– Update Mar. 23 –
The clever people at Google just moved to Hong Kong. Bad pollution, but free from tyranny. Needless to say, the Chinese government is pissed. To Google I say: awesome move worthy of the Tai Pan himself. To the Chinese government I say: in your face you paranoid dickwads.
– Update Jan. 22 --
On this subject, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said, “Censorship should not be in any way accepted by any company from anywhere. American companies need to take a principled stand. This needs to be part of our national brand.”
Well said. Left or right leaning, all Americans should really be unified in this opinion and commend Mrs. Clinton for her concise and unambiguous analysis.
– Original Post –
With an estimated 338 million Internet users in a country of about 1.3 billion, expansion into China is a no-brainer for any Internet based company. As China continues to modernize, those eyeballs amount to nothing less than the market to end all markets, yet it persists in being a market largely impenetrable to western companies. One reason is that we have different cultures, and trends that ignite the western world fail to catch on with the Chinese people. Another reason is that the Chinese government is quite paranoid.
Google entered this market in early 2006 knowing both of these things and has worked hard to make Google.cn the most popular western based Internet site in that country, with an estimated 80 million users- almost a quarter of all internet users in the country. Now Google and the Chinese government are engaged in a very high-stakes game of chicken and both have a lot to lose.
When Google entered the Chinese marketplace, the government was putting the finishing touches on a program it had been developing for the last 8 years. Known as the “Golden Shield Project” officially and unofficially as the “Great Firewall of China”, this project is as close as any real government has ventured into the Orwellian dystopia of 1984. According to the International Centre for Human Rights and Democratic Development, its ultimate objective is to “integrate a gigantic online database with an all-encompassing surveillance network – incorporating speech and facial recognition, closed-circuit television, smart cards, credit records, and Internet surveillance technologies.”
From a western perspective, that sounds downright evil. Google’s motto is famously, “Don’t be evil.” How did they reconcile this in moving into China? According to David Drummond at Google, they “launched Google.cn in January 2006 in the belief that the benefits of increased access to information for people in China and a more open Internet outweighed our discomfort in agreeing to censor some results.”
They agree that censorship is bad, but agreed to do to it because basically, they believe that the flood of information is too great for the Golden Shield to catch everything and the information that did get though would benefit the people of China and the ideals of free speech. Making that argument does have a “pact with the devil” feel to it, but the reality is that Google was largely correct. Four years later it turns out that Google.cn users are on average better educated and wealthier than those who use Baidu.com, the search engine used by the majority of Chinese Internet users. As in most countries, these are assumed to be the most liberal segment of the population, and those who most value free speech. They are also the ones who are best equipped to bypass government censorship.
But the paranoia of the Communist Party of China knows no bounds. Either that or they are extremely sensitive people. Either way, anyone who says anything remotely critical of them is a target to be shut down. This includes mentioning Tiananmen Square, Tibet or the Dali Lama, Taiwan, Uighur riots, pollution problems, or their human rights violations, of which there are many. If you are in China and search for any of these things, Google will likely tell you, “In accordance with local laws, regulations and policies, part of the search result is not shown.” This is part of their self-censorship deal with the government. The Chinese government tells Google which search terms to censor, then watches Google big brother style to make sure Google complies.
No doubt this situation was unpalatable to Google executives at the time, but even more than their “wedge of free speech” argument, they put up with it because of the incredible amount of money they could make in the most populated country on the planet. This fragile status quo has been in place since the inception of Google.cn but last Tuesday (Jan. 12, 2010) Google said no more.
The change of heart came about after Google discovered that the Chinese government was hacking their infrastructure to gain access to accounts and information pertaining to Chinese human rights activists. Not just Google accounts either; according to Google’s official statement at least twenty other large companies were targeted. Even if they were not aware of it, their company’s infrastructure was doing evil.
Google’s response has been to declare that it will no longer take any part in any censorship, even if that means getting kicked out of the country. This is where things stand now, and how this problem resolves will no doubt have far reaching implications. Google stands to lose a whole lot of money. It is rare the corporation that is willing to lose that kind of revenue for an essentially idealistic stand. Virtuous to be sure, but we can also be thankful that Google makes money hand over fist in other markets, giving them the leeway to make this threat credible.
What does the Chinese government have to lose? Mostly, it risks upsetting the 80 million Google users in China. The question then becomes, how much do these people like Google? Will they switch back to Baidu.com with a shrug, or will it cause a bigger backlash? These are among the most wealthy and educated Chinese after all, suggesting they might have elevated influence.
What I really want to ask the Chinese government is, “What are you so afraid of?” If the United States has been able to prove anything, it’s that giving citizens the ability to freely criticize their government doesn’t seem to affect that government’s power one iota.
A lot of the Chinese censorship policies seem to have their origins in preventing the China Democracy Party from gaining control. Of course, the China Democracy Party is currently banned, so if it is indeed a threat, it’s a true phantom menace.
Although I have never travelled there, I had spoken to several people that have lived in China. Based on these conversations and what I’ve read, I have concluded that if you made of list of countries at risk for a revolution or citizens revolt, China would near the bottom. Most people who understand this country agree that the average citizen of China has absolutely no interest in a new government, especially though any sort of dramatic means like a revolution or a coup. This is an ironic situation. The Chinese government has taken the most extraordinary measures to censor the information their citizens receive, all the while the citizenship of the country is among the least inclined to rise up against the state.
All of this suggests that the government of China is afraid that honest discussion of many of these important issues will turn their loyal subjects into revolutionaries. If that is indeed the case, I would suggest that any censorship is just postponing the inevitable. Tech savvy Chinese have been bypassing the Golden Shield for 5 years now, and will similarly bypass the newer “Green Dam Youth Escort.” If news from the outside world, or criticisms of the government were truly inflammatory enough as to provoke a revolution, it probably would have already happened. Rural China is isolated to be sure, but with their incredible cell phone coverage they aren’t that isolated. If their government had done something to truly make their blood boil and cause wide scale civil unrest, I’m convinced that the word would have spread.
My point is that the Chinese government is spending tons of money in this incredible effort that is either postponing the inevitable or protecting against something that will never happen. Either way, it doesn’t seem like the best way to address their concerns. If they believe that censorship is only postponing inevitable civil unrest, the best idea would be to attempt to address the reasons for that unrest, which might include censorship. On the other hand, you could be spending all this time and energy censoring people whose actions and decisions would be roughly the same had you not spent all that time and energy. In the business world, we call that bad ROI.
Clearly my advice to the Chinese government would be to allow Google to continue to operate Google.cn uncensored. From a negotiations perspective, this is the only win-win outcome. I’m convinced that such a move would be truly beneficial to both Google and the Chinese government, but I doubt the Chinese government will see it this way. To them I would ask that they objectively evaluate the value of their censorship efforts. Weigh that against openly addressing your critics and trusting your citizens to deal with criticism of their government responsibility. Such a move would generate a lot of positive press.