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Chinese President Xi Jinping gives the keynote address for the 2020 China International Expo in Shanghai on Nov. 4. (AP/Yonhap News)

The attitude of China’s state-run media on the US presidential election is somewhere between “strategic patience” and “deliberate disregard.” This approach seems to reflect awareness both of public opinion in China and the delicate nature of US-China relations.

This lackadaisical attitude is best exemplified by China Central Television (CCTV). On Nov. 3, the day of the election, CCTV’s flagship news program Xinwen Lianbo didn’t provide any coverage — not even a news brief — on the subject.

On Nov. 4, CCTV ran a single story, about one minute and 30 seconds long, toward the end of the program. Even that story only provided a brief recap of the count and quoted American media describing the US as facing “the worst division since World War II” and reporting “a record increase in gun sales” amid fears of post-election violence.

On Nov. 5, coverage was much the same, emphasizing the lawsuits that Trump had filed in four battleground states and scenes of clashes between protesters and police in New York and other areas at the close of the broadcast.

But unlike the state-run media, Chinese netizens have shown themselves to be highly interested in the US election. The story about Trump filing lawsuits received nearly 100 million views within one hour.

Netizens’ responses seem to mostly mirror the editorial stance taken by the state-run media. The South China Morning Post reported that some netizens had sarcastically suggested that US presidential election news be placed under the celebrity gossip section.

Chinese experts also seem to be focusing on the vulnerabilities and problems with American democracy that have been revealed through this election.

“Can Trump or any other individual politician be blamed for the serious institutional problems that have arisen in the United States, which is in theory the most politically advanced country on the planet? America’s Founding Fathers would not have wanted things to be as they are today,” said Shen Yi, professor of international politics at Fudan University, in a video commentary posted on Guan Cha Zhe Wang (The Observer) on Nov. 4.

“I’ve seen plenty of the US electoral system — now I’d like to see what the judicial system is like. It would be nice to wrap things up by checking out the fighting power of American militias,” one Chinese netizen wrote sarcastically.

Hu Xijin, popular pundit and editor of Huanqiu Shibao (Global Times), weighed in on the topic in a column in the Nov. 6 issue of his paper. “In the past, some people envied the democratic elections in the US and followed them with interest, but that time ended long ago. Elections have created extreme divisions in American society, and we are all aware of how dangerous that could be in a country as large and complicated as China,” Hu wrote.

By Jung In-hwan, Beijing correspondent

Please direct comments or questions to [english@hani.co.kr]