing.
17
The earthquake left about 4.8 million
people homeless,
18
though the number could be as high as 11 million.
19
Approximately
15 million people lived in the affected area. It was the deadliest earthquake to hit China
since the 1976 Tangshan earthquake.
20
The strong tremors were felt in half of China, as
far away as both Beijing and Shanghai, and in nearby countries.

15
Magnitude of SW China earthquake revised to 8.0". Xinhua News Agency. 2008-05-18.
http://english.gov.cn/2008-05/18/content_981724.htm. Retrieved on 2008-05-18.

16
"Magnitude 7.9 - Eastern Sichuan, China". USGS. 2008-05-12.
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/eqcenter/eqinthenews/2008/us2008ryan/#details. Retrieved on 2008-05-20.

17
"Casualties of the Wenchuan Earthquake" (in Chinese). Sina.com. 2008-06-08.
http://news.sina.com.cn/pc/2008-05-13/326/651.html. Retrieved on 2008-07-06. , and "Wenchuan
Earthquake has already caused 69,196 fatalities and 18,379 missing" (in Chinese). Sina.com. 2008-07-06.
http://news.sina.com.cn/c/2008-07-06/162615881691.shtml. Retrieved on 2008-07-07

18
"More than 4.8 million homeless in Sichuan quake: official". Relief Web (Agence France-Presse). 2008-
05-16. http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/RWB.NSF/db900SID/PANA-7EPG6V?OpenDocument. Retrieved
on 2008-07-07.

19
Hooker, Jake (2008-05-26). "Toll Rises in China Quake". New York Times.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/26/world/asia/26quake.html. Retrieved on 2008-06-01.

20
"10 Greatest Earthquakes in China in 20th Century" (in Chinese). Ningxia Daily website. 2008-05-15.
http://www.nxnet.cn/shouye/zktj/shxb/200805/t20080515_215065.htm. Retrieved on 2008-06-02.
38

5.2 The Chinese Government’s Crisis Management in the Sichuan Earthquake
In this chapter, the benchmarks of good crisis management and crisis communication
that have been set up in the Chapter 2 will be used to analyze the performance of the
Chinese government in the earthquake.
• Regarding the benchmark of “Coordination among all levels and departments of
government, including the military in natural disasters”
Many ministries and central and local departments were mobilized for disaster
relief. The response of related Chinese government departments was unprecedented.
According to the reports of China Daily, on May 13, 2008, the Communist Party of
China’s disciplinary commission ordered officials at all levels to step up the monitoring
and inspection of disaster relief work in quake-hit regions. A 21-member expert team
from the Ministry of Environmental Protection, led by Vice-Minister Li Ganjie, was
dispatched to Sichuan to assess nuclear and water pollution risks. The Ministry of Public
Security issued an urgent notice demanding all security personnel work to protect the
safety of the people and their property to maintain national stability. Vice-Minister of
Water Resources Jiao Yong arrived in Sichuan with a team to see whether dams that were
damaged by the quake might burst and endanger lives. The Ministry of Agriculture
organized more than 20 disinfectant, medical apparatus and vaccine drug producers to
provide help in quake-stricken areas. The General Administration of Quality
Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine issued a notice on May 12 demanding its
branches mobilize all available manpower and financial resources to the relief work.
Departments were also told to take measures to ensure the safety of food and essential
39

equipment. The China Seismological Bureau dispatched two teams on May 12 and
another team of 1,000 rescue and relief experts on May 13 which included seismologists,
medical workers and soldiers trained in disaster relief. On May 12, the State Electricity
Regulatory Commission activated its highest emergency response and promised all-out
efforts to restore power.
21

The Washington Post reported on May 14 that the Health Ministry issued an appeal
for blood donations. The Finance Ministry allocated an initial $123 million for rescue
efforts.
22

People’s Daily also reported on May 15 that Gao Qiang, deputy health minister, said
the Health Ministry had made careful plans for disease control and prevention in disaster
areas and had sent a large group of medical workers to those areas to ensure there would
be “no big epidemic after a great disaster.”
23

According to official media, the military response to the earthquake was rapid, as
the first Chinese military rescue team reportedly set out for the disaster area within 14
minutes after the strong earthquake began. People’s Daily reported that as of the
afternoon of May 13, near 20,000 soldiers and armed policemen had arrived in the quake-
hit areas of the province. An additional 30,000 soldiers were advancing toward the region
by plane, trains, trucks and on foot.
24
On May 14, the first two helicopters air-dropped

21
“Quake snippets”. Chinadaily.com.cn May 14, 2008 Wednesday.
22
“Death toll rising in China; Quake fatalities are expected to climb further as teams search for thousands
still trapped”. The Washington Post. May 14, 2008 Wednesday.

23
China aims at "no big epidemic after a great disaster", People’s Daily, May 15, 2008.
24
“Near 20,000 soldiers arrive in quake-hit SW China, 30,000 more coming”, People’s Daily, 20:20, May
13, 2008.
40

food, drinking water and medicine to Yingxiu Township of Wenchuan County.
25
The
Central Military Commission called on the army to view rescue and relief efforts as the
most imperative and significant political task. “All the troops in the relief efforts should
break convention, take exceptional measures and race against time to get in place as soon
as possible,” the commission ordered.
26

The New York Times and Washington Post gave positive coverage to the actions of
the military in Sichuan. The Times reported that China mobilized 30,000 additional
soldiers to the regions on May 14 to shore up weakened dams and other elements of the
infrastructure. It noted that the deployment of a total of 100,000 members of security
forces across the disaster zone was one of the largest peacetime mobilizations by any
country in recent memory. It also made comparison regarding the number of soldiers the
Chinese government dispatched in Sichuan earthquake with the number the American
government dispatched for Hurricane Katrina. It said in 2005 the American federal and
state governments dispatched about 50,000 members of the National Guard in eight days
to areas ravaged by Hurricane Katrina.
27

The Washington Post praised the Chinese government’s mobilization, noting that
“the Chinese government accelerated its massive rescue-and-recovery operation
Wednesday, dispatching hundreds of busloads of civilian rescue teams, paramilitary

25
“Army airdrops disaster relief goods to Sichuan”, People’s Daily, 21:22, May 14, 2008.
26
“PLA, police play backbone role in rescue”. chinadaily.com.cn. May 14, 2008.
27
“Chinese Soldiers Rush to Bolster Weakened Dams”. The New York Times. May 15, 2008 Thursday.
41

police and youthful volunteers toward earthquake-ravaged regions in a vivid
demonstration of the Communist Party’s power to mobilize.”
28

People’s Daily reported that as of 8 a.m. May 15, more than 130,000 troops were
engaged in rescue operations in areas ravaged by the quake, reaching all 58 counties and
towns. Military transporters and helicopters had taken 300 flights to transport or air-drop
rescuers and relief supplies. The railways were being used to ship in soldiers and relief
aid; 21 trains, or more than 10,000 soldiers, had arrived before 6 p.m. on May 15.
29
The
Army’s massive response to the earthquake reinforced its popularity among the people.
The earthquake relief effort provided opportunities for China to deepen its military-
civilian relations.
• Regarding the benchmark “Have in place advanced legal systems to deal with
public emergencies”
Chinese legislatures had passed two important laws in 2008 -- Regulations on
Disclosure of Information and an amendment to laws on earthquake safety and disaster
relief. According to China Daily, since May 1, 2008, all government departments had
been required to disclose information to the public in accordance with the Regulations on
Disclosure of Information, which was an important part of attempts to create a
transparent government.
30

28
“China Expedites Vast Rescue Operation; 'We Must Race Against Time,' Premier Says in Televised Visit
to Quake Scene”. The Washington Post. May 15, 2008 Thursday.

29
“130,000 troops in rescue operations throughout quake area”. People’s Daily. 18:29, May 15, 2008.
30
“Information is power indeed”. Chinadaily.com.cn. May 14, 2008 Wednesday.
42

On Dec. 27, 2008, China’s top legislature adopted an amendment to the law on
earthquake safety and disaster relief which stipulates higher quake-proof construction
standards for schools, Xinhua reported. The revision was made seven months after the
May 12 earthquake damaged nearly 14,000 schools in Sichuan Province alone.
31

• Regarding the benchmark “Establish and enforce accountability systems for
government officials”
According to China Daily, as well as passing a special law on emergency
management in 2007 setting out the government’s responsibilities, China built a regional
network of emergency management offices reporting to the State Council, which acts as
the government’s cabinet.
The Chinese government continued to enforce accountability among officials with
standards particularly aimed at crisis situations: By June 9, 15 government officials had
been removed from their posts for malpractice involving the quake-relief work.
32

However, such organs as South China Morning Post and the New York Times did
raise the criticism that until that point no one in the government had stepped forward or
been clearly singled out to assume accountability for the poor construction standards of
school buildings.
33

31
“China stipulates higher quake-proof standards for schools”. Xinhua, December 27, 2008 Saturday.
32
Xinhua, “Sichuan deposes 15 officials for malpractice in quake relief”, June 9, 2008.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2008-06/09/content_8334868.htm

33
“Economic model to blame for quake toll”. South China Morning Post. May 14, 2008 Wednesday
43

5.3 The Chinese Government’s Crisis Communication in the Sichuan Earthquake
The Chinese government’s crisis communication performance in the Sichuan
earthquake can be evaluated as follows:
• Regarding the benchmark “Be ready and determined to provide quick and
decisive response”
The response of Chinese government in Sichuan earthquake was considered to be
swift and decisive. China Daily reported that President Hu Jintao instantly called for all-
out efforts to save the injured and reduce the impact of the damage.
34
Less than two
hours after the quake, Premier Wen was on a plane headed for quake-hit areas. At about
7:10pm, Premier Wen landed in Chengdu, and immediately headed for Wenchuan. He
ordered the headquarters for rescue work to be set up in Dujiangyan, which lies halfway
between Chengdu and Wenchuan, since the roads to the county lay blocked by
landslides. He instructed the army to approach the epicenter from the north and south,
repair the roads as soon as possible, obtain a clearer understanding of the situation, try
sending relief supplies to quake-hit areas and provide a forecast of possible aftershocks.
At 10 p.m., Wen visited the Chinese Medicine Hospital in Dujiangyan, which was
reduced to rubble. He walked close to the ruins and asked the soldiers and doctors about
the situation. Then he drove to nearby Juyuan town, where 300 students lay buried in the
debris of a middle school. Memorably, he bowed three times to pay his respects.
35

34
“Information is power indeed”. Chinadaily.com.cn. May 14, 2008 Wednesday.
35
“Premier’s hands-on approach an inspiration”. Chinadaily.com.cn. May 15, 2008 Thursday.
44

Within hours, the State Seismological Bureau and the local seismological
departments held several press conferences to keep the media and public posted.
36

On the flight to Chengdu to oversee relief work, Premier Wen called for calm and
efficient organization for disaster relief work. “My fellow Chinese, facing such a severe
disaster, we need calm, confidence, courage and efficient organization,” he said in a
speech to the nation.
37

On May 14, the Washington Post published an article praising the Chinese
government. It compared the response in Sichuan earthquake favorably with that in 1976
Tangshan earthquake, as well as the contemporary response in neighboring Burma. “The
highly publicized operation is a dramatic change from Beijing’s reaction to previous
disaster: The last earthquake of similar proportions, in 1976, was treated like a state
secret. It also starkly contrasts with the rapidly worsening situation in neighboring
Burma, where up to 2 million people have been imperiled by the criminal failure of the
country’s military regime to provide relief in the 12 days since Cyclone Nargis struck
the country.”
38

The Daily Yomiuri (Tokyo) praised the Chinese government as having been “quick
to respond to the country’s deadliest earthquake in three decades.”
39
The Straits Times
(Singapore) believed the Chinese government had learned from the lessons of past

36
“Information is power indeed”. Chinadaily.com.cn. May 14, 2008 Wednesday.
37
“Wen we need calm, confidence, courage”. Chinadaily.com.cn May 13, 2008 Tuesday.
38
“Saved by China; Beijing rescues its own disaster victims -- and Burma's junta”. The Washington Post.
May 14, 2008 Wednesday.

39
“Quake a big test for Hu govt; Communist Party knows it must handle aftermath skillfully”. The Daily
Yomiuri(Tokyo). May 14, 2008 Wednesday.

45

mistakes. “It is growing in its capacity to tackle crisis”, the newspaper said.
40
The New
York Times quoted the secretary general of the United Nations, Ban Ki-Moon, as saying,
“The Chinese government, at the early stage of this natural disaster, has invested
strenuous efforts and demonstrated extraordinary leadership.”
41

• Regarding the benchmark “Put people first”
According to China Daily, the meeting of the Political Bureau Standing Committee
of the CPC Central Committee, presided over by President Hu Jintao, ordered saving
lives to be the top priority. The meeting called on various government departments to
take measures to provide accommodations to survivors and to ensure that they were well
fed, clothed and sheltered.
42

The Washington Post reported that Wen had been visiting scenes of devastation
since soon after the earthquake struck, and praised his message of encouragement for
rescue workers and compassion for quake victims, saying it “portrayed a leadership
firmly in charge and deeply concerned about the plight of the people.”
43

The New York Times commented, “China appears to be handling it responsibly --
quickly mobilizing the military for rescue work, allowing full media coverage and

40
“This time, China responds swiftly”. The Straits Times (Singapore). May 14, 2008 Wednesday.
41
“U.N. leader praises China's response to quake”. The New York Times. May 25, 2008 Sunday.
42
“Soldiers begin daunting task at epicenter”. Chinadaily.com.cn. May 15, 2008 Thursday.
43
“China expedites vast rescue operation; 'We must race against time,' Premier Says in Televised Visit to
Quake Scene”. The Washington Post. May 15, 2008 Thursday.

46

welcoming offers of assistance. It should press Myanmar’s generals to do the same,
before there are no more victims left to save.”
44

Although the disaster response of the Chinese government was praised widely by the
media, its history of shoddily built schools was criticized and has remained as a black
mark.
South China Morning Post reported that, since Sichuan’s education authority has said
nearly 7,000 school buildings collapsed during the quake, people were questioning if
corruption led to the shoddy construction of school buildings, particularly in rural areas.
45

The New York Times made the point that, the Chinese government hailed its own
vigorous response to the quake as evidence of its concern for human life. While there was
little disagreement with that contention, it was noted that China had apparently done little
in advance to shore up structures, limit growth or even conduct basic safety drills that
might have reduced the death toll.
46

On Sept. 4, Xinhua reported that China admitted “quality problems” in quake-
collapsed schools, and promised to investigate the issue. If the quick disaster relief helped
the Chinese government to create a good image of “people-centeredness” in its
governance, the investigation and response to the poorly built schools showed that the
Chinese government’s anticipation of circumstances that can arise in crisis sorely needs
to be improved.

44
“Shame on the Junta”. The New York Times. May 14, 2008 Wednesday.
45
“Why aren't China's schools as strong as Japan's, critics ask”. South China Morning Post. May 23, 2008
Friday.

46
“Long warned of quake risk, China did little to prepare, scientists say”. The New York Times. June 5,
2008 Thursday.

47

• Regarding the benchmark “Be on the scene”
President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao, as top officials in the Chinese
government, were visibly on the scene soon after the earthquake struck. Hu Jintao
swiftly called an emergency meeting of the Standing Committee of the Politburo and
mobilized the People’s Liberation Army to help, as well as ordering up large quantities
of food, medicine, clothes and tents to be sent to the stricken area, with an initial $30
million allocated to the operation, according to China Daily.
47
Premier Wen Jiabao
arrived in Dujiangyan city hours after the quake to oversee rescue work, and went to
Yingxiu by helicopter on May 14 afternoon to inspect the situation, before flying back to
Chengdu. In the morning of May 14, 2008, Wen was in Beichuan, one of the worst-hit
regions. When he heard that water and tents were in short supply and many babies
needed milk powder in Dujiangyan, he gave the assurance that the problems would be
solved within 24 hours. At Deyang, another seriously hit city, when Wen learned that
many workers and children were trapped at the state-owned Dongfang electric plant, he
immediately ordered the experienced China International Search and Rescue Team to
come to the site.
48

The New York Times reported that “Throughout the day, the images of Mr. Wen
directing disaster relief officials and comforting the injured dominated the airwaves.
With scenes of the calamitous cyclone in Myanmar still fresh -- and [that] military
government’s languid, xenophobic response earning it international scorn -- China’s

47
“Outside view”. Chinadaily.com.cn. May 15, 2008 Thursday.
48
“Premier’s hands-on approach an inspiration”. Chinadaily.com.cn. May 15, 2008 Thursday.
48

Communist Party leaders are keenly aware that their approach to the earthquake will be
closely watched at home and abroad.”
49

The Washington Post commented, “Wen, who flew in from Beijing soon after the
scale of the disaster became known, has been photographed and televised repeatedly
directing rescue workers and shouting encouragement to victims. His display of
concern, and its wide reporting by the official media, was in marked contrast to the
secretive way the Communist Party has handled emergencies in the past.”
50

• Regarding the benchmark “Commit the response system to information
transparency and openness”
The earthquake took place less than two weeks after China’s regulations on
disclosure of government information took effect, on May 1. Generally speaking, in the
Sichuan earthquake, the Chinese government disclosed information in an open and
transparent manner. According to China Daily, the China Earthquake Administration
(CEA) released the news 18 minutes after the quake shook Wenchuan County and the
tremors were felt by people in many other parts of the country. CEA released more news
about the quake and followed it up with news about the General Staff of the People’s
Liberation Army Headquarters sending people to get detailed information an hour later.
Two minutes later, there came the news about the President Hu Jintao’s instructions for
all-out efforts to rescue the injured and about Premier Wen Jiabao being on his way to

49
“Quake toll rises; China struggles to reach victims to the rescue, uncensored”. The New York Times.
May 14, 2008 Wednesday.

50
“Death toll rising in China; Quake fatalities are expected to climb further as teams search for thousands
still trapped”. The Washington Post. May 14, 2008 Wednesday.

49

where the quake took place. Less than an hour later, CEA convened a press conference
and organized the first rescue team of 180 members. All television stations and Web
sites constantly updated their news about the death toll and how the rescue work was
going.
51

On the Internet, official news agencies issued report after report to provide the latest
death toll. Details of rescue operations, of missing children and of damaged hospitals
were not concealed.
52
The New York Times also evaluated the earthquake information
flow as transparent: “While such scenes are a staple of catastrophes in much of the
world, the rescue effort playing nonstop on Chinese television is remarkable for a
country that has a history of concealing the scope of natural calamities and then
bungling its response.”
53
It noted that foreign correspondents had been given
unrestricted access to the quake zone, and that coverage seemed unfettered. South China
Morning Post said, “In something of a milestone, the earthquake also prompted the first
live news conference by top military brass, organized by the State Council.”
54

The New York Times praised the Xinhua News Agency, the government’s leading
propaganda organ, for “offering an unusually vigorous stream of updates about
casualties and problems confronting rescue teams.” It cited Dali Yang, the director of
the East Asian Institute in Singapore, as saying that the government might have come to

51
“Transparency works”. Chinadaily.com.cn. May 15, 2008 Thursday.
52
“Outside view”. Chinadaily.com.cn. May 15, 2008 Thursday.

53
“Quake toll rises; China struggles to reach victims to the rescue, uncensored”. The New York Times.
May 14, 2008 Wednesday.

54
“Quake rattles foundations of authority; Spontaneous volunteering and loosened media reins could test
the leadership”. South China Morning Post. June 12, 2008 Thursday.
50

the realization that openness and accountability could bolster its legitimacy and counter
growing anger over corruption, rising inflation and the disparity between urban rich and
the rural poor. Shi Anbin, a professor of media studies at Tsinghua University in
Beijing, proclaimed it “the first time the Chinese media has lived up to international
standards.”
The New York Times judged that the approach of open information disclosure
appeared to be paying off. Commentary on Chinese Web sites and in chat rooms was
full of praise for the government’s emergency response. On Tianya, a popular forum
where antigovernment postings sometimes find a home, users became quick to shout
down those who criticize Wen and delay in reaching some quake victims.
However, the New York Times also doubted that openness and responsiveness
would continue to be a regular approach of Chinese government. “Chinese Web sites
remain heavily censored, and a brief flirtation with openness and responsiveness does not
mean that China is headed toward Western-style democracy.” It published articles in the
later phase of the earthquake that reported the Chinese government’s censorship of stories
on unsafe school construction. It said censors had discouraged stories of poorly-built
schools from being published, and said there had been an incident in which police drove
away the protestors.
Generally speaking, transparency about both the quake itself and rescue efforts
through timely disclosures of information kept the general public well-informed in real
time. That played an important role in preventing residents in many cities who felt the
tremor from panicking, and in preventing rumors from spreading.
51

CHAPTER 6: THE BABY MILK POWDER CRISIS
6.1 Background of the Episode
The 2008 crisis involving baby milk powder was a food-safety crisis originating in
China and having embarrassing international ramifications and harmful results for babies
in China and abroad. Milk, infant formula, and other milk products became adulterated
with melamine. Melamine is nitrogen-rich and was illegally added to food products in
order to increase their apparent protein content, a selling point. The adulteration is
believed to have been the cause of kidney stones in many babies in China and some other
countries which received Chinese products by export.
The crisis may be said to have arisen – but not to public awareness -- on July 16, when
16 infants in Gansu Province who had been fed on milk powder produced by
Shijiazhuang-based Sanlu Group were diagnosed with kidney stones.
55
Government
inspections found the problem existed not only in Sanlu Group, but also in many other
famous national and foreign brands, including Mengniu and Yili. By November, the
Health Ministry’s figures showed that almost 300,000 babies had been taken ill due to
contaminated milk powder, six infants had died from kidney stones and other kidney
damage, and 860 babies had been hospitalized.
56 57
The World Health Organization

55
“Chinese figures show fivefold rise in babies sick from contaminated milk”,
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/dec/02/china, December 2, 2008.

56
Scott McDonald. "Nearly 53,000 Chinese children sick from milk". Associated Press. 22 September 2008.

57
Jane Macartney "China baby milk scandal spreads as sick toll rises to 13,000". The Times,
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article4800458.ece. 22 September 2008.

52

referred to the incident as one of the largest food-safety events it has had to deal with in
recent years.
58
The crisis undermined consumer confidence in “made in China” brands.
The crisis was initially a corporate crisis. However, due to the large number of
affected people and due to cover-up by some local government officials, it turned into a
public health crisis.

6.2 Crisis Management in the Milk Powder Crisis
• Regarding the benchmark “Coordination among all levels and departments of
government”
As in the SARS disaster, local government again tried to cover up information and
held it for at least a month before reporting to superiors in provincial government.
According to South China Morning Post, the Shijiazhuang city government had been
notified about the milk powder contamination as early as Aug. 2, 2008, as later
revealed by Fonterra, the New Zealand stakeholder of Sanlu dairy group. On Sept. 5,
Fonterra contacted the New Zealand government after a push for product recall yielded
nothing. New Zealand government officials then bypassed local officials in China and
informed the central government. On Sept. 10, Heibei Vice-Governor Yang
Chongyong said his government had received a report from the Shijiazhuang
government only on Sept. 8.
59
This suggested that the local authorities were aware of
the Sanlu infant formula problem at least a month before they reported it to the

58
"China's Melamine Milk Crisis Creates Crisis Of Confidence". VOA. 26 September 2008.
http://www.voanews.com/english/2008-09-26-voa45.cfm.

59
“Officials 'knew of tainted milk for a month'; Local government accused of failing to pass on information
to provincial leaders”. South China Morning Post. September 17, 2008 Wednesday.
53

provincial government. It was ironic and embarrassing that the whistle-blower of this
crisis was a foreign company and its government.
According to China Daily, a State Council investigation revealed that Sanlu
began receiving complaints about sick infants as far back as December 2007, but did
no tests until June 2008. It said leading government officials in Shijiazhuang city had
failed to report the contamination to provincial and state authorities until Sept. 9 in
violation of rules on reporting major incidents involving food safety.
60
Western media
speculated that China’s desire for a perfect summer Olympic Games in August
contributed to the delayed recall of the baby milk, although the central government
denied it.
• Regarding the benchmark “Have in place advanced legal systems to deal with
public emergencies”
On Oct. 23, 2008, the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress
began to review a stricter food safety law, a chapter of which was devoted to the
prevention and management of food safety incidents, according to China Daily. The
draft law abrogated the system whereby local food oversight agencies could grant food
producers exemptions from government quality inspections; compelled local
authorities "to issue recall orders to companies that do not proactively pull problem
products from the market"; and strengthened measures "to prevent the improper use
and misuse of food additives."
61

60
"Probe finds producer knew of toxic milk for months". Xinhua (China Daily). 22 September 2008.
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2008-09/22/content_7048712.htm.

61
“Prompt response”. Chinadaily.com.cn. September 18, 2008 Thursday
54

China Daily also reported that a draft regulation to raise standards and improve
supervision of domestic dairy products was approved in principle by the Cabinet on
Oct. 6, 2008. “The recent safety issue of dairy products, triggered by the Sanlu infant
formula incident, shows the country is still weak in the production supervision
process,” said Premier Wen Jiabao, who presided over the executive meeting of the
State Council. The regulation also clarified the responsibilities of government agencies,
and stipulated punishment for negligent inspectors and those who add toxic materials
to dairy products or violate production safety rules.
• Regarding the benchmark “Establish and enforce accountability systems for
government officials”
In the milk powder crisis, several government officials, from chief quality
supervisor in the central government level to city mayor in the local government level,
were punished. On Sept. 22, Li Changjiang stepped down as director of the General
Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine. Li was the highest
ranking official brought down by the contamination scandal.
62
The Communist Party
secretary of Shijiazhuang, the city where Sanlu is based, was also fired on the same
day.
63
Previously, Ji Chuntang, the mayor and deputy party chief of Shijiazhuang, was
sacked after the city government failed to react to a notification of the contamination
by Sanlu’s New Zealand stakeholder. “The officials didn’t realize [the gravity of the
situation], and they have to be held accountable for that,” Xinhua quoted Hebei Vice-

62
“China's chief quality supervisor resigns amid public grumbles”. Xinhua. September 22, 2008 Monday

63
“The World; Chinese official in milk crisis resigns; His agency has been under fire amid reports of
tainted formula”. Los Angeles Times. September 23, 2008 Tuesday.
55

Governor Yang Chongyong as saying on Sept. 17, 2008.
64
Four other officials of the
Shijiazhuang city government were also sacked, including the vice mayor in charge of
agricultural production, the head of the animal husbandry and fisheries bureau, the
director of the food and drug administration and the head of the quality supervision
bureau.
65

Just days before Li’s resignation, President Hu Jintao, also general secretary of
the Party Central Committee, reprimanded “some officials” over work and food safety
accidents this year. “These accidents indicated that some cadres lacked a sense of
responsibility and had loose governance, and some paid no attention to people’s
complaints and were even insensitive to life-threatening problems,” Hu said.
66

Chinese media have used the word “storm” to describe the wave of cases in
which officials were punished over accountability in accidents and scandals of 2008.
Such events had been considered rare in the previous decade. Xinhua News reported
that conditions could be tougher for officials in the future, as the Party Central
Commission for Discipline Inspection said in late December 2008 that authorities were
drafting rules to intensify the accountability system.
Most critics applauded the accountability storm. “A storm is powerful, and the
accountability storm shows the country’s determination to run the party and
government properly,” said Han Yu, professor in the Party School of the CCP Hebei

64
“Mayor sacked and former Sanlu chief held”. South China Morning Post. September 18, 2008 Thursday.

65
“Mayor sacked over of China milk powder scandal”. Xinhua. September 18, 2008 Thursday.

66
Chinese agency: "Accountability" downfall of many officials in 2008, Xinhua, December 30, 2008
Tuesday.
56

Provincial Committee. The storm also shows the power of public opinion, Han added.
“There should be someone held responsible for serious infringement of public
interests.”
67

Some analysts, however, have doubted the efficacy of the accountability system
left in place. They say the lack of a truly independent regulatory system means that
high-profile gestures, like executing or firing officials, have limited impact, especially
because local industries are so often intertwined with local officials.
68

6.3 Crisis Communication in the Milk Powder Crisis
• Regarding the benchmark “Be ready and determined to provide quick and
decisive response”
Because of the initial cover-up and delays in reporting by the local government and
because supervising authorities ignored early warning signs, the response speed in this
crisis was considered leaden in the initial phase. The Wall Street Journal reported that a
Shaanxi milk agent publicly discussed his fears about unauthorized substances being
added to competitors’ milk. His complaints to regulators and the dairy industry in 2005
and 2006 yielded no results. His story was picked up by China Central Television
(CCTV), which ran a report complete with footage of adulteration in progress, yet the

67
Chinese agency: "Accountability" downfall of many officials in 2008, Xinhua, December 30, 2008
Tuesday.

68
“China's regulators failed to stop tainted milk”. The New York Times. September 27, 2008 Saturday.

57

Shaanxi Quality and Technical Supervision Bureau said it failed to find evidence of
wrongdoing.
69

On July 16, 2008, Gansu Province reported to the Ministry of Health that a local
hospital had identified an increase in the incidence of kidney ailments among babies in
recent months, and that most victims had consumed Sanlu’s baby formula.
70

On July 24, the bulletin board of the General Administration of Quality
Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine indicated that a rare occurrence of kidney stones
in children--all causally traced to Sanlu milk formula—had been flagged by a urologist
in a pediatric hospital. But the warning signs were ignored by supervising authorities.
71

On Aug. 2, the Shijiazhuang city government had been notified about the
contamination by Fonterra, the New Zealand stakeholder of Sanlu dairy group, but
Shijiazhuang city government did not report to superiors of the provincial government
for a month. So on Sept. 5, 2008, Fonterra notified the New Zealand government, after
its push for a product recall had gone nowhere. On Sept. 8, New Zealand Prime Minister
Helen Clark notified the Chinese central government directly.
It was from then that the central government began to take action. On Sept. 13,
China’s State Council, the Cabinet, started a high-level national food safety emergency
response to deal with the crisis. It also set up a national leading group comprising
officials from the Health Ministry, the quality watchdog and local governments.

69
Gordon fairclough (3 November 2008). "Tainting of milk is open secret in China". The Wall Street
Journal. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122567367498791713.html?mod=googlenews_wsj.

70
“Spilling the blame for China’s milk crisis". English Caijing. 10 October 2008.
http://english.caijing.com.cn/2008-10-10/110019183.html.

71
"Timeline of China's tainted milk powder scandal". Associated Press. 23 September 2008.
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5joi2sgFfZeHnug8iBioRZpD9j1BgD93C0AN00.
58

Meanwhile, the State Council urged a thorough overhaul of the milk powder market,
directing the Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine to join
other departments to check all the brands of baby formulas circulating in the market, and
immediately pull tainted products off shelves. Production halted at Sanlu and 19 people
were arrested. Anger and panic spread across the country after the crisis was exposed to
the public. Netizens questioned why the government had failed to take action when
parents had complained months ago. Others wondered if milk products made by other
firms were tainted. Online chat rooms and internet forums buzzed.
72

On Sept. 17, Shijiazhuang Mayor Ji Chuntang was sacked. On Sept. 18, China
revoked the “inspection-free” right of top dairy companies. On Sept. 21, Premier Wen
Jiabao made a visit to sick infants. On Sept. 20, the State Council said sick babies should
be given free medical treatment, with all expenses being covered by government. The
Ministry of Health issued an urgent circular on the same day, urging all provinces to
establish hotlines for the public “in the shortest possible time.” On Sept. 22, Li
Changjiang, director of the Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and
Quarantine, was forced to resign after the State Council published an investigation that
concluded he was responsible for “negligence in supervision.” On Oct. 14, China
ordered the withdrawal of all milk produced more than a month earlier.
• Regarding the benchmark “Put people first”
The cover-up and delays of reporting by local government officials indicated that
for weeks government was more concerned about negative publicity than about

72
“Chinese netizens question lack of govenrment action over tainted milk” - Hong Kong newspaper
Sunday Morning Post. on 14 September, 2008.
59

protecting children’s health. Western media speculated that the initial cover-up was
associated with maintaining a “good” image for the Beijing Olympics. If that was so,
perhaps the most striking lesson to emerge from the contaminated milk scandal was that,
when it came to a conflict between China’s image abroad and the safety of its people,
the public lost out.
• Regarding the benchmark “Be on the scene”
According to Xinhua News, President Hu Jintao said on Oct. 1, 2008, “Food safety is
directly linked to the well-being of the broad masses and the competence of a company . .
. . Chinese companies should learn from the lessons of the Sanlu tainted milk powder
incident.”
73

Premier Wen Jiabao visited children sickened by tainted milk powder at Beijing
Children’s Hospital on Sept. 21 and apologized to the victims of the tainted milk and to
the country’s citizens during a broadcast on China Central Television.
“As the head of the government, I feel extremely guilty… I sincerely apologize
to all of you.”
“This incident made me feel sad, though many Chinese have been
understanding. It disclosed many problems for government and company
supervision of the milk sources, quality and marketing administration… The
government will put more efforts into food security, taking the incident as a
warning.”
74

• Regarding the benchmark “Commit the response system to information
transparency and openness”

73
"Hu Jintao underscores rural development, food safety on eve of National Day". Xinhua. 1 October 2008.
http://rss.xinhuanet.com/newsc/english/2008-10/01/content_10137005.htm.

74
"China Focus: Chinese premier calls on sick infants". Xinhua. 21 September 2008.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2008-09/21/content_10088285.htm.
60

Before the crisis was fully exposed to the public on Sept. 13, 2008, information
regarding the crisis was not at all transparent and open. South China Morning Post
reported that in the initial phase, Chinese journalists were banned from reporting on any
food safety issue during the Olympic Games. It said Chinese media outlets had been
ordered to tone down their coverage of the tainted powdered milk scandal as the public
become increasingly dismayed by what has been perceived as mishandling of the crisis
by authorities.
75
One news editor with China Central Television said they had been
ordered to stick to Xinhua copy in reporting the scandal, although first-hand reporting
would still be allowed as long as it followed the official line. Another source with CCTV
said it was given orders late on Sept. 12 not to go ahead with any more news features
related to the tainted dairy products produced by Sanlu Group. Media organizations in
Hebei slipped into virtual silence over the scandal after provincial propaganda
authorities reportedly issued a gag order for local media to stop “cooking up” stories.
76

75
“Scandal will stoke fears of 'Made in China' label”. South China Morning Post. September 13, 2008
Saturday.

76
“China censors media over contaminated milk powder scandal”. South China Morning Post. September
16, 2008 Tuesday.
61

CHAPTER 7: DISCUSSION
7.1 Weaknesses Exposed, Then China Does Better
The SARS crisis was a wake-up call for the Chinese government regarding to its
inadequate crisis management system. The experience had a great impact on the public
crises that followed. It showed in high profile many weaknesses in China’s crisis
management and emergency systems. It stimulated fresh thinking about the government’s
bureaucratic fragmentation and the delicate nature of China’s central-local relations. And
it aimed a bright spotlight at gross shortcomings in information disclosure.
Generally speaking, since then the government has done better at crisis management.
The Sichuan earthquake showed dramatic improvements. And if the milk powder crisis
showed some retrogression, the overall impression is that China has learned some lessons
over the decade. Those lessons include: implement laws to guide the response to public
emergencies; establish a limited accountability and responsibility system for government
officials; and insist on, legally and administratively, more open and transparent
information disclosure.

7.2 Crisis Management: Consistencies and Differences among the Crises
7.21 Consistencies-Accountability System
Since the official crisis accountability system was activated during the SARS
episode, the Chinese government has been consistent to use it in the Sichuan earthquake
and the milk powder scandal. Its use demonstrates China's resolve in building a
responsible, service-oriented, and accountable government.
62

But actions taken are far from enough. China needs to create an incentive system to
encourage local governments to be more transparent and accept greater accountability.
There is, for two reasons, very little incentive for local leaders to provide accurate data
and reporting in categories that might be received unpleasantly. These rough spots need
to be improved.
The first of those factors is the primacy accorded economic growth in evaluating local
cadres’ performance. Official performance has been judged primarily by ability to
generate local economic development and maintain social stability. Out of a great variety
of indicators, economic growth is the easiest and perhaps most sensible one to use. In
contrast, other indicators may have an ingrained bias toward one particular group of
provinces. For example, the level of public health and life expectancy may tilt the scales
toward developed provinces that have more hospitals and more qualified doctors. And
economic growth is emphasized because it can help solve the most pressing social
problems: unemployment, income, poverty, and backwardness. The end result is that a
high growth rate can impress a local leader’s superiors and increase an official’s chance
for promotion. Failure to meet the growth target can be interpreted as incompetence. In a
similar vein, the local as well as national government have devoted scant resources to
public health. Public health was viewed as an unproductive area for public spending, and
would consume valuable funds that could have stimulated economic growth.
A second factor further inhibits openness is reporting. In recent years, the central
government has mandated localities to report any accidents that involved over a few
deaths. The State Council introduced this stipulation in order to curb a rising number of
63

accidents and a large number of deaths each year. While this stipulation might have
helped to penalize potential responsible cadres, it may unnecessarily punish leading
cadres for accidents that are beyond their control. There exists a sometimes perverse link
between media and accountability. Once the media expose problems or crises and
attribute blame to a specific entity, someone is likely to be held accountable. However,
because the governments usually would not disclose much information regarding the
specific reasons for punishment, it was hard to know whether these government officials
were truly the ones who should be held accountable, or actually were scapegoats.
And how about a lot more malpractices that had not been exposed by the media?
Who should be held accountable for them? Sacking officials should not remain the
government’s knee-jerk response. Rather, the causes of failure should be examined. Last
year, Meng Xuenong gained the unusual distinction of losing a top job twice for handling
crises. He was dismissed as mayor of Beijing in 2003 for his performance during the
SARS outbreak. He managed to get a new position as governor of Shanxi Province. He
“resigned” in September 2008 after a collapse of mud and rocks at a mine that killed
more than 200 people. It is widely believed that as the top government official in Shanxi,
as he had been earlier in Beijing, Meng was the natural scapegoat. Top party officials (the
party secretary of a province usually wields greater power than the governor) still are
rarely held accountable. A real step forward would be to make the principle of
accountability a broadly-held principle of governance in the daily work of government. A
truly independent regulatory and legal system should also follow to investigate and
evaluate the performance of government officials.
64

7.22 Differences-Departmental Coordination
In terms of crisis management, there were also differences regarding coordination
among all levels and departments of government agencies in these three crises. In the
initial stage of the SARS crisis, horizontal and vertical coordination was unsatisfactory.
The local governments did not report SARS cases in a timely manner to central
government. Fragmentation also existed between the party’s Department of Propaganda
(DOP) and the MOH (Ministry of Health). In the second stage, after the top leadership
defined the SARS crisis as “People’s War,” several national ministries jointly took
measures to stem the spread of the virus. Under central leadership and pressure, many
localities formed a coordinating agency to handle SARS.
In the Sichuan earthquake, since the top leadership declared its attitude towards
swift disaster relief shortly after the earthquake, the coordination of government agencies
became much better. Different ministries and departments were mobilized and the speed
of response was unprecedented. In the milk powder crisis, however, local government
again concealed information from its superiors, trying to protect the national brand
involved in the scandal, which was also a big taxation source for local governments.
One important reason that the local governments did not report in a timely manner to
the upper-level governments was the inter-provincial competition in terms of economics.
A bureaucratic unit is responsible both to a vertical ministry and to a horizontal local
government in which it is embedded. Although a bureaucrat has the responsibility to
respond to central government directives, his or her political and economic life is tied
most immediately to the local government. As a result, the central policy is often
65

modified at the point of implementation to meet the preferences of local political elites.
Local governments and bureaucrats have incentives and capacities to pursue their own
agendas for economic as well as political purposes. In the past decade in China, local
government has acted as if it were the CEO of the local economy rather than the protector
of the public interest. Senior officials have given priority to economic development, and
provincial and city officials have regarded negotiations with domestic and international
investors as part of their job. Government officials were acting like the departmental
heads of a large company, each vying to ensure his own department outperforms the
others in order to win promotion.
In the SARS crisis, the local government covered up SARS information in the hope
of not affecting local economic development. In the milk powder scandal, the local
officials kept a lid on the issue for a month to protect large local companies -- after all,
they contribute to the wealth of the area and often form its main source of taxation
income.
The central government is aware of this problem and has repeatedly decreed that
bureaucrats must not engage in business activity. While some progress has been made,
state entrepreneurialism continues for two reasons. First, the central government has no
local watchdog authority independent from local political elites. Second, local
governments often meet their operating expenses and fund development projects with the
profits from state entrepreneurial activity. Until the central government can provide
alternative means to keep hospitals and schools open and fund local development,
66

governments on the lower levels are likely to put their own economic activities ahead of
central government policy initiatives (Thiers, 2003)
Under this circumstance, bureaucrats at all levels have economic incentives to
under-report crisis cases. While central leadership negligence and preoccupation with
power struggles may also play a role in the poor coordination during crises, there is
reason to believe that they received and continue to receive inaccurate information from
below. Whether horizontal and vertical coordination will improve will depend heavily on
the degree of pressure exerted from top leadership.

7.3 Crisis Communication: The Important Role of the Center
In terms of crisis communication, two differences among these three crises are
especially worth highlighting: speed of response, and information transparency and
openness.
7.31 Differences-Speed of Response
The Chinese government’s respond was slow in SARS the epidemic. It took almost
three months for the central government to be made aware of the local situation and for
the local government to convene a press conference. In the Sichuan earthquake, however,
the response of the Chinese government was swift – almost instantaneous -- and decisive.
Less than two hours after the quake, Premier Wen Jiabao was on a plane headed for
quake-hit areas. The military was quickly mobilized for disaster relief. Then in the milk
powder crisis, the Chinese government’s response speed was again unsatisfactory. The
67

local government held tight to the critical information for a month, instead of reporting to
upper level governments promptly.
So how does one explain the fact that the Chinese government’s response speed in
handling a specific public crisis varied greatly case by case? It is clear that the top
leadership was eventually the source of action in all these cases, but things didn’t start
rolling until “the center”—the center of national power and authority -- was given the
critical information. Once the top leadership decided that an all-out national effort was
necessary, the relevant central departments and local departments moved quickly. The
quick response speed in the Sichuan earthquake exemplified what could be accomplished
with a maximum effort.
Another example was the snowstorm crisis in January 2008. In the snowstorm,
believed to be the worst storm within half a century, the government was caught
unprepared. Jets were grounded and train services halted, stranding more than 1.93
million passengers, most of them eager to return to their hometowns for the Lunar New
Year holiday. Only after almost two weeks of rising discontent did Premier Wen Jiabao
give orders to tackle the situation. “No government department would dare to take action
before the premier’s emergency trip,” South China Morning Post quoted a source in the
State Council familiar with the disaster management system. “This is China’s political
culture. Those who take the initiative to act before the order from the top is given become
targets for attacks by others.”
The pattern of leaving it to the top leadership to take the vital first decision can still
function well in a public crisis, since the central government is capable of mobilizing all
68

the resources to cope with the crisis. However, this decision-from-the-top model has fatal
aspects in many circumstances that demand crisis management. First, it relies mainly on
the subjective judgment of top leaders. As a result, the approaches to crisis management
can differ greatly case by case. President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao are generally
regarded by the public as transparent and quick-to-act top leaders. However, without a
sustainable system of crisis management backing them up, it is hard to guarantee that all
crises will be handled efficiently in the future.
And there are insufficient established legal frameworks, political frameworks and
emergency systems serving as guidelines. That makes it difficult for government
departments at all levels to predict what to do in a crisis.

7.32 Differences-Information Transparency and Openness
In the initial stage of the SARS crisis, local bureaucrats and officials distorted or
kept negative information from the central government in order to protect their own
interests. But information got out nevertheless. Because of the wide spread of SARS to
more people and more countries around the world, and because of international pressure,
the top leadership decided that it was not in the interest of the nation to remain passive. It
was then that the Chinese government began to take action, sacking delinquent officials,
setting up a national task force to combat SARS at a meeting of the Standing Committee
of the National People’s Congress, and becoming more open and transparent in
information disclosure.
69

In the Sichuan earthquake the Chinese government was widely considered to be
much more open and transparent. It did not miss a beat. Official news agencies issued
report after report to provide the latest death toll. Foreign correspondents were also given
unrestricted access to the quake zone.
In the baby milk powder crisis, the Shijiazhuang city government initially tried to
withhold information regarding the crisis. It was not until New Zealand Prime Ministry
Helen Clark alerted Chinese central government and the scale of baby formula victims
became larger and larger that the crisis was taken seriously. Quick actions of
governments at all levels then followed.
One reason to explain China’s reluctance to disclose crisis information is Chinese
government officials’ obsession with “stability.” There was a long-held but outdated
conviction among many Chinese government officials that information disclosure in a
crisis could cause social panic and disorder. “It’s pretty typical behavior,” said Pierre
Landry, assistant professor in the Department of Political Science at Yale University, of
China’s reluctance to provide information. He said Chinese officials often are “quite
concerned about causing panic.” “There is a very high premium placed on social
stability,” said Landry. “They are quite reluctant to release news unless they know what’s
going on and they can state that they are in control.” However, contrary to their
expectations, outdated information control gave rise to swarm of rumors, resulting in the
very social panic those government officials had sought to avoid.
Another reason is the long tradition of “swallowing” all misfortunes, a distorted
tendency that has long prevailed in China as a way to deal with crises. There are many
70

aphorisms in the Chinese language that reflect this view, e.g. spread only the good
message whereas cover the bad news (bao xi bu bao you). In part, the self-concealing
instinct has historically served as a form of protection against the state. Whatever the
cause, in the past, public crises such as drought, flooding, earthquake, diseases, and coal
mining accidents etc. were covered up inside China and largely kept from the outside
world.
It is widely believed that the SARS crisis, however haltingly it was handled,
seemed to open a new chapter in a movement for greater openness in government affairs,
ratcheting up the trend toward greater transparency and government accountability. In
recent years, as part of a drive toward what the Chinese call “informatization” (xinxihua),
twin nationwide programs are being launched to make government affairs more open to
the people (zhengwu gongkai) and to build “e-government” networks under which
government agencies at the central and local levels would make an ever-increasing
amount of information available and provide administrative services on the Internet.
These projects have made government more open -- if not necessarily more accountable -
- to ordinary Chinese citizens. (Horsley, 2003)
On Feb. 28, 2009, Premier Wen Jiabao held his first online chat with China’s billion
plus citizens, hosted by the central government Web site and the Xinhua Web site. The
most revealing part of his talk may be what Wen said about government transparency and
accountability. “I have always believed that the public has the right to know what its
71

government is doing and thinking about, and the right to criticize and make comments on
government policies,” he wrote.
77

Wenran Jiang, associate professor of political science and acting director of the
University of Alberta's China Institute, commented, “If it is not a leap forward, it will be
several steps forward in China’s becoming a more open society.” However, he also
warned that this recent development does not mean the government will not take a few
steps back after the emergency subsides. Jiang describes this “two steps forward, one step
back” movement as the overarching pattern of China’s political development over the
past decade. Despite potential setbacks in the near future, the government’s movement
towards openness will be an important development in Chinese politics.

77
Ariana Eunjung Cha, “In Crisis, China Vows Openness Government Also Says It Will 'Dramatically
Increase' Stimulus Program”, Washington Post Foreign Service ,Thursday, March 5, 2009.
72

CHAPTER 8: CONCLUSION
8.1 Suggestions
This thesis used media analysis to examine three public crises in China in the past
decade, namely the SARS crisis, the Sichuan earthquake and the milk powder crisis.
Through the comparison of the three, the author sought to identify the consistencies, the
differences and the trends in the Chinese government’s application of crisis management
and crisis communication.
The author concluded that the Chinese government’s handling of crises in the past
decade points toward improvement. Poor performance in the SARS crisis served as a
wake-up call. Then the handling of the destructive Sichuan earthquake earned wide praise
by domestic and foreign observers for effective coordination among government
agencies, more transparent and open information disclosure, and quick and decisive crisis
response. The milk powder affair had characteristics both of the bad and the good.
Chinese crisis management in the past decade has not been moving in a linear
direction. One reason is that the Chinese government’s crisis management, when
operating at its best, mainly follows a model of “leadership from the top.” As the
discussion has shown, this model can be extremely effective when the critical
information is thrust directly into the hands of the top leadership. But when information
and decision-making has to start from diffuse lower levels of the vast Chinese system,
delays, indecision and self-protection can keep effective crisis management from getting
started and can block crisis communication for extended and harmful periods. To
improve crisis management in public crises, the following suggestions are provided:
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First, establish a sound legal framework regarding public crisis. The outbreak of
public crises in the past decade forced the Chinese leadership to consider the important
role of law in providing a basis for good governance. On Aug. 28, 2008, the Emergency
Response Law was passed by the national legislature, effective Nov. 1, 2008. The law
sought to improve the handling of industrial accidents, natural disasters, public health
situations and public security hazards. It bans the fabrication and spreading of false
information on accidents and disasters, and requires governments to provide accurate and
timely information. The state was also prompted to enact new regulations on information
disclosure and food safety. These regulations contain “rule of law” elements, but the
amount and range of laws is still not adequate, and the precision of legal provisions needs
to be improved. Moreover, China needs to enhance legal awareness and strengthen law
enforcement.
Second, the Chinese system needs to increase social and political transparency,
especially in information disclosure. Openness with information can prevent the
spreading of rumors and enhance the credibility of the government. In a crisis, what the
Chinese public wants to hear most is the authoritative voice of government. If the
government does not make timely response, the fragile mental bottom line of the public
can very easily collapse, leading to the spreading of rumors and public panic. To improve
crisis information disclosure systems, the following actions could be implemented:
• Establish and continue to develop for public consumption a wide range of
information channels, such as television, newspaper, telephone, SMS, radio and internet.
74

• Improve information reporting systems within the government apparatus, those
provisions which regulate the content, channels and timing of reporting. As things stand,
there is a lack of clarity in the reporting process for potential emergency situations among
government agencies in the Chinese system. At best this state of affairs discourages
timely and accurate reporting. At worst it distorts reality by embellishing optimistic
information and suppressing bad news. Too often, the result is government inaction and
the eventual magnification of a crisis (Zhong, 2007). The SARS crisis and milk powder
crises each illustrate the interplay of these factors that led to gross breakdowns in
communication and a delay in reporting. They also illustrate how small and relatively
localized incidents became major emergencies.
• Establish an early warning system of crisis information. The purpose of an early
warning system is to prevent lesser incidents from growing to crisis proportions. An early
warning system can delay or stave off the worst of crisis, and even prevent or disarm a
crisis. The key step in an early warning system is to improve information collection,
analysis, evaluation and crisis prediction.
Third, establish a sound political responsibility and accountability system. Under the
current vertically oriented political system, local government officials, who are appointed
from above and lack accountability to local people, have a tendency to stray from good
governance practices. Officials report to their superiors rather than to the people they
ostensibly govern, creating an environment that promotes action oriented to self-interest.
The central government is often stymied by its inability to assert power; central policies
75

are largely not welcomed by local officials. Local officials’ selective policy
implementation weakens central authority and can lead to policy fiasco.
Meanwhile, local officials have deep interests in the success of their own
administrative jurisdiction due to the often symbiotic relationship between local
government and business enterprise, as demonstrated in the milk powder crisis. Obsessed
with social stability and economic development, they have little incentive to report
negative data unless they are sure that it will not cause panic or slow down economic
growth through reduced consumption or investor flight. The utilization of “performance
contracts” at the local level based on economic development further encourages the self-
interested behavior of officials. Consequently, social development is neglected, and a
capacity for more comprehensive development is weakened, which increases the
likelihood of crises and weakens government capacity in dealing with them when they
occur. Since the reappointment of local officials largely depends on the productivity of
such performance contracts, local bureaucrats often make decisions aimed at increasing
their chances of survival in the system and maximizing their private interests and
agendas. (Zhong, 2007)
To establish sound systems of political responsibility and accountability, it is essential
to start evaluating government officials in a more comprehensive way, including
education, public health, poverty alleviation and other basic social services, all of which
play a vital role in building robust response mechanisms to crises of all kinds.
Meanwhile, a sound legal system is needed to serve as a strong underpinning.
76

Fourth, establish and improve crisis communication. Certainly there is a need to
establish a two-way communications mechanism between the government and the public.
On one hand, based on the principle of openness and transparency, the government
should integrate various information channels to communicate crisis information to the
public. On the other hand, the government should pay close and systematic attention to
public opinion, incorporating it into the process of decision making. Moreover,
communicate with the media in timely ways. Mass media are important carriers of the
government’s message. Meanwhile, the media can also provide government with a large
amount of valuable information and advice. To a certain extent, media are spokespersons
for both government and the public. Furthermore, there is a compelling need to improve
internal communication within the government. Currently, the internal information
system is all-too-rigidly segmented. It is essential to break departmental monopolization
and withholding of public crisis information; instead, China must establish, both
vertically and horizontally, highly efficient crisis information systems to collect, transmit
and share information in real time. Such steps would enhance transparency, promote
cooperation and empower ensure governments at all levels to make timely and accurate
decisions.
Fifth, enhance bureaucratic integration among different ministries and between
central departments and local departments with an eye to enhancing their coordination in
public crisis. There exist many incoherencies and inconsistencies between different levels
of government. The roles and responsibilities of governments at different levels are
ambiguous, with many jurisdictional gaps and contradictions. Similar jurisdictional gaps
77

and contradictions in government department roles and responsibilities exist between
departments of public health, transportation, rail, civil aviation and quarantine, as well as
between departments in different regions. Safety experts have stressed that China’s
emergency response systems fall under 17 different departments, each independent, often
overlapping, leading to a waste of resources.78 Structural inefficiency, paired with often
poor communication both vertically between different government levels and
horizontally between different bureaucratic agencies, results in an inability to create a
clear crisis management system. Already, the CCP’s Central Committee has in place
various so-called “small leading groups (SLGs)” (lingdao xiaozu) which combine
representatives from different backgrounds to better coordinate matters across ministries.
But most of these SLGs have a specific focus and were established to cope with specific
emergencies. Once a given emergency is over, the relevant group disbands. In some
cases, the small leading groups even failed to perform their assigned roles. The SLG
system could be enhanced and regular ones set up to monitor long term socio-economic
trends and challenges.

8.2 Further Studies
This thesis mainly focused on the “during crisis” stage of Chinese government. News
coverage considered from various media assessed the actions the Chinese government
took during crisis. Future research can investigate the government’s strategies at a pre-
crisis and post-crisis stage, namely crisis detection, crisis prevention, crisis preparation,

78
“Chinese cities preparing emergency plans,” China Daily, March 23, 2004.

78

and crisis recovery. The discussion of government crisis management at pre-crisis, crisis,
and post-crisis stages will make the analysis more persuasive. Just as Rosenthal and
Kouzmin (1997) suggested in their study, to broaden the horizons of crisis research from
the perspective of political administration, a diversity of stages should be incorporated to
understand how governments and decision makers respond to these crisis situations.
While the findings of this study provide new insights, a continued research effort is
needed for a greater understanding of the crisis management efforts and strategies at a
governmental level.

79

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Asset Metadata

Creator Zhao, Hui (author)

Core Title Chinese government’s role in crisis management: case studies of three major crises in recent years

School Annenberg School for Communication

Degree Master of Arts

Degree Program Public Relations

Publication Date 08/07/2009

Defense Date 08/01/2009

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag baby milk powder scandal,Chinese government crisis management,OAI-PMH Harvest,public crisis,SARS,Sichuan earthquake

Place Name China (countries), Sichuan (states)

Language English

Contributor Electronically uploaded by the author (provenance)

Advisor Wang, Jay (Jian) (committee chair), James, Patrick (committee member), Swerling, Jerry (committee member)

Creator Email huizhao@usc.edu,venus_zhao@hotmail.com

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-m2537

Unique identifier UC1214295

Identifier etd-ZHAO-2768 (filename),usctheses-m40 (legacy collection record id),usctheses-c127-175719 (legacy record id),usctheses-m2537 (legacy record id)

Legacy Identifier etd-ZHAO-2768.pdf

Dmrecord 175719

Document Type Thesis

Rights Zhao, Hui

Type texts

Source University of Southern California (contributing entity), University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses (collection)

Repository Name Libraries, University of Southern California

Repository Location Los Angeles, California

Repository Email cisadmin@lib.usc.edu