Introduction

As a rising global power, China’s increasing economic and military influence has astonished the world since it became the second-largest economy in 2010. To better project a favourable international image without irritating the outside world due to its increasing capacity and influence, China continues to emphasise its identity as a ‘responsible great power’ and has also begun to shoulder more international responsibility in global emergencies as a global public goods supplier (Boon, 2022). Although the ‘responsible power’ or ‘responsible stakeholder’ narrative has been employed by Western countries attempting to engage with China (Gill, 2007), this narrative has been adopted as China’s own to project its international image on the world stage. This was particularly evident during the COVID-19 pandemic. While the US and European countries were critically entangled in the pandemic, struggling to address their own problems locally and globally, China leveraged the global health emergency by utilising its health diplomacy as a form of soft power to expand its geopolitical influence (Gauttam et al., 2020). This study examines China’s COVID-19 vaccine as a case to investigate how and why China portrayed itself as a global public goods supplier through its global vaccine distribution efforts during the COVID-19 pandemic and, concomitantly, how other great powers, such as the US and European countries, perceive China’s self-projected identity as a global public goods supplier.

As the primary source of information on international events or issues, the media matters in terms of the construction of an international issue. The existing literature argues that the framing of an international issue in news coverage can be considered a strategic communication process (e.g., Aalberg et al., 2012; Liu et al., 2023). During this process, the issue is assigned a particular problem definition, causal analysis and moral judgement (Entman, 2008). For example, the issue of climate change, although not inherently a political one, becomes highly politicised in the process of media framing (Pan et al., 2019). Similarly, the issue of COVID-19 vaccines was subjected to the politicisation process. Far from prompting greater collaboration, the vaccine issue has become a new battlefield for the great powers, especially the US and China, both of which have initiated strategic ‘vaccine diplomacy’ (Tung, 2022; van Dijk and Lo, 2023). Consequently, studying media coverage of the Chinese vaccine issue will reveal the dynamics of contemporary great power cooperation and competition.

This study selects three representative and influential media outlets—China’s China Daily (CD), the US’s New York Times (NYT) and Germany’s Die Welt (DW)—to examine. Germany is selected as the representative of European countries in this study because it is the largest economy in the European Union (EU) and influences the EU’s China policy to some extent (McElwee and Mazzocco, 2023). On the other hand, regarding the development of COVID-19 vaccines, bio-technology companies from these three countries also exhibited a complicated relationship that involved both competition and cooperation. During China’s development of its COVID-19 vaccine, Pfizer, in the US, and BioNTech, in Germany, also accelerated their clinical trials (Pfizer, 2020). Additionally, Fosun Pharma, a prominent Chinese vaccine producer, maintains a close partnership with its counterparts in Germany (BioNTech, 2020). This study is intended to explore the frames for this issue and, more importantly, the contextual factors affecting the above-mentioned media outlets’ various perspectives.

The remainder of this paper consists of five sections. The first section reviews existing research outputs on media framing in the field of international communication, pointing out the significant role national interests play in it. Because international relations contexts cannot be ignored when analysing media frames, the second section discusses how China has portrayed itself as a global public goods supplier in recent years and why China considers this a part of its international strategy. This section also discusses how the US and Germany have come to view China’s international role in recent years, especially what changed in this regard during the COVID-19 pandemic. To increase the reliability and validity of this study, we have applied a new standardised content analysis approach, which is illustrated in detail in the third section. The fourth section presents the results for the US, Chinese, and German media frames for the Chinese COVID-19 vaccine. The fifth section provides a brief conclusion and examines how this case study contributes to the discussion of China’s ‘responsible great power’ strategy on the international stage and the challenges that nation faces.

Media framing as strategic international communication

As a central organising idea in the news, frames help to make sense of relevant events and define a given issue (Gamson and Modigliani, 1989). To frame an event or issue is to select or highlight some facets of it so as to ‘promote a particular problem definition, causal interpretation, moral evaluation, and/or treatment recommendation’ (Entman, 1993, p. 52). Media frames are, therefore, regarded as strategic issue positions that are evident in media output (Aalberg et al., 2012; Hänggli and Kriesi, 2012). This is particularly true in the realm of international communication. Given that the media serve as a primary source of information on international events and issues, international news coverage plays a crucial role in collecting, selecting, and distributing information for global audiences (Baum and Potter, 2008). Emphasising or hiding certain facets of an event or issue will affect how people’s perceptions and evaluations of unfamiliar nations, cultures, and ideologies are constructed (McPhail and Phipps, 2020; Wasburn, 2002). Media framing, which always involves a battle over meaning and an attempt to offer a dominant interpretation of an international issue, could thus be considered a strategic international communication process.

Multiple factors contribute to the framing process in international news. As Lee et al. (2002) illustrate, these factors include configuration of both international and domestic forces, the media’s organisational and personal constraints as well as the nature of an event or issue. A group of scholars have found a significant role on the part of national interests in influencing the frames used in covering international events or issues (e.g., Bier et al., 2018; Brewer, 2006; Silcock, 2002). When news coverage aims to strike a balance between national and global interests, it often tends to prioritise domestic perspectives over global ones. This tendency is especially pronounced when the issue or event involves conflicts between countries. For example, regarding the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) threat, CNN’s coverage predominantly employed a geopolitical frame centred on strategies for handling ISIS, whereas Al Jazeera English frequently discussed the human rights crisis, ISIS prowess, and the failing state (Zhang and Hellmueller, 2016). A more recent example is that during the 2018 US–China trade conflict, the US media was more likely to use journalistic practices typically associated with wartime, framing the US as the victor in the trade war. In contrast, the Chinese media primarily opposed the US tariff policy without challenging their own government’s support for global economic cooperation (Ha et al., 2024).

In this sense, as a strategic international communication process, the media framing process always involves counter-framing (Luther and Zhou, 2005; Pan et al., 2019). Whether or not one frame becomes dominant in the international discourse is largely determined by the power or strategy deployed by the relevant governments, the motivations of the mainstream media in reporting the issue and cultural congruence between the reporting country and the reported country (Entman, 2003). The COVID-19 vaccine should be a scientific and public health issue. Why and how has this issue been politicised in the associated media coverage? This study exemplifies the framing of the Chinese COVID-19 vaccine through an analysis of three distinct media outlets. Its objective is to delve into how China and the Western powers have utilised media outlets to construct their respective narratives and set the global agenda regarding the global pandemic in general and the Chinese COVID-19 vaccine, which was labelled a global public good by China, in particular. Before exploring the media frame contestation over this issue, we must first understand the background of China’s attempts to become a global public goods supplier.

China as a global public goods supplier

A public good is one ‘which all enjoy in common in the sense that each individual’s consumption of such a good leads to no subtraction from any other individual’s consumption of that good’ (Samuelson, 1954, p. 387). In the international order, whether one state will become the supplier of global public goods depends on various conditions (Freeman, 2021). If a state is transformed from a consumer into a supplier of global public goods, it may perceive the prevailing international stability as having an impact on its national well-being. Alternatively, it may view itself as having the capacity to assume the costs associated with providing the global public goods it deems necessary (Bussmann and Oneal, 2007). From being afraid of overdraft and losing a strategic opportunity for development because of Western pressure over ‘China Responsibility Theory’ to actively speaking about being a responsible great power in terms of providing global public goods, China’s self-projected identity seems to be changing under President Xi’s leadership (Nordin and Smith, 2020). Why has China been committed to becoming a global public goods supplier in recent years? Do the US and European countries, for example, Germany, view China as a provider of global public goods? During the COVID-19 pandemic, how and why did China conduct ‘vaccine diplomacy’? What are the perceptions of the US and Germany regarding China’s issues during the pandemic? These questions may become an important contextual framework for understanding the international coverage of China’s COVID-19 vaccine.

China’s attempt to become a global public goods supplier

Although China’s willingness to provide global public goods is not new, a call for China to expand its role as a supplier of global public goods has emerged since 2012, reflecting the great power mindset of China’s international outreach under the leadership of Xi Jinping (Liu, 2015). Over the years, China has offered more and more global public goods through independent initiatives or collaborations with other countries. These include the establishment of the New Development Bank (NDB) and Contingent Reserve Arrangement for the BRICS countries, the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and its Silk Road Fund (Zhang, 2018). Increasing evidence indicates that China is actively pursuing the role of global public goods supplier. As Freeman (2021) argues, the transformation of China’s role in global public goods has come about not only because of international crises and perceived threats to China’s national interests but also because of China’s increased national capabilities and the net benefits accrued through providing public goods to other countries. As China garners sufficient international and domestic support, providing global public goods also emerges as an imperative for China if it intends to claim its great power status and achieve national rejuvenation (Freeman, 2021).

As the first nation to confront COVID-19, China initially faced international criticism due to its government’s tight control over information and strict restrictions on personnel mobility (Huang, 2020). However, as China successfully contained the outbreak within a fairly short period and several Western countries faced challenges in balancing pandemic containment with free mobility, the Chinese government’s proactive measures also garnered recognition (Gauttam et al., 2020). Since March 2020, China has announced a plan to provide medical and economic assistance to more than 150 countries and regions, as well as international organisations (SCIO, 2020). All these activities show China’s intention to export its pandemic control experiences and maintain its commitment to defend individuals’ health and security, not only at home but also beyond its borders, mirroring its projection of international responsibility (Kobierecka and Kobierecki, 2021).

With the development and market launch of the Chinese COVID-19 vaccine, China initiated ‘vaccine diplomacy’ with numerous developing countries in early 2021 (Tung, 2022). During the opening of the 73rd World Health Assembly in May 2020, President Xi Jinping made a commitment that ‘COVID-19 vaccine development in China, when available, will be made a global public good. This will be China’s contribution to ensuring vaccine accessibility and affordability in developing countries’ (Cao, 2020). Subsequently, the then-Chinese-Premier Li Keqiang, Foreign Minister Wang Yi, and Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying reiterated these statements at various international events.

In contrast, the US government was largely absent from the vaccine diplomacy race in early 2021 due to its focus on prioritising its domestic vaccination programme (Tung, 2022). It was not until May 2021 that the US joined the competition, following President Biden’s announcement of a plan to distribute 80 million COVID-19 vaccine doses worldwide (US Department of State, 2022). This backdrop influences US perceptions of China as a provider of global public goods and shaped how other countries perceived the leadership roles of both China and the US during the COVID-19 pandemic.

US perceptions of China as a global public goods supplier

In US-China relations, the ‘responsible power’ concept was introduced in 1995, when then-US-President Bill Clinton met former Chinese president Jiang Zemin, indicating that while the U.S. welcomed China’s rise, great power comes with great responsibility (Nye, 1997). In then-Deputy-Secretary-of-State Robert Zoellick’s speech addressing China as a ‘responsible stakeholder’ in 2005, the ‘responsible power’ concept indicated the US’s expectations that China meet international standards and abide by international rules, norms and institutions, which are led by the West and, in particular, the US (Gill, 2007).

However, facing China’s rapid rise, especially after the 2008 global financial crisis, the US government has abandoned the aforementioned approach of engaging with China and integrating it into the international system as a ‘responsible stakeholder’. Given the fear of a loss of political prestige, the possibility of military conflicts and a decline in comparative gains, America increasingly considers China to be a strategic competitor, rather than an economic partner (Wang and Zeng, 2020). Under President Trump’s leadership, the December 2017 US National Security Strategy (NSS), as well as the 2018 National Defense Strategy (NDS), recommended that the US re-enter the ‘great-power competition’. His administration seemed to view the coming era of ‘great-power competition’ as a return to a Cold-War-style contest, in this case with China and Russia (Tavares and Schake, 2022).

Therefore, the 2020 global COVID-19 crisis unfolded during a time of diminished global cooperation, with the traditional leaders of the international collective response seemingly forsaking their responsibilities entirely (Zakaria, 2020). It appears that the world is descending into what can be termed a ‘Kindleberger Trap,’ which refers to a situation in which there is a notable absence of global leadership during times of international crisis (Bahi, 2021). On one hand, the US, as the dominant global power, still possesses the capability to lead but has chosen not to. This is evident from then-President Trump’s decision to halt funding to the World Health Organisation (WHO) in April 2020 (Gauttam et al., 2020). On the other hand, China, as a rising power, lacks the capacity to provide the global public goods needed, especially in areas such as climate change and security. However, China’s proactive gestures in terms of addressing health problems within and beyond its borders during the COVID-19 pandemic may alert the Western bloc to China’s material and even ideational influence (Ogden, 2020). A narrative battle over COVID-19 began to unfold between China and the US in 2020. Then-US-President Trump blamed China for its supposedly irresponsible actions regarding the COVID-19 pandemic, and China was framed as ‘a clear danger to the nation’ (Jaworsky and Qiaoan, 2020, p. 311).

However, the US’s stance towards China during the pandemic did not reflect the attitudes of other Western countries. The 2020 Munich Security Conference employed the term ‘Westlessness’, arguing that ‘the world is becoming less Western, but more importantly, the West itself is becoming less Western, too’ (Munich Security Conference, 2020). The US’s relationships with its European allies may not be as solid as these nations have claimed. Facing changes in the distribution of power in today’s international order, the EU countries, for example, Germany, may have different perceptions than the US of China’s role in world affairs.

The German perceptions of China as a global public goods supplier

During President Trump’s administration, his unilateralist ‘American First’ policy and criticism of its traditional European allies as ‘free riders’ in Europe’s defense weakened these nations’ faith in the US as a reliable ally (Schreer, 2019). To deal with an uncertain international system created by power shifts and power diffusion, even countries within the Western bloc seem to be adopting divergent approaches to the changing international sphere. Quite a few European countries, including France and Germany, have been caught between China and the US, so a strategy of hedging has been operationalised (Cook et al., 2022).

According to data released by the Federal Statistical Office of Germany, the bilateral trade volume between Germany and China reached 253.1 billion euros in 2023. China has been Germany’s largest trading partner for 8 consecutive years, while Germany has also maintained its position as China’s largest trading partner (German Federal Statistical Office, 2024). The economic interdependence between China and Germany has made a case for ‘economic realism’ (Mathur and Agarwalla, 2020). Although scholars argue that EU–China relations have shifted from ‘engagement and cooperation’ to ‘engagement and rivalry’, because of the impact of the Sino-US great-power rivalry (e.g., Li and He, 2022), a public opinion survey conducted by the European Council on Foreign Relations indicated that a majority of Europeans do not view China as a threat to their way of life (Krastev and Leonard, 2021). Additionally, at least half of the electorate in every surveyed country expressed a preference for their government to remain neutral in a conflict between the US and China (Krastev and Leonard, 2021, p. 14). Therefore, as an EU member state, Germany favours a transatlantic relationship on the basis of shared Western values, but it also has a tradition of implementing a practical foreign policy to engage with China for the sake of the German national interest (Barkin, 2020).

As mentioned above, the COVID-19 pandemic had further intensified the antagonism between the US and China. Given its deepening economic connections with China, Germany faces the challenge of balancing its relationships with both the US and China. However, the approach to achieving this balance remains uncertain (Fix, 2022). The debates on the issue of the Chinese COVID-19 vaccine, which China positioned as one of its important global public goods during the global pandemic, may offer a valuable perspective on the triangular relationship between China, the US, and Germany. Within this relationship, China attempts to assume its emerging global role as a responsible great power, while it may contrast with potentially divergent perspectives held by the US and Germany. Although current literatures have discussed China’s attempts to increase its global impact during the pandemic, ranging from ‘mask diplomacy’ (e.g., Sun and Yu, 2023) to ‘vaccine diplomacy’ (e.g., van Dijk and Lo, 2023), few studies have provided empirical data on the framing of the Chinese COVID-19 vaccine in international media discourses. Therefore, rather than offering general conclusions about China’s ‘vaccine diplomacy’, we intend to apply a standardised comparative approach in studying the variation in cross-national media frames on this issue.

Research design

Over the past decades, multiple approaches to studying media frames have been developed. For example, the hermeneutic approach relies on the qualitative method to identify frames by offering an interpretative analysis of media texts (e.g., Coleman and Dysart, 2005), the deductive approach uses standard content analysis techniques based on the frames summarised in the previous literature (e.g., Semetko and Valkenburg, 2000) and the computer-assisted approach identifies the frames by examining specific vocabularies in texts with the assistance of a computer (e.g., Miller, 1997). As Matthes and Kohring (2008) argue, these approaches are used capture latent or cultural meanings within a text, which may pose reliability concerns, while some other approaches offer reliable measurements but may lack validity. Thus, to increase the reliability and validity of the study of media frames, we should consider them as clusters of elements. According to Entman’s (1993) definition, the frame elements include the following: (1) problem definition, (2) causal interpretation, (3) moral evaluation and (4) treatment. In other words, when using a standardised content analysis approach to study media frames, a frame is not coded directly; rather, researchers code its elements first and then summarise the frame based on its elements (Matthes and Kohring, 2008).

This study uses Matthes and Kohring’s (2008) approach to identify diverse media frames in the US, German and Chinese media regarding the Chinese COVID-19 vaccine. This approach has two advantages. First, as mentioned above, it increases the reliability and validity of the study of media frames. Second, it enables us to not only identify the frames themselves but also discern frame variation and contestation by identifying their elements. Accordingly, three levels of comparison can be made: (1) frames across media, (2) frame elements across frames and (3) frame variation across the 2020 and 2021 (see Fig. 1).

Fig. 1
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Analytical framework: three levels of comparison.

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Consequently, three groups of research questions are posed:

Research Question 1: Frames: How do the Chinese, US, and German media frame the Chinese vaccine issue?

Research Question 2: Frame contestation: How do the media frames for the Chinese vaccine compete with one another? Why are they competing?

Research Question 3: Frame variation: Has the emphasis on certain frames varied along with the progression of the pandemic and the research and development on vaccines?

Samples

The news samples used in this study were taken from three English media outlets: the NYT, DW and CD. These three were selected because they are influential national newspapers in their respective countries, as explained above. Given the limits of the researchers’ language abilities, DW’s English edition was chosen. We set the timespan for sample collection from January 26, 2020, to July 1, 2021. January 26, 2020, was the day on which the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CCDC) announced the development of China’s COVID-19 vaccine (Wang and Qu, 2020). July 1, 2021, was the deadline for the first domestic vaccination target (40%) after the vaccine launched in China. Vaccinating 40% of the population was also the global target set by the WHO for each country to help control the COVID-19 pandemic. Footnote 1 The first China-produced vaccine, Sinopharm China Bio’s novel coronavirus inactivated vaccine, was approved by the National Medical Products Administration (NMPA) on December 31, 2020. In the following 6 months, seven Chinese vaccines with four technical routes were approved for marketing (Chen and Chen, 2021). Thus, such a 1.5 year study period is sufficient for exploring the media coverage of China’s vaccines, including four stages: project research and development, clinical trials, the approval of marketing, and the promotion of vaccination.

Using the keywords ‘China + vaccine + Coronavirus or COVID-19’ and removing news summaries, letters from readers and duplicates from the web and blog pages, we obtained 355 related articles via the Lexis Advance Database, which includes 142 articles from the NYT, 42 articles from DW (English edition), and 171 articles from CD.

Coding and reliability

As mentioned above, informed by Matthes and Kohring’s (2008) approach, a frame consists of several frame elements, each of which encompasses several content analytical variables. After reviewing the collected media texts multiple times, we developed the coding scheme for each analytical variables within the four frame elements (see Table 1). We analysed those 36 variables at the article level using dummy variables (0 = frame element absent from the article, 1 = frame element present in the article). Two coders were trained, and they coded the abovementioned news samples independently. The average agreement between the two coders for all variables was 0.84. The detailed results for each element can be found in the Appendix.

Table 1 Variables and Codes for Cluster Analysis.
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Because only those binary variables with frequencies higher than 5% were included in the cluster analysis, 32 variables from the NYT, 28 from DW and 24 from CD were ultimately submitted for analysis. For each newspaper, a separate hierarchical cluster analysis was conducted using the Ward method in SPSS, and the number of clusters was identified by using the “elbow criterion” (Wessler et al., 2016, p. 430).

Results

Identifying the frames across media

Through the hierarchical cluster analysis, we identified five frames for the NYT, two for DW and four for CD. Table 2 summarises the frames used by the three media outlets, with the Global Public Goods Frame receiving the highest proportion of coverage, accounting for 30.99% of the Chinese media’s coverage. However, both the US and German media considered Chinese vaccines to be a political or international threat. While the Chinese media highlights the safety of the Chinese vaccines and China’s leading role in research and development, the US and German media cast doubt on these vaccine’s safety and effectiveness. Vaccines should be a scientific or technological issue, but in the context of COVID-19, the media coverage of them was focused on political and international relations. Thus, the issue of COVID-19 vaccines, as discussed in the media, has gone far beyond a scientific or health-related agenda. Next, we will discuss the elements of each specific frame adopted by these three media outlets individually.

Table 2 Frame comparison between the New York Times, Die Welt and China Daily.
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Chinese media frames

Table 3 shows the result for each variable for the four frames identified in CD’s coverage. Serving as a crucial foreign propaganda platform, the frames used in CD’s coverage represent the key aspects of China’s vaccine that the Chinese government desires to convey to the international community.

Table 3 Results on all variables of the four frames identified by China Daily.
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Firstly, the Global Public Goods Frame is the most significant frame within CD’s coverage of the Chinese COVID-19 vaccine, thus, it is evident that CD’s reports are closely aligned with official Chinese discourses. Reviewing the results shown in Table 3, the mean value of the ‘Actor-Politics’ variable is high, at 0.98. This indicates that 98% of coverage within this frame pertains to political actors, highlighting the significant reliance of CD’s coverage on Chinese official sources. For example, CD’s reports frequently quote statements by the spokesperson for the Foreign Ministry of the PRC or the words of the director of the Development Center for Medical Science and Technology of the National Health Commission at related news conferences. In addition, 92% of articles that fit within this frame discuss China’s vaccines as benefits for global vaccine supply and distribution. As a result, the Global Public Goods Frame emerged as the dominant frame that both the official Chinese discourse and the media aim to emphasise to the international community. Within this frame, no articles mentioned the risk of the Chinese vaccine’s global supply chains, epidemic relief, and vaccination generally.

Associated with the Global Public Goods Frame, the second most covered frame is the Vaccination Promotion Frame (30.41%), which was mainly used to address the topic of vaccination (mean = 0.94, SD = 0.24) and emphasised the safety and effectiveness of the Chinese vaccines. Medical experts, such as academic Zhong Nanshan and Dr. Zhang Wenhong, were frequently quoted in this cluster of articles. This frame could also be seen as competing with frames questioning the Chinese vaccines’ safety and effectiveness within Western media. For example, CD criticised many Western media outlets for taking the efficacy rate of the Chinese vaccines in Brazil out of context and thus misleading the public (Zhang, 2021). Similarly, no article within this frame mentioned the risk of the Chinese vaccine for global supply chains, global vaccination, or vaccine research.

The third frame used by CD is the Leading Research and Development Frame, representing 28.07% of coverage and highlighting China’s leading role in vaccine research and development. In contrast with other frames that place higher mean values on political actors or political benefit attribution, this frame concentrates on scientific actors or scientific benefit attribution. It is also intriguing that no CD articles have addressed the risks associated with the Chinese vaccine.

Lastly, the Global Collaboration Frame highlights China’s attempts to enhance international collaboration in the field of global public health. This frame acknowledges both political factors (mean = 0.89, SD = 0.32) and scientific factors (mean = 0.78, SD = 0.43) when attributing benefits. Thus, CD’s reports aim to showcase the global recognition of the Chinese vaccines and China’s contribution to global anti-pandemic cooperation. As mentioned above, during Xi’s presidency, demonstrating China’s responsible great power identity also involves a domestic discourse, which advocates China to be a more proactive role on the global stage (Breslin, 2010). Remarkably, CD’s coverage of the COVID-19 vaccine does not mention any form of competition or negative judgements regarding the Chinese vaccines, emphasising China is not intentionally pursuing any competition with the other great powers but is, rather, attempting to cooperate and collaborate with them. Due to CD’s role as a ‘mouthpiece’ and in foreign propaganda, the issue of the Chinese COVID-19 vaccine has been highly politicised in its coverage.

Regarding frame variation, Fig. 2 compares the number of articles within each frame for CD’s coverage between 2020 and 2021. In 2020, the Leading Research and Development Frame is the most prominent frame in CD’s coverage. However, in 2021, the focus shifted to the Global Collaboration Frame and Vaccination Promotion Frame. Such frame variation is consistent with the Chinese domestic and foreign policy on the COVID-19 vaccines, as we have discussed above. Since the official launch of the Chinese COVID-19 vaccine on the last day of 2020 (State Council of PRC, 2020), the Chinese media’s discourse quickly followed the official narrative, presenting the vaccine as a crucial global public good. However, the frames used in CD’s reports stand in direct contrast to the frames observed in the US and German media, which illustrates the frame contestation between the Chinese media and Western media.

Fig. 2
figure 2

Comparison of article numbers within each frame for CD’s coverage between. 2020 and 2021.

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US media frames

Table 4 shows the clusters of the five media frames used by the NYT. The Safety Risks Frame is the most used frame regarding the issue of the Chinese vaccines, representing 38.73% of coverage. Within this frame, the potential safety risks of Chinese COVID-19 vaccines are the focus. The five variables with the highest mean values in this frame are (1) topic-vaccination (mean = 0.93, SD = 0.26), (2) actor-politics (mean = 0.98, SD = 0.14), (3) risks-health (mean = 0.95, SD = 0.23), (4) risks-vaccine allocation and vaccination (mean = 0.91, SD = 0.29) and (5) negative disposition (mean = 0.93, SD = 0.26). Therefore, one significant argument made by the articles in this frame is that the safety risks associated with the Chinese vaccines primarily stem from factors such as medical science and technology, the commercial personnel involved in vaccine development and promotion as well as the Chinese government’s control over the global supply chain and its participation in global vaccine distribution.

Table 4 Results on all variables of the five frames identified by the New York Times.
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The second most-used frame in the NYT is the Vaccine Diplomacy Competition Frame (21.13%), which emphasises China’s ‘vaccine diplomacy’ and influence on other countries. Certain articles express concerns about the US falling behind in the global vaccine competition. For example, an article entitled ‘US Takes Step to Use Vaccine for Diplomacy’ urges the Biden Administration to expedite the distribution of American-made vaccines to foreign nations. The article argues that this is crucial because ‘while the Biden administration plans its strategy to counter China’s growing global clout, Beijing is burnishing its image by shipping vaccines to dozens of countries on several continents, including in Africa, Latin America and particularly in its Southeast Asian backyard’ (Stolberg and Crowley, 2021). Thus, the NYT’s articles criticise the political motives of the Chinese government in allocating COVID-19 vaccines to the global community while also underscoring the altruistic nature of the US’s vaccine distribution, emphasising that it does not seek any reciprocation from recipient countries.

Being very similar to the second frame but focusing more heavily on the vaccine’s research and development stage, the third frame—the Chinese Threats Frame—discusses the political threats posed by China’s vaccine technology in the global vaccine competition. This frame predominantly emerged during 2020, a period in which the Chinese vaccines had not yet entered the market. In the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, several articles highlighted the proactive approach of the Chinese government and medical researchers in sharing viral genomic data. This sharing of data was seen as a significant contribution that laid the technical groundwork for collaborative vaccine research worldwide. However, as global competition in research and development intensified between China, Europe, and the US, the US media began to portray China as Europe and the US’s primary competitor. Consequently, China’s COVID-19 vaccine began to be framed as a potential threat, leading to escalating global political tensions and hindering international technological cooperation.

The fourth frame—the Global Cooperation Frame—and the fifth frame—the Effectiveness Problem Frame—both represented 11.97% of the NYT’s coverage. The Global Cooperation Frame is the only frame with a high mean value (mean = 0.94, SD = 0.24) in terms of positive judgements regarding the final frame element–treatment. This frame shows the recognition of China’s vaccine research and development technology and trust in scientific research cooperation. Thus, China’s vaccine is seen as a positive response to the COVID-19 outbreak. However, the Effectiveness Problem Frame indicates doubts about the effectiveness of China’s vaccine, questioning the lack of information about vaccine effectiveness.

Indeed, competing media frames can coexist within a single media outlet. This suggests that the NYT may have a nuanced and complex perspective on the issue of Chinese vaccines. On the one hand, their reports acknowledge and rely on the fact that China has shared crucial virus information and actively facilitated global cooperation on vaccine research and development. On the other hand, due to the limitations imposed by the US’s national interests, their reports may still present Chinese vaccines in a negative light.

It is important to note that these media frames can evolve over time. As the situation develops and new information emerges, the framing of the Chinese vaccines in the NYT’s reports may undergo changes. Figure 3 compares the number of articles within each frame for the NYT’s coverage between 2020 and 2021, based on which we can see that the Safety Risks Frame has dominated across these 2 years. While the Chinese Threats Frame and Global Cooperation Frame appear more often in 2020, the other two frames—the Vaccine Diplomacy Competition Frame and the Effectiveness Problem Frame—appear in 2021. The dynamic nature of media frames reflects the evolving understanding and context surrounding the topic. For example, when the US intensified its global vaccine competition, fewer articles in the NYT mentioned the Global Cooperation Frame. On the other hand, the media frames regarding the Chinese vaccines have become progressively more negative in the NYT’s second year of coverage.

Fig. 3
figure 3

Comparison of article numbers within each frame for the NYT’s coverage between 2020 and 2021.

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German media frames

Compared to the NYT’s complicated frames, DW has only two frames regarding the Chinese vaccine issue. One is the Political Risks Frame, and the other is the Potential Cooperation Frame. The first frame represents 71.4% of DW’s coverage, while the latter makes up only 28.6%. Table 5 summarises the results for all variables related to these two frames, as identified from DW’s reports. It is interesting to find that these two frames competed with one another.

Table 5 Results on all variables of the two frames identified from Die Welt.
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The Political Risks Frame primarily focuses on the political intentions of the Chinese government concerning the global distribution of Chinese vaccines. The reports of DW view the international distribution of these vaccines as a potential threat to the global political structure and argue that accepting Chinese vaccines could pose health risks amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Thus, DW follows a similar logic to that of the NYT when covering this issue but does so from a German or EU perspective. For example, an article published on August 5, 2020, asserts that ‘Europe is in danger of being crushed between the social-Darwinian laissez-faire of the USA and the paternalism of China.’ The article suggests that Europe should consider the global distribution of vaccines to be an ‘ethical-political project’ via which Europe can revive and export its own tradition of liberating liberalism (Mitscherlich-Schönherr, 2020). In this context, China’s COVID-19 vaccine is viewed as a tool for vaccine nationalism rather than a contribution to the supply of global public goods. Consequently, it is regarded as a risk factor that exacerbates global political tensions.

On the other hand, the Potential Cooperation Frame emphasises a more positive aspect of the Chinese vaccines’ development and distribution. Since 2016, economic and trade exchanges between China and Germany have deepened, and the German economic community has taken a relatively friendly attitude toward Chinese enterprises (Yao, 2018). One interview article with Mr. Helmut Jeggle, the chairman of the supervisory board of BioNTech, shows a very positive view of working with China on COVID-19 vaccine development (Boldt, 2020). Therefore, within this frame, cooperating with China is considered a way to help Germany play a dominant role in the global vaccine development competition. However, it is worth noting that the frame emphasising the threat posed by the Chinese vaccines takes up less of DW’s coverage. A greater portion of the coverage is directed towards highlighting the perceived threat rather than emphasising cooperation.

In terms of the frame variation in DW’s coverage, it is interesting to find that the number of articles on those two frames changed significantly between 2020 and 2021. In 2020, the two frames appeared at a similar frequency, with 10 articles fitting within the Political Risks Frame and 11 articles fitting within the Potential Cooperation Frame. However, in 2021, only one article fits within the Potential Cooperation Frame, while 20 articles emphasised the Political Risks Frame. In other words, the negative frame dominated DW’s coverage as China promoted its vaccines as global public goods in 2021.

Nevertheless, while DW and the NYT have similarities in their coverage of the Chinese vaccines, they also exhibit differences in emphasis. Both media outlets delve into the political aspects of the Chinese vaccines. However, the specific angles and focal points chosen vary between the two. Based on our calculations regarding the frame elements, the mean score for the global-cooperation-benefit variable in DW’s Potential Cooperation frame (see Table 5) is significantly higher than that in the NYT’s Global Cooperation frame (see Table 4). This indicates that DW may place a greater emphasis on cooperation between China and other countries, as well as the role of the Chinese vaccines in facilitating global collaboration, in comparison to coverage by US media outlets. Indeed, such an affirmation of China’s vaccine research and development technology also serves as an acknowledgment of the collaboration between Chinese and German companies.

Conclusion and discussion

Via performing a comparative standardised content analysis of three media outlets, we find that CD emphasises China’s role as a responsible state and global collaboration regarding vaccine development and distribution, while the NYT and DW indicate concerns about China’s emerging ‘vaccine diplomacy’ and regard the world-wide distribution of China’s vaccine as a political threat. Focusing on the global vaccine competition, the US and German media have made ‘safety risks’ and ‘political risks’ their top concerns, respectively. Although there are also frames that focus on ‘cooperation’ in the Western media, they are masked by more negative frames. This was particularly evident in 2021 when the Chinese government promoted its COVID-19 vaccine as a global public good. Consequently, a debate emerged in international media discourses regarding the Chinese COVID-19 vaccine as a global public good. However, comparing DW and the NYT certainly shows that the German media obviously places more emphasis on the global cooperation frame. In fact, 28.60% of DW’s coverage addresses potential cooperation between the EU countries and China regarding vaccination and vaccine allocation, whereas only around 12% of the NYT’s articles advocate for cooperation between the US government and China. Thus, in the narrative competition over COVID-19 vaccines, Germany, as is evident in its news reports, maintains a stance of dealing with China’s vaccines based on pragmatism, while the US’s attitude towards China’s vaccines has been affected by a power dynamic that is changing in China’s favour.

Indeed, CD, as an official Chinese media outlet, aims to counter the negative frames presented in Western media. However, because it is a state-owned media, the credibility of its coverage may be perceived as compromised. It leads us to rethink China’s international communication strategy in today’s international order. If China’s external publicity does not work well, amplifying the voice of the Chinese media in the international community is a very difficult, if not impossible, job. On the other hand, the news media plays a crucial role in influencing the development of international cooperation. If the Western media reported on the conflicts or risks involved in the relationship between China and the West, achieving international cooperation to produce global public goods might become more difficult. Put differently, emphasising a threat frame rather than a cooperation frame in media coverage may impede mutual understanding and trust between countries.

News reports about COVID-19 vaccines typically relate to non-health issues and serve political and economic ends. However, the high level of politicisation in media coverage of this issue highlights how the COVID-19 pandemic has intensified great-power rivalry on the global stage, resulting in much fiercer competition not only in scientific research but also in the realm of power discourse. While China seeks to project its image as a responsible great power and present the Chinese COVID-19 vaccine as a global public good, the Western media seeks to contain this narrative by shifting to one that views such actions as a threat. This case also epitomises the broader landscape of China–US and China–West relations.

This study takes Chinese COVID-19 vaccines as a case study, but similar forms of narrative contestation can be found in today’s competitive international communication landscape (Liu et al., 2023). For example, the Chinese BRI project, which China also positioned as a global public good, led to a security debate within international political discourse (Shah, 2023). In today’s international society, the ‘China Threat Theory’ and the ‘China Responsibility Theory’ represent two major ideas dominating international discourse about China.

The present study has limitations, which suggest future avenues for research. First, this work only analysed three traditional media outlets. Further exploration is warranted to understand how the international discursive battle unfolds within the evolving landscape of new media, as well as to examine the responses of the global audience to these competing media narratives. Second, while perceptions of China’s rise vary across European countries, it would be beneficial for future research to include samples from additional European countries for the sake of a more comprehensive exploration. Global cooperation is urgently needed for the sake of supplying global public goods, prompting an enquiry into the potential roles that the international media might assume in mitigating conflicts and fostering a sense of international duty towards the supply of global public goods. Future research could help answer this important question.