Google, who are really being affected by your actions?

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Living with local Chinese students the past few months has given me valuable perspectives. I share my observations here.

Google’s decision to leave China and redirect Google.cn to its site in Hong Kong has sparked much controversy this past week. While some have praised Google’s decision, righteously justifying the need for total Internet freedom and human rights, other commentaries lament this illogical business decision. Views from within the mainland, however, have been too quickly glossed over.

We’ve heard that Google’s symbolic exit from China does not drastically affect the lives of the ordinary public; Baidu’s services are just as useful, if not even more catered to Chinese netizens. They are not dependent on Google like we are. But, Google’s departure from China will have more repercussions than those pertaining to limited international media access.

Google’s actions have triggered a government crackdown on Internet use and a drastic increase in censorship. Google’s granting of temporary access to all pages available on Google’s non-censored Hong Kong site to mainland China was interpreted by the Chinese government as an act of aggression. In response, Chinese government officials quickly addressed the problem by censoring Google Hong Kong and other sites deemed “suspicious”, ultimately pushing the nation’s censorship policy a few dangerous steps backwards.

More stringent regulations
I remember clearly a student stating last week that the blog of popular writer Han Han on Sina.com would never be shut down, for in spite of his popular anti-government voice, the government wouldn’t dare upset his hundreds of thousands of followers. Han Han’s site is currently down. One could argue that this action most accurately reflects the nature of China’s administration, with officials merely using Google’s actions as an excuse to clamp down. However, we all know our wonderful Party does not need anything, especially such a well-documented scandal, to justify its actions. For example, I have family friends in Shanghai who were kicked out of their own house so it could be bulldozed and developed by the government. All for a little compensation and a frightening experience.

Chinese political indifference
Chinese people--at all levels of education attainment—are, by and large, politically indifferent. The CCP therefore, does not need to worry about a massive uprising.

I met a 21 year old who had just heard about the Tiananmen Square “incident” for the first time last week. You would think this to be quite the norm. However, students are often given a vague assertion concerning such subjects in high school and are told to never discuss them again (but don’t worry--I have been entertaining our roommates with YouTube and a subscribed VPN). When I asked the student whether he felt wronged by the government’s lack of transparency; he said that as a citizen he wasn’t entitled to the Party’s “secrets”. He also added that revelations such as this happen too often for him to actually care. I was completely caught off guard by this student’s apathy.

True authoritarianism?
Yet, perhaps there is wisdom in political indifference. The threat of the government’s power is real and present in the daily lives of those who shed their political indifference, especially within state-run institutions.

Four years ago, three students at ZJUT (Zhejiang University of Technology), Middlebury’s partner school in Hangzhou, in an effort to get more, better and cheaper food, persuaded the whole campus to take part in a week long dining hall strike. This was coordinated through the university’s online messaging system. It was a great success, apart from the ramifications for the leading students, who were soon after expelled by ZJUT. This decision must have been insisted upon by the Chinese government which now subsidizes our cheap, delicious dining hall meals (I kid you not, we spend around $1 on every meal).

Although a relatively insignificant example, this anecdote clearly highlights the Chinese govt.’s far-reaching power and influence and reveals some justification for political indifference. Furthermore, due to deeply rooted cultural tendencies that respect hierarchy, the educated public gracefully accepts the censorship of some sites.

Students pay the price for Google’s actions; intellectual expansion and outward growth hindered
Google executives thought they were doing the noble thing by standing up for free speech, and making everything available to the masses via the Google Hong Kong site. But Google’s actions have produced the opposite effect.

In fact, the Chinese government’s Internet censorship blitz is most deeply felt by students. Google’s unwillingness to compromise on the principle of Internet freedom is not only further limiting the choice and quality of research available to students, but also hindering China’s level of intellectual expansion and outward growth. This is essential for our relationship with this generation of Chinese, with whom we will be working in the future.

Google impacts future relations with China
However, because Google’s actions have sparked an overreaction from the Chinese government, more than the politically active are now being affected by censorship. University students with whom I spoke naturally see this as a step backwards in regards to the progress that China’s media was making, however slowly, to open up. By creating such a dent in the Google-China relationship, Google is also forfeiting the opportunity to play a major role in the opening up of such a critical market and to influence one of the world’s most significant generations. This also carries implications for our generation’s future relationship with China.

Google, although standing up to China appears admirable, your stubbornness is compromising the quality of Chinese intellectual development and only fuelling the government’s censorship tendencies. The only way to help the Chinese achieve intellectual freedom would be to compromise now. Your mere presence in the country as an international corporation, with its many large-scale domestic partnerships, would pressure the government to slowly open up Chinese media. Establishing yourself over time will reap more longterm benefits than those offered by leaving the game in a huff. Moreover, you have forgotten the stakes-- not only monetary—involved in your own country’s overall relationship with China.

It would be great if you put more thought into who is really being affected by your decisions, namely the Chinese people and their intellectual development.

But the scariest part is, a vast portion of the population thinks it will be fine without you.

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I'm currently studying abroad at Hangzhou's Zhejiang University of Technology.