By Dr. SHI, Anbin

(Associate Dean of International Development and Professor of Media and Cultural Studies, School of Journalism and Communication, Tsinghua University)

On behalf of the School and in the name of Dean LIU, Binjie, first of all, I should convey my heartfelt congratulations to the Class of 2014 of the MA program in Global Business Journalism (GBJ), with the School of Journalism and Communication, Tsinghua University (TSJC). Today is your day; you are all the shining super stars!

I should also thank all faculty, staff, sponsors, parents and friends to make these young ladies and gentlemen to fulfill their Chinese dream in the “Tsinghua Garden”, one of the most beautiful campuses around the globe recognized by Forbes. Among others, I would make a special mention of wonderful work done by the GBJ co-directors, Professors HANG, Min and Rick Durham, and last but the least, our hard-working and customer-friendly GBJ officers, Ms. Rose Li and Ms. Olivia Zhou .

In particular, I want to acknowledge the persistent support from International Center for Journalists （ICFJ）, Bank of America Merrill Lynch, the Knight Foundation, and Bloomberg, to make this program happen and sustain for the past seven years.

On this special occasion, I want to convey Dean Liu Binjie’s best wishes and goodwill for Class 2014. Last year, he retired from the position as the Minister of State Administration of Press and Publication and is now acting as the deputy chair for the Committee of Education, Science, Culture and Public Health under the National People’s Congress, China’s top legislative branch. I also want to pay a special tribute to the founders of this wonderful program, the School’s founding Dean, Professor FAN Jingyi, and our former executive dean, Professor LI Xiguang，for their foresight of internationalizing journalism education in China.

During the two- year stay in Tsinghua, the Class of 2014 has the privilege of witnessing China’s dramatic transformation, which will end up in overtaking the U.S. as the world’s No. 1 economy as early as the end of 2014, according to a World Bank report released in early May. Although most of Chinese officials and experts would cast doubt upon this over-optimistic prediction, no one would deny that China’s rise would remap and reinvent the layout of the global geopolitical arena since the US overtook the U.K. in the 1870s. The coming of “China century” in lieu of “American century” is no longer an urban legend.

In the meantime, we are also witnessing the soaring impact of China’s new leadership heralded by President Xi Jinping, who is also a Tsinghua alum, or “Daddy Xi,” as Weibo users put it, and his notion of “Chinese Dream”, and the new Premier Li Keqiang‘s “Likonomics.

However, the world still holds an ambivalent attitude toward China, with half positive and another half negative toward China, according a BBC survey released in May. Thus, China’s charm campaign to better her national image and enhance her soft power becomes a timely urgency. As future journalists and communicators, the GBJ graduates have therefore been empowered to analyze the China and global interactions with a more multicultural and diverse perspectives in this globalized environ of TSJC, the most internationalized journalism school in China.

Since its launching in September, 2007, the GBJ program, as the first all-English-taught MA program in journalism in mainland China, have successfully incorporated the various media philosophies and praxis from both China and the rest of the world, and created an integrative teaching and learning environment with the participation of faculty and students from China and nearly 50 different countries, constituting a growing United Nations of Media in a journalism school. In Class 2014, we have claimed the first GBJ graduate from countries like Costa Rica (Keren), Lebanon (Nadim) , and Georgia (Koka), extending our alumni to the greater outreach of the globe.

On this occasion, I also want to make a special mention of the excellent GBJ graduates in Class 2014 , Ms. Laura Marti who won the University’s top M.A. thesis award; Mr. Himanshu Kumar Sethia from India who won the School’s top M.A. thesis award, who also published extensively with Global Times; Mr. Nadim Diab who also won the School’s top M.A. thesis award. Among Chinese students, Miss Wu Yanni won both the University's top graduate award and the M.A. thesis award; Miss Guo Xiaohe, Wang Wenyu, Wang Yuqi, Wei Wei, Wu Danni and Xiao Dan won the School's top MA thesis award.

In the next decade of TSJC’s development, the GBJ program still remains the core of our school’s long-term goal of interdisciplinary integration and academic globalization. I hope you all cherish this Tsinghua motto of “self-discipline and social commitment” and make your own contributions to shaping a more sustainable world and a more peaceful global community for the next decades and centuries.

Another less known Tsinghua motto is coined by Professor Chen Yin-que in memory of his colleague, Professor Wang Guo-wei and is engraved on Wang ’s monument, quietly situated in a corner not far from the Omnicom building. Both Professors Wang and Chen were among the Four Tutors of Chinese Classics in the 1920s. Professor Chen’s axiom reads: “Independent Thinking; Free Will.” This is also the motto for every Tsinghua graduate, no matter you will become a journalist, PR professional or a CEO in the foreseeable future, to maintain independent thinking and free will.

One of the emergent global issues is the economic disparities and widening income gap, not merely seen in the developing countries in China, but also adequately uttered by recent protests in Egypt, Brazil and Turkey, even in welfare nations like Sweden in the wake of the sweeping “Occupying the Wall Street” movement in 2010. The silent majority never keeps silent in the age of social media. The world has seen the rise and heard the voice of “Global 99%”, the newly-rising middle class, the angry young men, and still a larger body of people from the lower stratum.

Harvard Professor of history, Neil Fergusson, published an article last June, calling for the end of American Dream as “nightmare,” because it is testified as an accessible and affordable dream merely for the global 1%, namely, the transnational power elite. It is therefore quite natural for the global community to anticipate the alternative, that is, the Chinese Dream.

But whither the Chinese Dream? As our “Daddy Xi” succinctly put it, Chinese Dream is people’s dream which provides adequate chances for every “small potato” to shine on their own stage and to make their life meaningful and valuable. As up to date, the 290 million migrant workers, a combination of “farmer-cum-workers” in Chinese language, still contribute to the economic boom not only for China, but also for the rest of the world. Thus, as business journalists or media professionals, we must always remember to speak for the global 99%, to ensure a better life for one billion population (among them 400 million in China) who are still living in poverty. Simply put, journalists and media professionals should always bear this Chinese Dream, both accessible and affordable for the global 99%, in their mind whenever and wherever they are making news coverage: to lend a helping hand to the downtrodden, to give voice and stage for the small potato to shine up, and ultimately to achieve the greatest happiness for the greatest number of people.

The concept of “harmony” remains the core to the Chinese Dream. In Chinese language, the word of “harmony” (he xie) means that everyone would have enough harvest and have equal right to speak. This Chinese Dream has been adequately elucidated by all kind of names: Confucianism, communism, socialism, welfare capitalism, enlightenment, etc. These different naming reflects that no matter what ideology we uphold, we have shared the same dream for the mankind. I hope all GBJ graduates would take a lead in making the dream of a harmonious world come true.

As early as the 1960s, the founding father of mass communication studies, Professor Wilbur Schramm from the US, has proposed the concept of NWICO (new world information and communication order). On June 1st, 2011,Mr. LI Congjun, the editor-in-chief of Xinhua News Agency published a commentary with the Wall Street Journal and called the founding of “United Nation of News Media,” echoing Schramm’s dream of NWICO. Both Xinhua and CCTV, along with four other Chinese media organizations, have built the headquarters in major global cities and expanded China’s visibility throughout the world. With China’s peaceful rise and growing visibility in the global media sphere, I believe the dream of NWICO will come true within your generation, particularly the graduates from the GBJ program, the real United Nations of media based in Tsinghua.

In conclusion, I am proud of you all and wish you the greatest success in your future career development and lifelong pursuit of freedom, equality and happiness for mankind. Wherever you are booming or roaming, please bear in mind that we are always waiting for you right here, in Tsinghua, your eternal sweet home and haven.