chinese internet events
DESCRIPTION
Internet events refer to public events where large numbers of netizens participate in often unorganized, autonomous online efforts to express their sentiments and opinions, address collective needs, or influence public opinion and policy. In an authoritarian country of 420 million Internet users and 200 million bloggers, Internet events occur often and have the potential to rally public opinion, pressure government, and reshape China’s public life. The article outlines the major actors (who), issues (what), causes (why), places (where), and mobilization (how) of Chinese Internet events.TRANSCRIPT
Chinese Internet Events
Wang luo shi jian 网络事件
Working Paper Submitted July 2010 to
Encyclopedia of Chinese Internet, Berkshire Publishing Group
| Please Do Not Cite Without Permission from Author |
| Comments Are Welcome |
Min Jiang (Ph.D. Purdue)
Assistant Professor of Communication Studies
Colvard North 5011, UNC-Charlotte, Charlotte, NC 28223
E-mail: [email protected]
Telephone: 1-704-687-2826
Jiang 1
Abstract
Internet events refer to public events where large numbers of netizens participate in often
unorganized, autonomous online efforts to express their sentiments and opinions, address
collective needs, or influence public opinion and policy. In an authoritarian country of
420 million Internet users and 200 million bloggers, Internet events occur often and have
the potential to rally public opinion, pressure government, and reshape China’s public life.
The article outlines the major actors (who), issues (what), causes (why), places (where),
and mobilization (how) of Chinese Internet events.
Jiang 1
Chinese Internet Events
Wang luo shi jian 网络事件
Internet events refer to public events where large numbers of netizens participate in often
unorganized, autonomous online efforts to express their sentiments and opinions, address
collective needs, or influence public opinion and policy. The popularity of Internet events,
otherwise known as new media events, online public incidents, or online collective
incidents in China (Qiu & Chen 2009), has grown considerably over the last decade that
parallels the rise of online public opinion and the surge of Internet population in China.
In an authoritarian country of 420 million Internet users and 200 million bloggers
(CNNIC, 2010; SCIO 2010), Internet events occur often as netizens seek alternative
information, channels of expression, and means of mobilization. The legendary case of
Sun Zhigang in 2003 symbolizes for many the power of Chinese public opinion as
hundreds of thousands of netizens reacted to the death of the 27-year-old in police
custody detained for failing to carry proper identification papers. Online fury and
sympathy eventually resulted in the abolition of the “Custody and Repatriation” system.
Although few Internet events produced victorious institutional changes as did the
Sun Zhigang case, they have left indelible marks on public consciousness and remained
part of public memory. In fact, Internet events are such an indispensible part of Chinese
Internet that the government and web companies have been polling netizens on the most
influential events in the past few years to gauge public opinion. The latest poll, conducted
jointly by 15 influential Chinese mainstream Internet companies, attracted more than 90
million netizen votes, carrying Eluding the Cat to the top (People’s Daily 2010a).
Who: Netizens as New Broadcasters and Agenda Setters
Jiang 2
Historically media events are conceived as live broadcasting of momentous events by
mass media organizations that have a profound impact on audience experiences and
knowledge (Dayan & Katz 1992). With the ever expanding use of the Internet and digital
devices, however, the means of reporting are increasingly in the hands of common people
to produce new media events (Qiu & Chen 2009) and reshape public life.
Chinese netizens actively participate in the consumption, sharing, and production
of Internet events as state-dominated mainstream media often fail to cover certain events
for fear of triggering public anger and social unrest. In particular, a small number of
citizen journalists have taken upon the task of collecting and distributing news of public
interest. Zola (nickname of prominent Chinese citizen journalist Zhou Shuguang), for
instance, became known for his online coverage of the “coolest nail house” story that
exposed the plight of two Sichuan home owners in defiance of wealthy developers.
Besides the growth of citizen journalism that uncovers and amplifies public voices, many
Chinese journalists who work for state media now blog, under real or pseudo names, and
manage to publish stories otherwise censored by official news outlets (MacKinnon 2008).
Joining these watchdogs and muckrakers are hundreds of millions of Chinese
netizens who actively seek information and post comments. It is reported 66 percent of
Chinese netizens frequently post comments via various news websites, BBS forums, and
real-time online chats (SCIO 2010), making Chinese Internet a space of rising cacophony
(Hu 2008) where controversial issues can rise to the top and become prominent Internet
events. The State Online Public Opinion Monitor Office (People’s Daily 2009b) reported
in 2009, 23 out of 77 influential social issues emerged from online to set public agenda.
What: Issue Types of Internet Events
Jiang 3
Chinese Internet events cover a wide range of issues. Yang (2009) divides such events
into seven major categories: 1) popular nationalism, 2) rights defense, 3) corruption and
power abuse, 4) environment, 5) cultural contention, 6) muckraking, and 7) online charity.
Further, rights defense issues often involve vulnerable persons, homeowners, and forced
relocation. Qiu & Chen (2009), in a similar manner, identified four major types of issues:
nationalism, rights defense, morals and privacy, and abuse of power. A greater deal of
overlapping exists between different types. For instance, rights defense cases are often
intertwined with power abuse, such as the Sun Zhigang case.
Although many Internet events are contentious (Yang 2009), others do not have
any apparent reference to conflict or power struggle. For example, “Jia Junpeng, your
mother wants you to go home to eat” is a post left at Baidu Post Bar in the World of
Warcraft online game section around 11AM on July 16, 2009. It became an instant hit,
attracting almost 400,000 views and 17,000 comments within six hours. Anonymous and
nonsensical, the post channeled gamers’ frustration at web portal Netease’s delay in
resuming its gaming service as well as a sense of belonging and play. Many other Internet
events, centered on such issues as pornography, extramarital affairs, and plagiarism,
convey netizens’ yearnings for morals and values in a fast changing Chinese society.
Overall, Internet events reflect an overwhelming public concern over rights
defense and power abuse (Wang & Fang 2009). For instance, among the ten most popular
Internet events in 2009 (People’s Daily 2010b), eight directly question authority and
evoke sympathy for the underprivileged. Rights defense has also moved from a focus on
the individual to the collective. Online public opinion, for example, vehemently defended
Deng Yujiao, a young waitress who stabbed and injured local officials approaching her
Jiang 4
for sexual favors. Public pressure not only kept Deng from prison terms, but also helped
diffuse the state’s plan in 2009 to install Green Dam Youth Escort software on all
computers sold in China intended to collect user data and filter content beyond the
proclaimed pornographic websites harmful to minors (BBC 2009).
Why: The Causes of Internet Events
Despite the variety of issue types, the causes of Internet events, most believe, can be
located in offline public sentiments, concerns, and demands. As an amplifier, not a mere
reflection, of the hopes and fears in our society, the Internet mediates the real and the
virtual, reinforcing existing relationships and institutions (Agre 2002). If the previous
analysis of issue types such as rights defense and clashing moral values is indicative of
the specific kinds of reasons that trigger various Internet events, one may uncover deeper
societal roots of these events when viewing them collectively.
Chinese Internet events differ from those in other societies, partially because the
social forces that bring them about are distinctive. Yu (2009) observes that contemporary
Chinese society is characterized by social fracture and a deep resentment of the rich and
powerful as it transitions from a socialist economy to one dominated by crony capitalism
(Huang 2008). This social chasm and rancor are intricately related to societal-wide
structural problems such as widening income gap, unequal distribution of resources,
rampant corruption as well as changing morals, values and ethics. Specific social issues
like land seizure, forced relocation, pollution, legal injustice, and restructuring of state-
owned enterprises, when handled inappropriately, may trigger social confrontations that
sometimes take more destructive forms like social venting and riots (Yu 2009).
Jiang 5
Previously private domains such as family, sexuality, and marriage also start to take on a
carnivalesque quality when making their way online.
Public participation in environmental protection, for example, is seen as pivotal in
halting the construction of a controversial petrochemical project worth $1.6 billion near
Xiamen, Fujian Province in 2007. Informed by both traditional and online media,
particularly SMS, over 10,000 residents marched peacefully through the city, or “took a
stroll” as locals prefer to call it, to protest the project hazardous to public health and
environment. On the other hand, public curiosity and voyeurism made Sexy Photo Gate
Scandal, involving the online leakage and spread of nude photos of HK pop star Edison
Chen and his girlfriends, the biggest Internet specter in 2008 (Song 2008).
Where: The Virtual and Real of Internet Events
Although most agree Internet events are driven by what happens offline, there is little
agreement on how to differentiate the deeply intertwined real and virtual aspects of such
events in order to determine the role played by the Web. Three types of Internet events
can be discerned based on how the real and virtual interact: 1) those events that take place
online only, 2) offline events amplified by the Internet, and 3) a hybrid of the first two.
Some events (e.g. Jia Junpeng case) remain solely in the virtual space. Others are
amplified by the Internet. The sudden collapse of a shoddy condo building in Shanghai in
2009 attracted the public gaze. As dramatic pictures of the debris made rounds on various
sites, netizens rigorously debated hot button issues of housing markets, building quality,
and public safety. The hybrid type, however, may be less common as an incident must be
instantly amplified through the Internet as it unfolds. But the arrival of mobile blogging
made it more likely. While speaking at a public lecture at Peking University in June 2010,
Jiang 6
Li Baozhu, a propaganda official proudly announced “with a wave of my hand, tens of
millions of posts about the Deng Yujiao incident were all deleted” (China Digital Times
2010). The comment, accompanied by live pictures, was quickly circulated via
microblogging before being taken down by commercial portals soon afterward. With
deeper integration of the mobile web into everyday life, Chinese netizens are more likely
to document and magnify anything they find provocative, scandalous, and intriguing.
How: Mobilization of Internet Events
Regardless of where an event occurs first, online or offline, an Internet event gains
momentum through various means of mobilization including resources, discourses, and
emotions. Besides financial backing, organizational structure, institutional norms,
resources utilized in social activism increasingly include cheaper and more ubiquitous
information and communication technologies (ICTs). It is well recognized that ICTs such
as mobile phones and social networks could help lower the barrier to participation,
facilitate group formation, identity construction, and increase the speed of collective
action (Shirky 2008). It is also observed by the less optimistic (e.g. Goldsmith & Wu
2006; Morozov 2009) that the more resourceful government and business institutions,
which have been strengthened by the same technologies, could produce more bane than
boon. Many authoritarian states including China have marshaled technological, legal, and
social resources to control, filter, and suppress, if necessary, Internet events or activities
deemed harmful to their rule (Deibert et al. 2010). The well-known Great Firewall of
China (GFW) is the epitome of state resource mobilization.
It would be inaccurate, however, to cast the mobilization of Internet events in
direct opposition to the authoritarian state. An examination of Internet events discourse
Jiang 7
will quickly reveal that some events (e.g. Anti-CNN movement in response to Western
media’s biased coverage of Tibet unrest and Beijing Olympics in 2008) support the state
out of popular nationalism. Many others are directed at specific individuals and local
governments instead of the state. Increasingly the government is taking an active role to
guide, shape, and forge online public opinion to increase its legitimacy in a process
dubbed “authoritarian deliberation” (Jiang 2010). Thus frame analysis, the definition and
construction of a public issue or controversy, is key in revealing how the parties involved
in an Internet event mobilize through “contentious conversations” to define and frame the
issues in question. The Deng Yujiao case acutely demonstrates, for instance, how Deng is
viewed by the public, not as a murderer, but rather as a symbol of the powerless before
corrupt and immoral officials wielding wealth and influence.
Such framing, however, would be ineffective if not for the emotional mobilization
of netizens through joy, anger, sadness, sympathy, parody, and humor (Yang 2009).
Traditional means of mobilization through rational discussion and persuasion may have
limited utility in online events whereas human emotions can be more engaging and
compelling. Moreover, emotions can be capitalized. Emotions matter not only to netizens
but also to commercial websites which profit from online traffic and attention. Emotional
expressions thus should not be dismissed as purely irrational, biased, or even dangerous
that need to be monitored, managed, and contained.
Chinese Internet Events: Summary
The popularity of Internet events in China is attributable, at least partially, to the
unprecedented growth of Internet use in China that affords netizens with the tools and
spaces to engage in information exchange, online discourse, and collective actions.
Jiang 8
Netizens participate in agenda setting on a wide range of issues to reshape public life via
online and offline channels. The Internet, while amplifying public voices in an age of
radical sociopolitical transformation in China, has also strengthened the state’s
monitoring, filtering, and regulatory capabilities. The complexity of Internet events
however cannot be reduced to a simple zero-sum game between the state and the
individual or between the state and an emergent civil society. The mosaic composition of
Chinese society simply defies linear answers.
Instead, it should be noted, for those interested in Chinese Internet or China’s
sociopolitical future, that the impact of such events on individuals and the Chinese
society at large is far from clear or straightforward. Of the various topics swarming
through Chinese Internet, very few could rise to visibility, create powerful social impact,
let alone instigate institutional change (Wang & Fang 2009). Online discussions on a
given public issue can rarely sustain over time, partially because they hardly produce
immediate, palpable change in public institutions or decision making. Regular exposure
to increasingly dramatic Internet events in the public space may even create emotional
fatigue on the part of spectators and participants.
Despite being sporadic, often inconsequential, Internet events may be exerting an
incremental yet profound influence on the individual psyche and social mentality over
time. For instance, how do Chinese netizens react to Internet events, particularly the ones
demanding social and institutional change? How do their attitudes evolve? Do they
choose to participate in public affairs? In what ways? On the other hand, how do Chinese
cyber activists and their communities evolve? How do they mobilize their resources,
sustain their activities, negotiate with government institutions, and engage the average
Jiang 9
netizens? The consequences of Internet events and cyber activism in China should be
studied in greater depth and at greater length in the future.
In addition, government’s response to the regular occurrence of Internet events
should command some attention. Viewed by Chinese authorities as something more than
conduits of public sentiments, demands, and opinions, Internet events are increasingly
seen by the authority as unstable, dangerous, rupture-prone, and thus need to be
monitored, contained, and diffused (Zhu 2009). The past few years have witnessed not
only the mobilization of government resources to rein in Internet events, but also a
growing bureaucratic consensus that favors tighter Internet control (SCIO, 2010). It will
be of interest to see whether the central government can take the initiative to build more
effective channels for public participation in local and national public affairs and address
the underlying structural issues of governance in a rapidly changing Chinese society.
Jiang 10
Bibliography
Agre, P. (2002). Real-time politics: The Internet and the political process. The
Information Society, 18(5), 311-331.
China Digital Times. (2010). Li Baozhu: Deleting Internet posts with a wave of his hand.
Retrieved on June 22, 2010 from http://is.gd/d2CsZ
China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC). (2010). 26th Statistical Survey
Report on the Internet Development in China. Retrieved July 15, 2010 from
http://www.cnnic.net.cn/uploadfiles/pdf/2010/7/15/100708.pdf
Dayan, D. & Katz, E. (1992). Media events: The live broadcasting of history. Cambridge,
MA: Harvard University Press.
Deibert, R., Palfrey, J., Rohozinski, R., & Zittrain, J. (2010). Access controlled.
Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Goldsmith, J. & Wu, T. (2006). Who controls the Internet? Illusions of a borderless
world. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
Hu, Y. (2008). Zhongsheng xuanhua: Wangluo shidaide geren biaoda yu gonggong
taolun [Rising cacophony: Individual expressions and public discussions in the
age of the Internet]. Guiling: Guangxi Normal University Press.
Huang, Y. (2008). Capitalism with Chinese characteristics. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge
University Press.
Jasper, J. (1998). The emotions of protest: Reactive and affective emotions in and around
social movements. Sociological Forum, 13, 397–424.
Jiang 11
Jiang, M. (2010). Spaces of authoritarian deliberation: Online public deliberation in
China. In Ethan Leib and Baogang He (Eds.), The search for deliberative
democracy in China (2nd
ed.), (pp. 261-287). New York, NY: Palgrave.
MacKinnon, R. (2008). Blogs and China correspondence: Lessons about global
information flow. Chinese Journal of Communication, 1(2), 242-257.
Morozov, E. (2009, November 18). How dictators watch us on the web. Prospect.
Retrieved on December 20, 2009 from
http://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/2009/11/how-dictators-watch-us-on-the-web/
Nathan, A. (2003). Authoritarian resilience, Journal of Democracy, 14(1), 6‐17.
People’s Daily (2010a). 2009 nian shida wangluo shijian pingxuan chulu: Duomaomao
jushou [Top 10 Internet Incidents of 2009: Eluding the Cat tops the chart].
Retrieved on Jan 5, 2010 from
http://bbs1.people.com.cn/postDetail.do?boardId=1&treeView=1&view=2&id=9
6630400
People’s Daily (2010b). Renminwang tuichu “08-09 nian tufa gonggong shijian anliku”:
Huiji liangnian yuqing redian, fenxi zhengfu yingdui deshi [People’s Daily
Online publishes case studies of 2008-2009 public emergencies: Collect hot
button issues in two years, analyze the pros and cons of government responses].
Retrieved on June 2, 2010 from
http://politics.people.com.cn/GB/1026/11697703.html
Qiu, L. & Chen, W. (2009). Maixiang xinmeiti shijian yanjiu [Toward new media events
research]. Chinese Journal of Communication and Society, 9, 30-38.
Jiang 12
Shirky, C. (2008). Here comes everybody: The power of organizing without
organizations. New York, NY: Penguin Press.
Song, R. (2008). Sexy photo gate. Retrieved on September 9, 2009 from
http://www.zonaeuropa.com/20080209_1.htm
State Council Information Office of the People’s Republic of China (SCIO). (2010). The
Internet in China. Retrieved on June 9, 2010 from
http://www.scio.gov.cn/zxbd/wz/201006/t660625.htm [Chinese]
http://china.org.cn/government/whitepaper/node_7093508.htm [English]
Wang, C., & Fang, K. (2009). Buying gaogu wangluo yanlun: Jiyu 122 ge wangluo yiti
de shizheng fenxi [Online discourse should not be overestimated: An empirical
study of 122 online issues]. Guoji Xinwenjie [Journal of International
Communication], 2009(5), 98-102.
Yang, G. (2009). The power of the Internet in China. New York, NY: Columbia
University Press.
Yu, J. (2010). Maintaining a baseline of social stability: Speech before the Beijing
Lawyers Association. Retrieved on February 27, 2010 from
http://new.21ccom.net/plus/view.php?aid=6390
Zhu, H. (2009). Gei difang zhengfu yingdui wangluo yulun de 10 tiao jianyi [10
recommendations for local governments on handling public opinion]. Retrieved
on December 18, 2009 from http://yq.people.com.cn/htmlArt/Art335.htm
Zhu, H., Shan, X., & Hu, J. (2009). 2009 Nian Zhongguo Hulianwang Yuqing Fenxi
Baogao [2009 Chinese Internet Public Opinion Analysis Report], in Zhongguo
Jiang 13
Shehui Lanpishu 2010 [Blue Book of Chinese Society 2010]. Beijing: Social
Sciences Academic Press (in Chinese).