This article looks at arguments framing civil society debates and questions the usefulness of civil society models in understanding how media policy is made and implemented in China. The key argument is that viewing the state-society relationship in China through a Western optic obviates the distinctive differences between the autonomous civil society of liberal democracies and Chinese social relations. This does not mean that civil society is a redundant concept. It can be usefully applied to describe economically driven political and social change in China. However, its capacity to explain how cultural and media policy is formulated is limited.
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