共產黨的媒介為何自套枷鎖、陷入困境？－－以電視劇《河殤》為案例探討中國大陸電視媒介的功能

WHY PARTY MEDIA BACKFIRE? Television as the Agent of Social Changes in post-Mao China - a case study of the Chinese TV series 'River Elegy'

大眾媒介在列寧式共產國家中歷來是執政黨嚴密掌管的最重要工具。然而隨著大陸改革開放不斷深入，黨的媒介卻發生了微妙而又深刻的變化。一方面，大眾媒介仍舊以黨的利益為依歸，扮演著黨的喉舌之角色；另一方面，大眾媒介卻在瓦解共產黨專制統治、創造自由多元的非共產主義社會形態的轉型中成為推動變革的先鋒和動力。大眾媒介本身已成為社會改革力量的一部分。也就是說，黨的媒介反過來成為傳播民主自由、促進和平演進的重要工具。毛之后中國大陸電視媒介在這方面所起的作用尤為明顯；其中，大陸中央電視台1988年播放的六集電視片《河殤》所造成的社會影響和震蕩較為深刻地反映了這一趨勢。共產黨的媒介為何會自套枷鎖、陷入困境？本文旨在探究這一有趣的吊詭現象，并通過研討電視媒介的本質特徵尋求部分解答。本文嘗試運用制度分析(Institutional Analysis)的方法，以政經考察之取向論述電視媒介作為文化產品和文化業的制度性的悖論，并以電視片《河殤》為例，剖析了共產黨媒介內在制度性矛盾以及陷入吊詭與固境的原因。本文共分三部分：第一部分主要從政經分析的取向理解電視媒介在共產黨國家中的動態作用；第二部分為電視片《河殤》的個案考察；第三部分以制度分析的方法解剖共產黨媒介為何自陷困境這一吊詭現象。

The great advancement of television medium in post-Mao China has had a profound impact on social changes within mainland society. As a potent cultural forum, television is the electronic amplification of social contradiction. Its rapid development has fostered cultural pluralism and contributed to the decline of the Party cultural monopoly. While it has reflected social changes, television itself in post- Mao China has also become the agent of social changes in a direction that is beyond the control of the dictatorship and towards the process of social democratization. Ironically, the Party's media have increasingly backfired. The case of the Chinese TV series 'River Elegy' in the late 1980s of China, illustrates this trend to a great extent, and thus highlights the plight of the Party media institution. But, how can television do so? What is the relationship between television performance and culture development? How is the phenomenon of cultural production in Soviet model system formed and maintained? And what is its material base? What, coupled with the operation of the social system, is the relationship between cultural production and the Party's political management (i.e the Party cultural hegemony)? How, after a decade and half of Deng's reform program, the cultural performance has been changed in the post-Mao China? And finally, and probably more importantly, why the tightening controlled Party's media have increasingly backfired? In this paper, therefore, I will examine and discuss these issues. In part One, I attempt to establish a theoretical framework by examining some key lineaments of the nature of cultural production on the one hand, and the role of the mass media (i.e. in this case, mainly television) on the other. Within that framework, part Two is the case study of the Chinese TV series 'River Elegy' that focuses on television performance in the context of social transformation in post-Mao China. Finally, by making an inquiry into the institutional problems and changes, I employ institutional analysis to explore the underlying contradictions of post-Mao communist media behaviour and institutional crisis.