What does an Arabic language TV channel get you?

Michael Hedges July 27, 2009 Follow on Twitter

Every government with a story to tell wants to tell it on television. Internet services of state-run news agencies can put out all the press releases and official statements. Nothing, however, beats a television channel for a foreign audience.

State run international broadcasting, radio and TV, has a storied history, long and interesting. Many of these broadcasters have developed over the years strong followings for their foreign language channels. Those with the deepest history – mostly Western governments – see international broadcasting as essential to public diplomacy; strengthening outreach in search of a minute or two of well-placed attention. For that they must speak the language.

China Central Television (CCTV) launched its Arabic language satellite television channel this past weekend (July 25). The footprint covers North Africa, the Middle East and Asia. At the welcoming press conference in Beijing (July 24) CCTV vice president Zhang Changming said it “will serve as an important bridge to strengthen communication and understanding between China and Arab countries,” according to the official Xinhua news agency. The new service offers news, entertainment and educational programs.

CCTV’s new Arabic language TV channel arrives as the Chinese government faces domestic unrest in Xinjing province among the Muslim Uyghur majority. The Uyghur language, widely spoken in Xinjing and adjacent areas of Uzbekistan, is an Arabic and Persian derivative. Uyghurs aren’t the target for CCTV’s Arabic TV channel.

The rush to set up Arabic language satellite channels targeting the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region started after the first Persian War (1991). During that conflict the Arabic speaking public tuned to CNN’s live coverage often rebroadcast locally or available on cable systems. Thereafter several Arabic language channels launched, mostly with Saudi investment. One, Orbit, contracted the BBC to provide Arabic language programming. That ended badly with contention over cultural sensitivity.

The US government launched satellite channel al-Hurra in 2004. More recently, Russia Today (Russia) and France 24 (France) started Arabic channels in 2007 with Deutsche Welle (Germany) expanding service to 8 hours daily. BBC Arabic reentered in 2008 and this year launched BBC Persian.

Arabic language television channels, particularly on satellite, are as plentiful as they are diverse. MENA region viewers have choices from over 400 satellite channels; from CNN Arabic and Al-Jazeera on the news side to soap-operas and entertainment shows from Arabic producers to movie and sports channels. All this diversity led to an agreement among Arab information ministers to adopt (February 2008) a charter to “protect Arab identity from the harmful effects of globalization.”   Western media watchers saw the charter as another attempt at institutionalizing censorship and protecting rulers from potential criticism on television. Lebanon and Qatar opted out of the charter’s rigid language.

International broadcasters – government sponsored and otherwise – know that audience development in new regional targets takes years of grinding out news and programs. Politicians funding these efforts have notoriously short attention spans, lengthened only by the number of times they become interview subjects. The shift of attention by Western international broadcasters from Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union to the Middle East, Africa and Asia is comparatively recent. Also recent is the interest by China in getting their message to viewers – following Russia, Iran and even Venezuela – comes from the hope that viewers will see all information equalized by the miracle of television.

The Chinese government is not inclined to dabble in Arabic politics overtly through the new satellite channel. The primary interest is overcoming what it sees as “biased coverage” of China. And MENA region viewers will, if they find CCTV’s Arabic channel, have another point of view to add to the rest. As Harvard University Kennedy School of Government Dean Joseph Nye wrote in Soft Power (2004), “Plenty of information leads to a scarcity of attention.”

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