Rebecca MacKinnon weighs in on Nicholas Kristof’s NYT piece on how blogs may bring down the Chinese communist Party - respectfully and forcefully arguing that the opposite may be true:
The point is, democracy isn’t the only thing that can sprout and grow on the internet. So can intolerance, xenophobia and belligerence.
And those qualities – which are permitted and even encouraged by the government to fester in Chinese cyberspace – may help the Chinese Communist Party stay in power. Last fall I wrote a long rant in response to cyber-utopians (whose ranks Kristof appears to have joined) and connectivity idealists like Thomas Barnett (of The Pentagon’s New Map fame) in which I warned:
Don’t assume that the expansion of freedom of speech in Chinese cyberspace will necessarily strengthen international peace and brotherly love between China and other countries - the opposite is also possible.
Recent anti-Japanese protests certainly make that clear. The fact that Chinese cyberspace was cheering right after the 9/11 attacks (as Kristof himself reported) is another stark example.
Don’t expect the Chinese blogosphere to bring down the Chinese Communist Party any time soon.
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Mao: The Unknown Story - by Jung Chang and Jon Halliday:
A controversial and damning biography of the Helmsman.
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May 26th, 2005 at 10:19 pm
Thanks for the link!! I’ll be doing another post in the next day or so with more details.
BTW, in case you’re not aware of it, I’ve got a group blog on North Korea at: www.NKzone.org.
Cheers,
Rebecca