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Abstract

The huge interest in Zambia-­‐China relations globally, both in academia and popular press, inspires several inquisitions. How have these relations changed and panned out in the present, from a Zambian media perspective? Would a Zambian media approach help provide insights into the ebb and flow of perceptions about China inside Zambia? What can we gather from the Zambian media on the September 2011 regime change in Zambia vis-­‐à-­‐vis China’s engagement? In other words, how did Zambian media craft perceptions on and of China in the era of late president Michael Chilufya Sata’s leadership? To answer these questions, this exploratory study applies a framing theoretical approach to analysis of content from three Zambian news media: Daily Mail, The Post Online and Zambian Watchdog. The objective is to offer perspectives from this sample of the Zambian media scene with a view to determining optimistic versus pessimistic perceptions on China’s image. Selected international media are included for a transient, loose comparative comment. The news framing analysis is fore grounded by literature review to set the background and context in which the selected media reported China between January 2013 and January 2014. After a systematic content review, this article concludes that the three newspapers frame China in more optimistic than pessimistic terms. The article concludes by arguing for the need for audience-­‐based fieldwork as an important next step.

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