The Olympic Games is a mechanism through which numerous advocacy and political groups compete to frame the media coverage that it generates. These processes are restricted by the relatively fixed guidelines imposed upon Olympic media by the International Olympic Committee (IOC, 2007). Yet, in the past years, the interaction among and communication between communicators, media and various publics has changed dramatically through the Internet one of the reasons being the emergence of convergent media structures. This thesis investigates the process of media convergence and transition that is occurring within the Olympic infrastructures as seen during the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games. Employing Entman’s (1993) framing theory as a theoretical background, this thesis analyses how ideology influenced the framing of China and discourses about its human rights record. Using online data collected during the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games, the thesis examines how discourse about China’s human rights changes from the official materials released by advocacy groups (Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch) and Olympic organizers (The Beijing Organizing Olympic Committee – BOCOG - and The International Olympic Committee – IOC) into online, international traditional media outlets (CNN, BBC, CCTV Channel 9, New York Times, Chicago Tribune, Guardian, The Telegraph, People’s Daily, China Daily) to the online readers that left comments for the media outlets. As such, employs qualitative and quantitative methods as well as traditional and computer assisted analysis to analyse the framing functions human rights had in different discourses. By integrating framing with the hegemonic thesis, it presents framing as a dynamic process, conceptualizing it as a strategy of constructing and processing news and as a characteristic of the discourse itself.

The EU’s approach towards China on human rights has often been criticised for its conflicting interests, and coordination problems between EU institutions and national member states. However, simply renouncing its efforts in the name of realism or neo-liberalism does not fully explain the EU’s commitment to principles of international law, nor does it provide us with understanding as to why its policy has proven so weak and what ‘ought’ to be done. This thesis proposes a normative power approach to the study of EU human rights policy towards China between 1989 and 2009. Central to it is the assumption that the EU has been and should be a normative power towards China in the field of human rights. To verify this assumption, I adopt a tri-partite analytical framework drawn from existing ‘Normative Power Europe’ (NPE) literature in order to make sense of the EU’s adherence to human rights norms and its linkage with its external identity, illustrate how norms are diffused through a discursive form of power, and how impact should be evaluated normatively in the case of China. In so doing, I seek to achieve two central objectives: 1) to add to the empirical richness of NPE literature by analysing the Chinese case; 2) to apply a normative power perspective to the human rights dimension of EU-China relations. To address the first goal, I apply the NPE approach to two selected cases – the death penalty and the Tibet question, which are both high on the EU’s human rights agenda and yet are predicted to produce contrasting results. The second aim is met by operationalising the notion of NPE and developing its analytical and empirical relevance. To that end, I intend to make a contribution to the literature by presenting primary findings in the case-studies and a conceptual refinement of NPE as applied to the Chinese case.

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This thesis examines the People's Republic of China's posture toward the international human rights regime between 1982 and 2011. It focuses on three case studies, including China's participation in the drafting and adoption of the Convention against Torture and the Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture, its role during the negotiations to replace the UN Commission on Human Rights with the UN Human Rights Council, and its posture in the International Labour Organization's Conference Committee on the Application of Standards. To explain China's conduct in these contexts, I offer a framework of five possible roles a state can adopt toward a regime—maker, promoter, taker, constrainer, and breaker. I argue that China's posture was determined by three key explanatory variables that include the PRC government's preferences and ideas about international human rights, its concerns with cultivating a positive international image, and the degree of its familiarity with the international human rights regime. In addition, China's willingness and ability to work with other countries acted as a scope condition that influenced the manner in which it played its particular role. Although I find that the PRC played a range of roles, including maker, taker, and constrainer, overall it tended toward a low-profile posture even when it was playing the more demanding role of maker or constrainer. This thesis draws on documentary records, including United Nations reports, International Labour Organization reports, UN Human Rights Council documents, Chinese government statements, and reports from non-governmental organizations, including the International Service for Human Rights and Amnesty International's New York office. It also uses material from over 90 interviews conducted with diplomats from a range of countries, including China and key countries with similar views such as Pakistan and Egypt; representatives of non-governmental organizations that participate in the international human rights regime; and Chinese officials and scholars, including several affiliated with the Chinese government.