Pride and Patriotism: De-Otherness in US and Chinese Media Discourse on Techno-Nationalism

This study aims to investigate how media from China and the United States construct the ongoing technological conflicts between the two countries. While concerns and disagreements over technological development are primarily political, their interpretations are cultural and ideological. Conceptually, we merge literature from international relations, social psychology, and media studies into a full model centered on the concept of “de-otherness.” Empirically, we carried out a depth qualitative text analysis of two mainstream newspapers: The New York Times in the United States and China Daily in China. Results show that the narrative construction in the media of both countries is strikingly political, a position tactfully concealed by opinion writers who try to divert attention toward moral and social progress aspects of technology. With a host of frames ranging from threat to theft, the mutual de-otherness reflects a shift of discursive emphasis on global technological development to exclusive de-globalization.