Comparative paper examining some aspect of the legal regime governing Essay

Comparative paper examining some aspect of the legal regime governing media in Hong Kong and in the United States - Essay Example Under this principle, the media are the voice of the ruling Party and play by its rules and policies. Apart from that, the Party controls all activities of the media that pertains to news production and delivery to the public. Thus, the media only delivers what is authorized by the Party to the public. On the contrary, in America, the media operates freely with minimal interference from the government. Additionally, the media functions as a â€Å"watchdog,† which evaluates and monitors the actions and activities of the government. Defamation laws in these two countries clearly bring out the differences and similarities in media activities and regulations in America and China. Defamation in law is the act of making statements about a person, which damages the reputation of the individual in question. When in written format, defamation is referred to as â€Å"libel† and â€Å"slander† when in spoken form. In order to understand how defamation law works in China, it is essential to explore the structure and function of the legal system in China as it pertains to matters of the media. Thus, the first section of this paper will explore the legal system in China while drawing on any similarities and differences with the United States legal system. The second section will look at the background of defamation law in the United States and Chinese, and finally, the last section will draw on comparison between defamation law in China and the United States. This provision is similar to what is found in the United States Constitution, and at first, one may think that the Chinese media enjoys the same rights as that in America. However, application of the Chinese Constitution is different from that of the United States constitution. Unlike the Americans, citizens of China enjoy neither economic nor civil rights enjoyed by their American counterparts. This ineffectiveness in the application of the Constitution in China is because of the