by Andrea Ferrario

Women's rights organizations have also long been targeted by Beijing's crackdown. As a result, opportunities for women in traditional newsrooms have been drastically reduced, while alternative online spaces remain under constant pressure. The cases of Haze Fan, editorial assistant for Bloomberg in Beijing, and Zhang Zhan, the blogger who reported on Covid in Wuhan, who has been re-imprisoned.

Milan (AsiaNews) - In the few Chinese newsrooms that continue to practice investigative journalism, women remain vastly underrepresented compared to their male colleagues.

For those among them who seek to address gender issues or do their jobs fully, the obstacles go far beyond widespread censorship.

A deeply male-dominated editorial culture and increasingly fragmented and precarious working conditions also weigh heavily.

This situation is the result of a process that began more than a decade ago, during which the Chinese authorities gradually dismantled the infrastructure of the most progressive media outlets and feminist organizations.

From the arrest of the Feminist Five in 2015 to the banning of Feminist Voice three years later, to the last post published by the Women Awakening Network's Weibo account in 2021, the space for organized women's activism has shrunk to almost nothing.

Today, in fact, running a formally registered women's rights organization has become virtually impossible.

Li Sipan's professional trajectory offers an inside look at this reality. A journalist and activist, she has lived through both the expansion of commercial media and its gradual suffocation. When she joined the investigative department of the prestigious Southern Metropolis Daily in 2007, she was one of only two women in a newsroom of about 30 people.

At the time, the Nanfang Media Group, to which the newspaper belonged, was considered the most progressive media group in China, but despite this, the gender gap within it remained marked.

Editorial dinners were dominated by drinking contests between men and conversations that made female colleagues uncomfortable, while the most prestigious reports, those capable of building professional reputations, were assigned almost exclusively to male journalists.

The culture of newsrooms and the invisible gap

The division of labor reflected deep-rooted gender stereotypes. Reporting on social issues and legal matters often required dealing with local officials in informal settings, where sexual harassment was common.

Male journalists drank with these officials to establish informal relationships of trust, which later translated into tips.

Women, on the other hand, had to endure meetings that made them deeply uncomfortable, marked by harassment and vulgar jokes. Li Sipan preferred to settle for less-than-perfect results rather than subject herself to such situations.

Her meeting with Ai Xiaoming, a professor and feminist activist, marked a turning point in Li Sipan's career, as she pointed out in an interview with the China Media Project.

A training session organized by Ai Xiaoming on media and gender issues led to the creation of the Women Awakening Network, founded by twelve media professionals in Guangzhou.

From the outset, the organization adopted a pragmatic approach, aimed at connecting journalists with sources knowledgeable about gender issues and activists, rather than imparting lessons in professional ethics.

The goal was to make women's activism a visible presence in Guangzhou's public space through conferences, exhibitions, seminars, and events.

Unlike women's organizations active in northern China, which are often led by figures from the official media or government think tanks and therefore bound by the need to maintain good relations with the authorities, the Women Awakening Network has taken a more direct and autonomous approach. Women in the north described Guangzhou's initiatives as particularly effective.

The organization's work over the course of a decade helped create a favorable environment in which, when new generations of activists emerged in 2012, the local media already had a core group of journalists interested in the issue and with a basic understanding of how women's rights organizations work.

Repression and fragmentation

In 2014, following a case of sexual harassment at a university, the Women Awakening Network launched an eight-month campaign to support victims and work with academics to translate anti-sexual harassment policies adopted elsewhere.

At that time, traditional media were suffering from the collapse of the advertising market, and many veteran journalists were leaving the profession.

Online platforms offered greater flexibility and were more willing to accept contributions from non-governmental organizations.

The situation changed radically in 2017 with the enactment of the NGO law, which made the work of civil society organizations increasingly risky.

Li Sipan was forced by the authorities to leave the Women Awakening Network and turned to teaching. Although she has often thought of giving up because of the stress and personal risks, what keeps her going is the sense of fulfillment she gets from being able to convey something she considers important.

The women's movement has now been suppressed across the board, and the authorities are investing enormous energy in controlling its spread.

It is still possible to discuss issues ranging from domestic violence to less serious topics such as the cost of wedding ceremonies, but anything related to ideology or state institutions is closely monitored.

The sexual harassment case involving Liu Qiangdong, a private entrepreneur, can still be discussed, while the case involving Zhu Jun, a prominent figure in the state media, remains taboo.

Women seeking to work as journalists in China continue to face multiple risks. The case of Haze Fan, a Chinese editorial assistant for Bloomberg in Beijing, is emblematic: in 2020, she was taken away by agents of the Ministry of State Security on charges of endangering national security.

Released in 2022, she attempted to resume her journalistic work in Hong Kong, but was denied a visa. Her story highlights the particular vulnerability of female editorial assistants, who effectively perform full-fledged journalistic duties without having the professional status or protections guaranteed to those with journalist credentials.

Beyond organizations, repression also affects individuals. A citizen journalist and practicing Christian, Zhang Zhan had documented the initial response to COVID-19 in Wuhan, an activity that had already cost her a four-year prison sentence.

In September 2025, she was retried in Shanghai and sentenced to another four years, in a trial from which diplomats and international observers were excluded, on charges of spreading “false information that seriously damages the national image” on foreign social media.

Zhang Zhan's case shows that repression is not limited to organized feminism, but more generally affects independent journalists and activists operating outside recognized structures. After years of informal work and awareness-raising, many women's rights issues have now entered the public debate in a widespread form, conveyed by individual initiatives and unstructured networks.

At the same time, the conditions that made organized activism possible in the past have disappeared, and it is unlikely that the mainstream media will return to mobilizing in support of coordinated movements, whether feminist or more broadly civic.

Fragmentation and isolation no longer appear to be transitory, but rather the stable framework within which independent activism operates today, increasingly exposed to repression.

For young women aspiring to journalism in China today, the context is radically different from that encountered by Li Sipan at the beginning of her career.

Opportunities offered by traditional newsrooms have been drastically reduced, while alternative online spaces remain under constant pressure.

But the survival of independent female voices, however fragmented and precarious, indicates that the drive to tell stories and give visibility to marginalized perspectives has not been exhausted.

Even in such a restrictive environment, Li Sipan observed in her interview with the China Media Project, idealism and a sense of justice continue to find forms of expression and intervention, albeit limited ones.