ABSTRACT
Imagine if the Internet took hold in China. Imagine how freedom would spread.
Former U.S. President George W. Bush, 1999Many social scientists believe that democracy and Internet use are correlated to the extent that increasing Internet use assures the demise of the present dictatorship in China and the emergence of a democracy. Some observers await the adoption of Western-style democracy in China at the very moment that Chinese scholars and leaders denounce Western democracy as a failure and pronounce their own visions of progressive changes. Reliable surveys show that most Chinese think that China is a democracy and that its government has brought prosperity to the population. Observers need to drop their European and American lenses and ideological filters and focus objectively on what is happening politically in China.
This chapter describes the tension and intersectionality of two counter-forces in China: one for more citizen engagement and the other for more government control over all forms of political communication. It is argued that it is possible to have increasing political participation within a closed and non-democratic system. This system is a typical case of networked authoritarianism. This means that Chinese citizens can become more empowered in online agency and networking, yet be continuously constrained by censorship and manipulation by an authoritarian government.
