Jennifer Pan

How Censorship in China Allows Government Criticism But Silences Collective Expression

We offer the first large scale, multiple source analysis of the outcome of what may be the most extensive effort to selectively censor human expression ever implemented. To do this, we have devised a system to locate, download, and analyze the content of millions of social media posts originating from nearly 1,400 different social media services all over China before the Chinese government is able to find, evaluate, and censor (i.e., remove from the Internet) the subset they deem objectionable. Using modern computer-assisted text analytic methods that we adapt to and validate in the Chinese language, we compare the substantive content of posts censored to those not censored over time in each of 85 topic areas. Contrary to previous understandings, posts with negative, even vitriolic, criticism of the state, its leaders, and its policies are not more likely to be censored. Instead, we show that the censorship program is aimed at curtailing collective action by silencing comments that represent, reinforce, or spur social mobilization, regardless of content. Censorship is oriented toward attempting to forestall collective activities that are occurring now or may occur in the future—and, as such, seem to clearly expose government intent.

Reverse-engineering censorship in China: Randomized experimentation and participant observation

Introduction Censorship has a long history in China, extending from the efforts of Emperor Qin to burn Confucian texts in the third century BCE to the control of traditional broadcast media under Communist Party rule. However, with the rise of the Internet and new media platforms, more than 1.3 billion people can now broadcast their individual views, making information far more diffuse and considerably harder to control. In response, the government has built a massive social media censorship organization, the result of which constitutes the largest selective suppression of human communication in the recorded history of any country. We show that this large system, designed to suppress information, paradoxically leaves large footprints and so reveals a great deal about itself and the intentions of the government. The Chinese censorship decision tree. The pictures shown are examples of real (and typical) websites, along with our translations. Rationale Chinese censorship of individual social media posts occurs at two levels: (i) Many tens of thousands of censors, working inside Chinese social media firms and government at several levels, read individual social media posts, and decide which ones to take down. (ii) They also read social media submissions that are prevented from being posted by automated keyword filters, and decide which ones to publish. To study the first level, we devised an observational study to download published Chinese social media posts before the government could censor them, and to revisit each from a worldwide network of computers to see which was censored. To study the second level, we conducted the first largescale experimental study of censorship by creating accounts on numerous social media sites throughout China, submitting texts with different randomly assigned content to each, and detecting from a worldwide network of computers which ones were censored. To find out the details of how the system works, we supplemented the typical current approach (conducting uncertain and potentially unsafe confidential interviews with insiders) with a participant observation study, in which we set up our own social media site in China. While also attempting not to alter the system we were studying, we purchased a URL, rented server space, contracted with Chinese firms to acquire the same software as used by existing social media sites, and—with direct access to their software, documentation, and even customer service help desk support—reverseengineered how it all works. Results Criticisms of the state, its leaders, and their policies are routinely published, whereas posts with collective action potential are much more likely to be censored—regardless of whether they are for or against the state (two concepts not previously distinguished in the literature). Chinese people can write the most vitriolic blog posts about even the top Chinese leaders without fear of censorship, but if they write in support of or opposition to an ongoing protest—or even about a rally in favor of a popular policy or leader—they will be censored. We clarify the internal mechanisms of the Chinese censorship apparatus and show how changes in censorship behavior reveal government intent by presaging their action on the ground. That is, it appears that criticism on the web, which was thought to be censored, is used by Chinese leaders to determine which officials are not doing their job of mollifying the people and need to be replaced. Conclusion Censorship in China is used to muzzle those outside government who attempt to spur the creation of crowds for any reason—in opposition to, in support of, or unrelated to the government. The government allows the Chinese people to say whatever they like about the state, its leaders, or their policies, because talk about any subject unconnected to collective action is not censored. The value that Chinese leaders find in allowing and then measuring criticism by hundreds of millions of Chinese people creates actionable information for them and, as a result, also for academic scholars and public policy analysts. Censorship of social media in China Figuring out how many and which social media comments are censored by governments is difficult because those comments, by definition, cannot be read. King et al. have posted comments to social media sites in China and then waited to see which of these never appeared, which appeared and were then removed, and which appeared and survived. About 40% of their submissions were reviewed by an army of censors, and more than half of these never appeared. By varying the content of posts across topics, they conclude that any mention of collective action is selectively suppressed. Science, this issue 10.1126/science.1251722 China censors online posts that advocate collective action. Existing research on the extensive Chinese censorship organization uses observational methods with well-known limitations. We conducted the first large-scale experimental study of censorship by creating accounts on numerous social media sites, randomly submitting different texts, and observing from a worldwide network of computers which texts were censored and which were not. We also supplemented interviews with confidential sources by creating our own social media site, contracting with Chinese firms to install the same censoring technologies as existing sites, and—with their software, documentation, and even customer support—reverse-engineering how it all works. Our results offer rigorous support for the recent hypothesis that criticisms of the state, its leaders, and their policies are published, whereas posts about real-world events with collective action potential are censored.

Sources of Authoritarian Responsiveness: A Field Experiment in China

A growing body of research suggests that authoritarian regimes are responsive to societal actors, but our understanding of the sources of authoritarian responsiveness remains limited because of the challenges of measurement and causal identification. By conducting an online field experiment among 2,103 Chinese counties, we examine factors that affect officials’ incentives to respond to citizens in an authoritarian context. At baseline, we find that approximately one-third of county governments respond to citizen demands expressed online. Threats of collective action and threats of tattling to upper levels of government cause county governments to be considerably more responsive, whereas identifying as loyal, long-standing members of the Chinese Communist Party does not increase responsiveness. Moreover, we find that threats of collective action make local officials more publicly responsive. Together, these results demonstrate that top-down mechanisms of oversight as well as bottom-up societal pressures are possible sources of authoritarian responsiveness.

How the Chinese Government Fabricates Social Media Posts for Strategic Distraction, Not Engaged Argument

The Chinese government has long been suspected of hiring as many as 2 million people to surreptitiously insert huge numbers of pseudonymous and other deceptive writings into the stream of real social media posts, as if they were the genuine opinions of ordinary people. Many academics, and most journalists and activists, claim that these so-called 50c party posts vociferously argue for the government’s side in political and policy debates. As we show, this is also true of most posts openly accused on social media of being 50c. Yet almost no systematic empirical evidence exists for this claim or, more importantly, for the Chinese regime’s strategic objective in pursuing this activity. In the first large-scale empirical analysis of this operation, we show how to identify the secretive authors of these posts, the posts written by them, and their content. We estimate that the government fabricates and posts about 448 million social media comments a year. In contrast to prior claims, we show that the Chinese regime’s strategy is to avoid arguing with skeptics of the party and the government, and to not even discuss controversial issues. We show that the goal of this massive secretive operation is instead to distract the public and change the subject, as most of these posts involve cheerleading for China, the revolutionary history of the Communist Party, or other symbols of the regime. We discuss how these results fit with what is known about the Chinese censorship program and suggest how they may change our broader theoretical understanding of “common knowledge” and information control in authoritarian regimes.

Conditional Receptivity to Citizen Participation Evidence From a Survey Experiment in China

An increasing number of scholars have established that authoritarian regimes employ quasi-democratic institutions as part of their efforts to retain power. However, we know little about the potential variation among institutions providing citizens with opportunities for voice and the conditions under which such institutions are true channels of responsiveness. In this article, we develop and test the concept of “receptivity,” that is, whether autocrats are willing to incorporate citizen preferences into policy, using a list experiment of 1,377 provincial-and city-level leaders in China. Contrary to expectation, we find that leaders are similarly receptive to citizen suggestions obtained through either formal institutions or the Internet unless they perceive antagonism between the state and citizens, in which case receptivity to input from the Internet declines, while receptivity to formal institutions remains unchanged. Our findings show that whether quasi-democratic institutions are mere window dressing or true channels of responsiveness depends on the perceived quality of state–society relations.

China's Ideological Spectrum

This paper offers a quantitative analysis of ideology in China, to examine how beliefs and preferences are configured, and to measure the extent to which they are bound together by some form of constraint. Based on a large scale online survey, we identify an ideological spectrum characterized by one main dimension bound by a relatively weak constraint using both principal component analysis and models of the item response theory. On one end of this spectrum, preferences for authoritarian rule coincide with support for traditional norms and political distribution of resources. On the other end of this spectrum, preferences for political liberalization coincide with opposition to traditional values and support for markets allocation of resources. Evidence suggests that this latter set of views is more likely found in provinces with higher levels of development and among individuals with higher income and education. We corroborate these findings with a nationally representative sample from the Asian Barometer Survey.

How Market Dynamics of Domestic and Foreign Social Media Firms Shape Strategies of Internet Censorship

There is ongoing debate over whether authoritarian regimes can maintain control over information given the rise of social media and the Internet. In this debate, China is often cited as a prime example of how authoritarian regimes can retain control, but to date, there has been limited research on whether China’s online censorship strategies can be replicated in other authoritarian regimes. This article shows that China’s ability to censor social media rests on the dominance of domestic firms in China’s market for Internet content. The absence of U.S. social media firms in China allows the Chinese government to engage in censorship through content removal, which can quickly and effectively suppress information. In contrast, for most other regimes, the market for social media is dominated by U.S. multinational firms, e.g., Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, and in these contexts, content removal is an immense challenge. This article then examines the prospects of instituting content removal by developing domestic social media or importing Chinese platforms, and finds that most authoritarian regimes are unlikely to be able to duplicate China’s online censorship efforts.

Online field experiments

ABSTRACT Changes in information communication technology across the Asian region have altered our field substantively and methodologically. The rapid growth of digitized communications allows us to find new purchase in examining questions fundamental to our understanding of communication theories, norms, and practices across Asia. While methods such as text mining and user analytics are increasingly popular among computational scholars, here, we focus on online field experiments, an approach to studying communication that has the potential to overcome many existing obstacles to social scientific inquiry but one that has been used relatively rarely in Asia. In this paper, we discuss what online field experiments are and how they differ from traditional experiments as well as online lab and survey experiments. We show how researchers can go about designing and implementing online field experiments, focusing on issues where online field experiments differ from their traditional counterparts – legal and ethical considerations, construct validity, randomization and spillover, and statistical analyses. Finally we discuss how online field experiments can advance our understanding of communication in Asia by helping researchers to gain insight and make causal inferences on attitudes, behaviors, and interactions that were previously unobservable ℘.