The European Council on Foreign Relations

Where next? China’s internal internet debate

Date: 12th January 2012  |  Author: Jonas Parello-Plesner,

Categories: China, Security and Defence,
Tags: , beijing, china

What type of superpower China will evolve into is hotly debated. Will it become a new world empire like the US, able to police its interests across the globe? Or will it become a purely geo-economic power that only looks out for its business interest and ignores the plight of ordinary people at home and abroad? Whichever way China evolves it will have a defining impact on the 21^st Century.

China’s official position has been to highlight that the country is pursuing its own benign version of ‘peaceful development’, growing peacefully by itself and not interfering in other countries’ affairs. This official line is the one that generally gets through to us in the West, with China accepted as a singular entity in thought and aspiration.

Yet behind the monolith of state-press and media, the Chinese internet is letting a thousand blogs blossom. The Chinese internet has the world’s largest number of users (at 485 million almost as many as there are EU citizens) and there are more Chinese pages on the internet than in any other language. There are even roughly as many Chinese microbloggers as there are Americans – around 300 million. These netizens discuss virtually everything, apart from the longevity of their own political system. One big issue is whether it is now time for China to go out into the world to protect its interests, or become something a bit closer to a global policeman.

I recently co-authored a Financial Times article (with Parag Khanna) looking at exactly this debate. This was then published in the FT’s Chinese edition, sparking a wider discussion, before bouncing onto other Chinese websites such as Sina, Sohu, Globaltimes and Ifeng. Here, with abundant help from my ECFR colleague Hui Zhang, are some of the key parts of this Chinese netizen debate:

Many more Chinese are accepting and endorsing the change in China’s global role, which is now very different from when it was a backwards nation with little sway beyond its own borders. Chinaiss used the FT article as the backdrop for a poll on the larger question of China’s role in the world and what responsibilities it ought to assume. The large majority of those responding – around 77% (10457 votes) – agreed with the statement that 'We should be positive about the fact that with China’s rise, China’s global interests extend and face constant challenge' (we don’t know if there was any psychological impact from the fact that this button was red – see below). 2972 disagreed, clicking the blue button endorsing the view that a global policeman role for China 'runs counter to the position we repeatedly insist, it’s not wise to break our foundation in the world'.

Beyond this simple division, more detail emerged in comments posted under reproductions of the FT article elsewhere. One netizen from Tianjing, responding on Ifeng, wrote that ‘China is not a global policeman. China will only protect its legitimate interests, and will never intervene in the peace and stability of other nations and regions.’

‘Acting as global policeman is like thugs playing with fire,’ commented Chianiiss user Junyou. ‘China doesn’t need to become a thuggish policeman. China should become the world mediator, a peaceful agent to manage and coordinate the world. It’s a wise and adaptable strategy.’ 

Others sensed an agenda behind the article. On Globaltimes one respondent suggested that this was a defamation of China from the foreign media. ‘People who say that China want to be a super power are all bad-intentioned. It will make China lose friends. China needs to be the leader against the hegemony in the world'.

Another respondent on Ifeng described the article as 'sugar-coated bullets, with sinister intention. With more responsibility China will need to spend more money. China’s basic power is not as high as others.'

Some went on to cite internal constraint as the reason why China wouldn’t take on a more active policing role on the global stage. A netizen using the pen name, Yandatou stated, 'don't even think about it! China has lack of domineering and courage and lack of strategic thinking on global security. China doesn’t dare to establish military bases overseas and to make alliances. It lacks American wisdom. Its leaders are too weak.  All these factors hinder China in becoming a global policeman.'

There were also replies that pointed out China’s challenges in controlling its own territory and solving its own problems at home.

‘China has not even completed its unifying the country,” said one on Globaltimes.‘Our islands and sea area are still occupied by others. We have loads of internal affairs to worry about, how could we care about other people’s business?’ Another simply pointed to Beijing’s inability to solve its own border disputes: ‘Diaoyu Islands, South Sea, Mekong River…what a miserable global policeman.'  

This debate illustrates the vibrant internet-based debate that goes on within what is seen by many outsiders as a monolithic authoritarian system with one voice. Of course it won’t be the Chinese people that decides how China develops on the world stage, but broader public opinion is starting to count more and more in government policy: President Hu is even said to get a digest of blogs every morning so that he can feel the vibes from the Chinese people. One of these vibes seems to be that increasingly many Chinese are now ready to accept a much more active role for China in world affairs.

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