Panorama - 1980

A look at the UK Government's preparations for the public in the event of a possible outbreak of Nuclear War.

David Dimbleby follows the stories of some of the people he interviewed for his earlier programme on the Afrikaners, The White Tribe of Africa. Despite great wealth for some, and a booming economy, he finds severe hardship in the homelands of South Africa.

Michael Cockerell reports on the changes in China, and examines the elaborate apparatus used to control the thoughts and actions of 1,000 million people. The first-ever film inside the Chinese news machine reveals how the People’s Daily, the Communist Party paper, is produced. Its words are spread to the biggest readership in the world, and one vast factory monitors every single news story in China. But there is a dissident movement, and the programme includes an exclusive interview with one of those inside China who questions the Communist system.