BRI CODING INSTRUCTION

A. BRI Coding Instruction

Analysis unit: One BRI news or commentaries Tool: Excel and SPSS

Each item should be coded as follows:

Selection

Date Between 2013/9/1 to 2018/8/31 News

origin

1. Reuters, 2. AFP, 3. AP, 4. Bloomberg, 5. Washington Post, 6. Financial Times, 7. Huffington Post, 8. New York Times, 9. Other foreign origins (1-9 will be considered as Foreign origins);

10. People’s Daily, 11.China Daily, 12. Xinhua, 13. Other Chinese origins (10-13 will be considered as Chinese origins);

14. National news agency such as Philippine News Agency and Bernama, 15. Local news staff, 16. Other local origins (14-16 will be considered as local origins);

17. Asian News Network (17 is Other Asian origins) Topic

(can be multiple)

1. Domestic politics or its foreign relations, 2. Chinese politics or its foreign relations, 3 Activities or remarks of high-level officials, 4. The SCS issue (1-4 are considered as political field related).

5. Domestic economy or its economic influence abroad, 6. Chinese economy or its economic influence abroad, 7. Introduction or economic results of BRI and its forum, 8. Entertainment, 9. Travel/tourism (5-9 are treated as economic related field), 10. Chinese culture, 11. Others The most prominent topic will be decided based on the amount of coverage of certain theme.

Tendency 1. Positive, 2. Negative (containing negative economic results or political threat such as China’s expansion in SCS), 3. Mixed (contain both positive and negative views), 4. No judgement

New source (can be

1. Local officials or government statement, such as prime minister, president, vice-president, foreign minister, ambassadors, spokesperson;

2. Chinese officials or government statement; 3. Foreign officials or

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multiple) government statement; 4. Local scholar, expert or research institute;

5.Chinese scholar, expert or research institute; 6. Foreign scholar, expert or research institute; 7. Local businessperson or company representative;

8. Chinese businessperson or company representative; 9. Foreign businessperson or company representative; 10. Local media; 11. Chinese media; 12. Foreign media; 13. Unspecified*; 14. Others. (1-3 will be grouped as officials; 4-6 are scholars; 7-9 are businessperson; 10-12 are media; 1,4,7,10 will be local sources; 2,5,8,11 will be Chinese sources;

3,6,9,12 will be foreign sources). ‘Unspecified’ sources include ‘critics,’

‘Some analysists’. The most prominent source will be decided based on his/her official or company status, the amount of coverage of his/her words. Sources such as ‘Chinese government’, ‘Philippine government’

Frame (can be multiple)

1. Economic incentive, 2. Economic concern, 3. Political stability, 4.

Political threat, (1,3 will be grouped into development meta-frame; 2,4 will be put into concern meta-frame), 5. No dominant frame, 6. Others The most prominent frame will be based on the amount of content the frame covers. If there is similar amount of coverage, the it will be based on the article’s headline or the first frame that appears.

Tendency

Positive and negative word lists are based on Hu and Liu (2004), Liu et al. (2005).

Explanation

Positive Describing BRI with positive words such as authentic, astonishing, attractive, beneficial, beneficiary, benevolent, benefits, bolster, booming, boost, cheerful, convenient, convenience, contribution, dependable, desirable, efficient, efficient, empower, enjoy, entertaining, excel, excited, extraordinary, enthusiastic, famous, fairness, fashionable, fast-growing, fine, fortune, friendly, gain, gifted, generous, good, hallmark, happy, harmonious, heavenly, high-spirited, honest, ideal, innovative, inspiring, insightful, keen, kindness, , lawful, luxurious, magnificent, mercy, majestic, mind-blowing, miracle, nice, openly, optimistic, passion, peace, pleasing, plentiful, promise, prosper, qualified, rapport, reasonable, resolute, rich, rightful, safe, sincere, skillful, smooth ,stimulating, successful, superb, talented, thrive, treasure, triumph, trust, undisputed, unity, variety, valiant, victory, well-known, winner, worthy,… etc.

Negative Describing BRI with negative words such as absurd, abused, accuse,

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anxious, attack, awful, baffling, bait, bankrupt, betray, biased, blinding, boycott, brainwash, bribery, brutal, bully, burden,

catastrophe, chaos, coldly, complaint, concede, concession, condemn, condescend, conflict, conspiracy, corrupt, crisis, damage, danger, debt, deceive, defame, delay, deteriorate, disadvantage, disagree,

disappointing, disapprove, disaster, disorder, dismay, doubt, enemy, enraged, endanger, entanglement, equivocal, evade, evil, exclusion, fallacy, far-fetched, fatal, fear, frustrated, graft, handicap, hard, hazardous, heartless, hegemonism, hoax, horrible, hostage, hostile, hurt, ill=natured, illegal, impede, impeding, inconsistent, ineffective, inhuman, insufficient, insult, intrusive, invasive, jeopardy, kill, lawless, leaks, loss, lose, madness, manipulative, messy, misguide, mistake, myth, negative, notorious, obsessive, offense, opportunistic, oppose, oppressive, overrated, pain, passive, penalty, pollute,

polarization, poisonous, poverty, punish, puppet, quarrels,

questionable, radical, refuse, reject, revenge,, rip-off, risk, sabotage, scam, selfish, self-interested, setbacks, skeptical, sluggish, stereotype, terror, threat, trap, traitor, troubles, tyranny, unacceptable, unfit, unfavorable, unfriendly, unknown, unsafe, unworthy, vain, vague, villain, vulnerable, warlike, waste, worried, worst, wrong, … etc.

Mixed Articles containing both positive and negative words for BRI No

judgement

Without judgmental words for BRI and simply stating facts about BRI.

For example, ‘On Sunday, Duterte will attend the opening ceremony of the “One Belt, One Road” forum’, or ‘…as China steps up its

investment in its neighboring nations as part of its trillion-dollar One Belt One Road investment initiative’.

Frame

Argument Economic

concern

If mention anything that is bad for both local and international

economy, such as unrepayable loans, too many Chinese products in the market.

For example, ‘Struggling countries could be saddled with Chinese loans requiring payment regardless of project performance’, ‘The Philippines must stop relying on foreign suppliers to modernize the military equipment of its armed forces,’ or ‘some countries say the BRI

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possible detriment of other countries.’

Economic incentive

If mention anything that is good for both local and international economy, such as praising BRI is a win-win project that improves or contributes economy and connectivity.

For example, ‘it will become one of China's greatest achievements in the future’, ‘The Ayala group will ride with it (One Belt, One Road initiative) because we are involved in many industries, so one way or another, we'll be participants in these opportunities’, or ‘the agreement will serve as the basis for the grant to be provided by China to the Philippines to implement the grant of RMB 500,000,000’.

Political threat

Articles articulate the rise of China as a superpower, a threat to the world, and suggest cooperating with China means the concession of sovereignty rights.

For example, ‘Why will these countries support China if China is grabbing their maritime zones?’, ‘China may have a “hidden agenda,”

and that the Asian superpower might use the route to expand its military powers’ or ‘China’s grand scheme.’

Political stability

Joining BRI is not giving up national interest. BRI promotes mutual trust and peace. China has no intention to interfere other countries’

politics. Any description of lowering doubts, intention or risk of BRI will be counted as political stability frame.

For example, ‘President has pushed for friendly relations with China instead of waging war over the territorial dispute in the West Philippine Sea’. ‘China has sought to allay such fears, saying the initiative will only take flight if championed by other countries.’

No

prominent frame

The article contains one or more of the above frames, and does not give a clear judgment or decision.

Others The article does not possess any of the above frame

* The most prominent frame is distinguished through manual analysis. BRI articles with a prominent frame means that it has a clear judgement on BRI from either economic or political perspective. The length and the location of frame will also contribute to the recognizing of prominent frame. For example, if an article uses economic incentive frame in the first paragraph, but later uses most of the time telling the possible threat of

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Chinese military rise in SCS, or its intention to challenge international order, than political threat is more prominent than economic incentive frame. The most prominent source will be decided by how much BRI content he/she offers and whether they have a clear judgment of BRI.

**Commercialized and less commercialized media are decided by the composition of their shareholders. Almost every media chosen for analysis have shares controlled by private companies, however, media such as Rappler from the Philippines and Malaysiakini from Malaysia are less commercialized compared to others since their workers can own part of the company.