When a high-speed train crash killed dozens of people in China in July, the Communist government tried to do what it normally does in such situations: Control media coverage of the event.
But a funny thing happened when government officials tried to dictate which aspects of the story to cover and which to ignore: Chinese journalists rebelled.
Instead of doing the government's bidding - focusing on the soft, human interest angles of the tragedy - Chinese reporters started asking tough questions about what might have caused the crash, and whether officials were ignoring safety concerns in a headlong rush to build a high-speed rail network.
Even official news outlets like the China Central Television network questioned the government's decision to bury the wreckage, implying a conspiracy afoot to hide evidence. And the official Xinhua news agency noted widespread public outrage on how the crash response was handled.
Frustrated by the surprisingly feisty attitude of Chinese journalists, the government went draconian, imposing a news blackout on the crash that forced many papers to tear up dozens of pages of critical coverage. "My story will not go to print today and looks like I will have to write something else," wrote one journalist. "I'd rather leave the page blank with one word - 'speechless.' "
Still, this brief display of editorial independence raises the question: Is the Chinese government losing its once all-powerful grip on the country's news media?
Such a development would be welcome news to human rights watchdog groups, but Arthur Waldron, a professor of international relations at the University of Pennsylvania, cautions that China is a long way from having the kind of press freedoms typical of Western democracies.
"For a week the investigative journalists in China got a taste of freedom and a sense of what they could do," Waldron says. "There's no question that the journalists in the print media are trying to push the envelope."
But he adds: "The fact remains that the government can simply stop production and distribution of newspapers. One should never underestimate the blunt repression the party can impose if they feel it's necessary."
Isabella Bennett, a research associate at the Council on Foreign Relations who has written broadly on U.S.-China relations, agrees.
"Some reporters are pushing back, but only with great risk," Bennett says. "When the criticism grows too pointed or too widespread, a stricter ban on coverage is often imposed, and a scapegoat is identified to calm the public fury."
What's not allowed, under any circumstances, is criticism of the country's ruling Communist party, Bennett says. "Pointed and deep criticism at the rule of the CCP is what is censored at bottom, and continues to be well-censored. In that way, frustration around some events is allowed to be publicly discussed, but only within limits, and carefully manipulated."
One ray of hope may lie with social media sites, which give Chinese journalists and citizens alike an alternative outlet for airing complaints about the government. One of the most popular, known as Weibo, is a microblogging site similar to Twitter.
"The media that have been most effective are the microblogs," Waldron says. "The government has an easier time controlling print media than web media."
Waldron cites the example of "a tweet that used the train as an image for China and said, 'We are all passengers on this train and we're going too fast.' That got great circulation."
Bennett agrees that social media can be tougher to censor. But she cautions that within China, "the proportion of people who follow such postings and re-postings is lower than some Western observers may infer from coverage in Western news outlets."
Of course, even the Internet is subject to government scrutiny. China's so-called "Great Firewall" blocks a host of overseas sites and censors information and news deemed sensitive.
Indeed, Weibo officials recently announced they had suspended two accounts and were tightening controls over the site, supposedly to prevent the spread of false rumors.
But the move was clearly in response to government pressure, and the Committee to Protect Journalists called it an attempt to block journalists and bloggers from using the site to report breaking news.
"Chinese authorities concerned by rumors would be better served by allowing free reporting in the nation's media - not by stepping up online controls," said CPJ Deputy Director Robert Mahoney.
Waldron believes there will eventually be a free press in China, but not anytime soon.
"I don't know know how long it will be," he says. "As things stand I think the government is still in a very powerful position."
But Wang Qinglei, former producer of China Central Television's "24 Hours" news program, has a slightly different take on things. Wang was suspended from his job after his reports questioned the cause of the train crash, showed footage of victims in hospitals, and asked whether the country was putting progress before safety.
On his personal blog, Wang predicted more defiance of the government when he wrote: "Constantly restricting and blocking is a way to make things appear peaceful on the surface, but it's actually going to stir up an even bigger crisis."
