Abstract: As the development of digital technology has reshaped the news communication ecology, its underlying logic has undergone significant changes: the professional boundary has been dissolved, the traditional definition of news has been rewritten, the food chain of news industry has been reconstructed, and news communication is changing from “professional activities” to “public life”. The change of the international and domestic macro environment, the low-level change of the news communication ecology, and the confluence of these tow macro forces have increased the pressure on social governance. Accordingly, China's national governance requires professional media to reconfirm their “mainstream identity”, and needs the media to rebuild a hard core ideological highland. The traditional journalism theory adheres to the “material ontology” and forms the thinking line of “epistemology-objectivity-professionalism-class nature”. After the reconfirmation of media identity, the theoretical chain guiding journalism has changed into “social practice theory-social relations theory-public life theory-social governance theory”.

Key words: news communication ecology, professional media, digital technology, ideology, social governance