Stevenchauu
The Chinese Internet Age
Dynamic Processes in Regime Changes
3th December 2012
CHAU, Pak Hong (3035002825)
POLI0094 Political Participation: Why and how? Department of Politics and Public Administration Faculty of Social Sciences The University of Hong Kong
The Chinese Internet Age: Dynamic Processes in Regime Changes
“Internet will bring freedom to China.” - George W. Bush Internet has played a vital role in China’s contentious politics said by Yang (2009). The inter-relationship between internet and social movements have long been discussed in the field. However, related researches have been largely accumulating within democratic regimes or bounded by generalized arguments over decades. Therefore, this paper is to examine empirically the importance of internet in nurturing social protests in China, and thus provide empirical results for further analysis of changes in the authoritarian regime. In the following, the concentration will be on the opportunity structure proposed by Gamson and Meyer (1996) to illustrate how internet generates new opportunities for protests. After that, the state declining capability to carry out sufficient repressions will be explored. In the third section, a emerging collective identity among Chinese netizens will be examined. Discussions of how online contentions transformed into social protests in China (see Yang, 2009), as well as how collective identities mobilize people in social movements (see Polletta & Jasper, 2001) are omitted in this short essay. An attempt will be made to highlight and address the crucial changes in China’s contentious politics which are contributing to the long revolution of regime changes rather than to cover all important tasks in the domain. Lastly, I will conclude by suggesting radically how these vital moves will potentially contribute to regime changes in China, and pointing out the major threat, the Chinese government - the largest player in cyberspace, to the whole process.
New
Dynamic Processes in Regime Changes
3th December 2012
CHAU, Pak Hong (3035002825)
POLI0094 Political Participation: Why and how? Department of Politics and Public Administration Faculty of Social Sciences The University of Hong Kong
The Chinese Internet Age: Dynamic Processes in Regime Changes
“Internet will bring freedom to China.” - George W. Bush Internet has played a vital role in China’s contentious politics said by Yang (2009). The inter-relationship between internet and social movements have long been discussed in the field. However, related researches have been largely accumulating within democratic regimes or bounded by generalized arguments over decades. Therefore, this paper is to examine empirically the importance of internet in nurturing social protests in China, and thus provide empirical results for further analysis of changes in the authoritarian regime. In the following, the concentration will be on the opportunity structure proposed by Gamson and Meyer (1996) to illustrate how internet generates new opportunities for protests. After that, the state declining capability to carry out sufficient repressions will be explored. In the third section, a emerging collective identity among Chinese netizens will be examined. Discussions of how online contentions transformed into social protests in China (see Yang, 2009), as well as how collective identities mobilize people in social movements (see Polletta & Jasper, 2001) are omitted in this short essay. An attempt will be made to highlight and address the crucial changes in China’s contentious politics which are contributing to the long revolution of regime changes rather than to cover all important tasks in the domain. Lastly, I will conclude by suggesting radically how these vital moves will potentially contribute to regime changes in China, and pointing out the major threat, the Chinese government - the largest player in cyberspace, to the whole process.
New
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