ABSTRACT
This study examines the new approach and working standards of Chinese journalists who are working in international consumer magazines in China. In the past 15 years, Chinese lifestyle journalists have reoriented their multiple functions to present their social role as an “information vehicle”, “serving the rising class”, with “independence from media ownership and commercial forces” and “contributing consumerism to culture and traditional society”. The elements involved in this new genre of journalism include financial and operational autonomy from the State and editorial independence from their international parent magazine companies. This professional approach also utilizes a working strategy that lays bare each individual’s unique journalistic identity. The professionalization of these lifestyle magazine journalists is the result of a global and local media cultural collision; a product of the reconciliation of commercialism and professionalism.
