Help to understand this phrase?
Some issues with your translation:


一贯（的） means typical/consistent, not one thing. In this sentence, 一贯批判手法 could be translated as typical/consistent criticism
The original sentence focused on the criticism itself instead of the phenomenon of "the Chinese media being critical of democracies"


IMHO, a better translation would be,


  The writer first mentions typical criticism of the Chinese media on the Western World’s democracies.