Caixin Media, a Chinese company that produces several print and online news publications, will receive the 2011 Shorenstein Journalism Award from the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center. Caixin was selected for its leadership in establishing an independent media in China and its commitment to journalistic integrity.

Caixin is the first Asian recipient of the $10,000 award since it was first given in 2002. For the past nine years, the award has recognized contributions of Western journalists who deepened Americans’ understanding of Asia. The pool of contestants has expanded to include Asian journalists who are at the forefront of the battle for press freedom and are using social media and Internet-based journalism to build new roles for the media. The award also honors Asian journalists who have aided the growth of mutual understanding between Asia and the United States.

Hailed by the Economist as “one of China’s more outspoken media organizations,” Caixin is internationally recognized for its tough-minded investigative reporting on China’s economic and social issues.

In recent months, Caixin has probed the errors that led to the crash of a high-speed train in China, and investigated the seizure and sale of children by family planning officials in Hunan province.

In 2011, Caixin editor-in-chief Hu Shuli, a former Knight Journalism fellow at Stanford, was named one of Time Magazine’s Top 100 Influential People, and managing editor Wang Shuo was ranked among China’s top 10 young editors. 

Caixin publishes several leading print and online publications, including the weekly business and finance magazine Caixin Century, the monthly periodical China Reform, the bimonthly journal Comparative Studies, and the English-language Caixin Weekly: China Economics and Finance. Caixin’s other offerings include a Chinese- and English-language news portal Caixin.cn, a publication series, video programming, an international journalism fellowship program, and extensive use of social media.

Hu and Wang will accept the Shorenstein Journalism Award at Stanford on Dec. 7. They will participate in a public panel discussion on the future of China’s independent media, joining acclaimed China historian and former Pulitzer Prize jury member Orville Schell, Shorenstein APARC associate director for research Daniel C. Sneider, and other noted Asia specialists.

The award was named after Walter H. Shorenstein, the philanthropist, activist, and businessman who endowed two institutions that are focused respectively on Asia and on the press: Shorenstein APARC in the Freeman Spogli Institute at Stanford University, and the Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics, and Public Policy in the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.