An overwhelming majority of texts (81 percent) was neutral, simply describing the amounts of investment, bilateral trade volume or positions and actions of the engaged politicians and lobbyists. 17 percent of the texts, however, were fairly critical, mostly appearing in the commentary sections or in the blogs and mentioning China’s activities abroad. Only two percent of texts were coded as carrying a positive sentiment.

The most varied approach can be observed in the case of TV Barrandov, which underwent a change from reporting on Chinese investment in an overwhelmingly positive manner, especially through regular interviews granted by the Czech President Miloš Zeman, until September 2018. Since November 2018, the president has been either vocally negative or neutral on the issue of Chinese investment in TV Barrandov. While Jaromír Soukup, the interviewer and also the co-owner of the TV station, was often negative on China in his questions towards the president, possibly to stir the discussion or to enable the president to challenge the position and present a positive view of China.

In general, it can be argued that the Czech media included in the analysis did not attempt to bring new information or conduct adequately thorough investigations of Chinese investment issues. 

The lion’s share of attention has been paid to the actions of local political actors or lobbyists and the impacts of their activities. Most prominently, this features in coverage of President Zeman’s trips to China, Prague Mayor Zdeněk Hřib’s announcements in connection to sister-city agreement, or Czech Senate President Miloš Vystrčil’s trip to Taiwan. The issues revolving around Hřib and Vystrčil were both presented as having a potential impact on Chinese investment to the country and led to brief comparisons of the volume of Taiwanese and Chinese investment inflows to Czechia. 

Attempts to cover more qualitative issues like CEFC’s global operations, the persona of Ye Jianming, or detailed analysis of Chinese investment (beyond a mere list of companies invested into by CEFC/CITIC) were conversely lacking. 

To be sure, some outlets did make mention of security risks connected to Chinese investment, such as a dependency on China. Especially after 2019, the Czech media debate on Chinese investment was relatively flat.

Unsurprisingly, the list of agenda setters is quite robust, comprising 439 authors, co-authors, or quoted persons. As authors and co-authors of the texts, journalists logically create the biggest category of agenda setters (48 percent), followed by politicians (26 percent), state administration staff (11 percent), representatives of business and business analysts (8 percent) and China experts (5 percent).

An overwhelming majority of texts (81 percent) was neutral, simply describing the amounts of investment, bilateral trade volume or positions and actions of the engaged politicians and lobbyists. 17 percent of the texts, however, were fairly critical, mostly appearing in the commentary sections or in the blogs and mentioning China’s activities abroad. Only two percent of texts were coded as carrying a positive sentiment.

The most varied approach can be observed in the case of TV Barrandov, which underwent a change from reporting on Chinese investment in an overwhelmingly positive manner, especially through regular interviews granted by the Czech President Miloš Zeman, until September 2018. Since November 2018, the president has been either vocally negative or neutral on the issue of Chinese investment in TV Barrandov. While Jaromír Soukup, the interviewer and also the co-owner of the TV station, was often negative on China in his questions towards the president, possibly to stir the discussion or to enable the president to challenge the position and present a positive view of China.

The issue of security of 5G networks in the Czech Republic is mostly associated with Huawei, a Chinese telecom company with the highest share of components in local networks. Huawei is also arguably the most active Chinese telecom company in the V4 countries. ZTE and other Chinese companies have, at least so far, had a less visible presence.

The majority of analyzed texts focused on security risks, such as the existence of ‘back doors’ in Chinese companies’ software and China’s National Intelligence Law passed in 2017. This legislation creates affirmative legal responsibilities for Chinese but also some foreign citizens, companies, or organizations operating in China to provide access, cooperation, or support for Beijing’s intelligence-gathering activities, cases of espionage, etc. Other topics were associated with Chinese companies’ products, Sino-American relations, cooperation within EU or NATO on solving 5G problems, the position of Five Eyes countries on cooperation with China and links between Huawei and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

Regarding agenda setters, 318 people were identified as contributing to the discourse in the analyzed period either as authors, co-authors, or quoted persons.

The largest group constitutes journalists (40 percent). Nevertheless, the key agenda setters have not been persons but institutions and state administration staff (31 percent) and politicians (19 percent).