THE JOURNAL OF EDUCATION, COMMUNITY, AND VALUES
by Jeffrey Barlow <barlowj@pacificu.edu>
Mengin, Françoise. (Ed.) Cyber China. Reshaping National Identities in the Age of Information. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004.
Cyber China is one of a series of works emanating from the most distinguished French center in International Studies, the Centre d'Etudes et de Recherches Internationales (CERI). The origin of the work greatly influences its content, and this is both its strength and its weakness.
The authors are primarily from France or England, but noted American and Asian scholars are represented as well. Taken as a group, the authors are productive and widely influential academics. Most of them are from major research-oriented institutions and they are not attempting to communicate here with a general audience. Their mode of analysis is commonly post-modernist which often makes an already complex topic even more challenging to the lay reader not yet comfortable with that vocabulary
The topic itself---Chinese Cyberspace--- of course, is necessarily technical. Some of the articles are highly technical in their references to international governing bodies, as well as to computer hardware, software, and Internet protocols. The list of abbreviations routinely used in the articles runs almost two and one-half pages. While those not familiar with recent Chinese political history can understand the work, some knowledge would be very helpful.
These caveats aside, however, the work could be useful to a number of audiences. The book is divided into three sections, each of three or four chapters. These sections give first, a general introduction to Chinese cyberspace, particularly to the relationship between Chinese "Netizens" and Chinese authorities. The overwhelming question in this lead-off section is the one that is most often asked of Chinese cyberspace: Will the increased use of the Internet with its access to broader flows of information as well as to an ability to express individual opinion, necessarily democratize China?
All objectivity---not a strong post-modernist value to begin with---is lost in this section. All three authors clearly hope for the democratization of China---a term never defined. This is, of course, a widely held value in the West, but one wishes that the authors would do more than simply view democratization as the inevitable and only possible consequence of the loss of control by the Communist Party. However, their expertise inevitably asserts itself, and their conclusions ultimately wind up being carefully hedged as they assess the positive and negative forces tending toward democratization. Taken as a whole, in this section the reader gets a good introduction to the nature of the Chinese Internet, to its users and to its managers.
The second section, "Communication and Control," has two chapters on the relationships between the Internet and the two contending Chinese political entities, the PRC and Taiwan. Because Taiwan long held a leading role in the production of computer technology in Asia, and continues to be the dominant investor in Mainland facilities and to have a leading role in research and development, it is continually mentioned throughout the book. [1]
Because Taiwan is so important to an understanding of the political implications of the Internet for China, or for "Greater China" (the PRC, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore, plus Chinese Diaspora communities) the book's attention to Taiwan is necessary and useful.
The most useful chapter in this section, however, does not deal with Taiwan, but rather with the architecture of the Chinese Internet. Christopher R. Hughes' chapter would be particularly useful to anyone who works with firms doing business with China, or to those with a strong interest in the technology of the Internet. It is the best brief introduction we have seen to the specific nature of the Chinese Internet and the rules by which it is governed. It is also one of the few chapters which does take account of post-9/11 realities in the United States and Great Britain.
As Hughes points out, a number of ironic convergences have occurred. What was once evidence of totalitarian control over the Internet in China is now becoming common practice in the U.S. and Great Britain.
While imbedding his analysis in a very clear presentation of the mechanics of the Chinese net, Hughes also addresses far larger problems. He is one of several of the authors included here to treat Chinese security concerns as more than just inevitable, but also realistic ones. The tension between human rights and security is one that he addresses directly, though probably like most of us deeply concerned with the Internet, he hopes for some international global governance of the Internet which will address both concerns.
The third section, "Global networking and Economic Interactions" is organized around the Information Technology industry itself, again in both the PRC and Taiwan. These chapters would, like Hughes' chapter addressed above, be of interest to anyone with a pronounced technical bent, and to anyone working with firms that deal with China or Taiwan, or firms that might deal with them. If you have wondered about the possibility of your job being outsourced, these chapters will be useful to you.
As is so often the case in edited works, the last chapter is a sort of outlier. But Aihwa Ong's "Urban Assemblages: An Ecological Sense of the Knowledge Economy" should not be overlooked. While dauntingly post-modernist, like another work we have recently reviewed, Alessandro Aurigi's Making the Digital City, Ong discussed architecture and urban planning within the context of Information Technology. We found her analysis thought provoking and another useful intellectual tool with which to better understand the impact of the Internet.
Cyber China also raises some other complex issues which we are addressing at another location in Interface, namely the problem of what we are going to call "Internet English". Many of the authors are non-native speakers of English and the English translations of the various chapters are wildly uneven. Unfortunately, the worse offender is the editor herself, Françoise Mengin. As editor, of course, she sets the tone for the entire work in her introduction, and supplies a key chapter as well. The combination of her inadequately edited English and a heavily layered post-modernist analysis is occasionally deadly. For example:
As a matter of fact, if one refuses the functionalist/evolutionist paradigm, modernization models set as linear models, the issue at stake is not a speculation about the hypothetical mechanical impact dissident movements could have, notwithstanding their intrinsic importance. The point I want to make here is that the political and sociological landscape within which Internet is developing in China should downplay the threat the latter is hanging over the regime; and not only because the media, in China, are closely linked to the CCP. (54)
Other chapters, however, are beautifully translated; usually it appears, by the authors themselves.
On balance, Cyber China has a great deal of value, but extracting that value often requires a determined and relatively savvy reader. Because in Interface we make a determined attempt both to cover the impact of the Internet in Asia, and to bring books with an international perspective to our readers' attention, this work has been useful to us. We think that many of our readers could find it very useful as well. Others, however, are going to find it turgid, pedantic, and uneven.
References
[1] Those feeling the need for more information on the nature of the relationship between Taiwan and the mainland of China might begin with my earlier editorial in Interface, "The Internet, R&D, and U.S. policy in the Taiwan Straits Part I of II" found at: http://bcis.pacificu.edu/journal/2003/01/edit.php Part II is found at: http://bcis.pacificu.edu/journal/2003/02/edit.php My reading of the work under review, however, would cause me to rewrite some of my conclusions had I the time to do so. In particular the great sophistication with which the authors, and particularly Edward S. Steinfield, analyze production relations between the two would make me less alarmist about the future of Taiwan, for reasons discussed in this review
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