Intergovernmental Conflict and Censorship: Evidence From China’s Anti-Corruption Campaign

Abstract

I study how local Chinese newspapers report on the national anti-corruption campaign, by collecting a large-scale dataset of newspaper articles, internet searches and comments on social media. Despite greater reader interest, local newspapers underreport and deemphasise corruption scandals involving high-level officials from their own province. Underreporting is greater when a corrupt official is well connected and a newspaper does not rely on advertising revenue. City-level newspapers report less about corruption in their own city, but are more likely to report about corruption within the provincial government. I present suggestive evidence that this type of localised censorship reduces the accountability of local governments.