Pub Date : 2022-12-29DOI: 10.1080/1369118X.2022.2161829
Yiyan Zhang, Shengchun Huang, Tong Li
ABSTRACT In the algorithmic era, both users and the platform battle for visibility. Chinese fans are savvy users who explore the hidden algorithms behind platform functions. With the collectively developed algorithmic imaginary, digital fandom communities negotiate with the platform over algorithms to optimize the visibility of celebrities they endorse. Drawing from participatory observation and semi-structured interviews in Chinese online fandoms of an idol group, INTO1, we detailed how fans as digital users collectively explore, interpret, and creatively utilize algorithms to increase their idol’s visibility. We conclude that visibility, as a representation of algorithm power, is co-defined through the constant push-and-pull between digital users and the platform. This paper contributes to both algorithm and fandom studies by describing large-scale non-professional users’ daily construction of the algorithmic imaginary in the unique context of Chinese fandom and beyond. It also discusses broader civic implications of fans’ algorithmic practices to wider digital users in China.
{"title":"‘Push-and-pull’ for visibility: how do fans as users negotiate over algorithms with Chinese digital platforms?","authors":"Yiyan Zhang, Shengchun Huang, Tong Li","doi":"10.1080/1369118X.2022.2161829","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2022.2161829","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT In the algorithmic era, both users and the platform battle for visibility. Chinese fans are savvy users who explore the hidden algorithms behind platform functions. With the collectively developed algorithmic imaginary, digital fandom communities negotiate with the platform over algorithms to optimize the visibility of celebrities they endorse. Drawing from participatory observation and semi-structured interviews in Chinese online fandoms of an idol group, INTO1, we detailed how fans as digital users collectively explore, interpret, and creatively utilize algorithms to increase their idol’s visibility. We conclude that visibility, as a representation of algorithm power, is co-defined through the constant push-and-pull between digital users and the platform. This paper contributes to both algorithm and fandom studies by describing large-scale non-professional users’ daily construction of the algorithmic imaginary in the unique context of Chinese fandom and beyond. It also discusses broader civic implications of fans’ algorithmic practices to wider digital users in China.","PeriodicalId":48335,"journal":{"name":"Information Communication & Society","volume":"26 1","pages":"321 - 339"},"PeriodicalIF":4.2,"publicationDate":"2022-12-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46842144","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-12-29DOI: 10.1080/1369118X.2022.2161827
Yan Wang, Ting Luo
ABSTRACT Chinese idol fans have been identified among the main forces in cyber nationalist activisms in recent years, acting as the nationalist fans protecting the state as an idol in response to external political shocks. Their skills in acknowledging, involving, and even reinventing the image of the state and national pride in cyber nationalist activisms do not emerge in a vacuum. This article examines how idol fans involve and reinvent the nationalist discourse in their everyday fan activities – idol promotion. We focus on the pandemic in 2020 as it provides a specific social and political context that allows us to understand better the interaction between idol fans and the state in their mundane fan activities. We construct our analysis under the computational grounded theory framework with over 6 million fan posts collected from Weibo and 11 in-depth interviews with active idol fans. Our findings show that when engaging in pandemic-related discussion, idol fans actively borrowed official discourse on nationalism and strategically responded to key political and social events in their idol promotion activities. The idol images they built are not only positive but also nationalist. Therefore, they play not only the commercial logic commonly seen in the Japanese and Korean K-pop/idol culture but also the political logic propagated by the state in China.
{"title":"Politicizing for the idol: China’s idol fandom nationalism in pandemic","authors":"Yan Wang, Ting Luo","doi":"10.1080/1369118X.2022.2161827","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2022.2161827","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT Chinese idol fans have been identified among the main forces in cyber nationalist activisms in recent years, acting as the nationalist fans protecting the state as an idol in response to external political shocks. Their skills in acknowledging, involving, and even reinventing the image of the state and national pride in cyber nationalist activisms do not emerge in a vacuum. This article examines how idol fans involve and reinvent the nationalist discourse in their everyday fan activities – idol promotion. We focus on the pandemic in 2020 as it provides a specific social and political context that allows us to understand better the interaction between idol fans and the state in their mundane fan activities. We construct our analysis under the computational grounded theory framework with over 6 million fan posts collected from Weibo and 11 in-depth interviews with active idol fans. Our findings show that when engaging in pandemic-related discussion, idol fans actively borrowed official discourse on nationalism and strategically responded to key political and social events in their idol promotion activities. The idol images they built are not only positive but also nationalist. Therefore, they play not only the commercial logic commonly seen in the Japanese and Korean K-pop/idol culture but also the political logic propagated by the state in China.","PeriodicalId":48335,"journal":{"name":"Information Communication & Society","volume":"26 1","pages":"304 - 320"},"PeriodicalIF":4.2,"publicationDate":"2022-12-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47148822","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-12-29DOI: 10.1080/1369118X.2022.2161830
Rachel Aalders
ABSTRACT Buy now, pay later (BNPL) is a new, increasingly popular form of short-term credit used for everyday items. While critics are concerned that these typically unregulated products pose risks for financially vulnerable people, many BNPL companies argue their app-based products are more responsible than other forms of credit. In this study, I use Davis’ (2020) mechanisms and conditions framework of affordances and Light et al.’s (2018) walkthrough method to analyse how three popular BNPL products (Afterpay, Klarna and Zip) define responsible lending and spending. I argue these BNPL companies claim they are more responsible than credit cards because they are more inclusive and have fairer loan terms, and that these claims are made possible by the platformed nature of BNPL products. At the same time, these BNPL companies define responsible consumers as those who make their repayments on time. This redefinition of responsible consumption encourages increased spending and normalises the use of BNPL credit for that consumption. These products, which challenge traditional regulatory responses to consumer credit, are disproportionately used by lower-income families, who are increasingly reliant on credit for everyday purchases.
{"title":"Buy now, pay later: redefining indebted users as responsible consumers","authors":"Rachel Aalders","doi":"10.1080/1369118X.2022.2161830","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2022.2161830","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT Buy now, pay later (BNPL) is a new, increasingly popular form of short-term credit used for everyday items. While critics are concerned that these typically unregulated products pose risks for financially vulnerable people, many BNPL companies argue their app-based products are more responsible than other forms of credit. In this study, I use Davis’ (2020) mechanisms and conditions framework of affordances and Light et al.’s (2018) walkthrough method to analyse how three popular BNPL products (Afterpay, Klarna and Zip) define responsible lending and spending. I argue these BNPL companies claim they are more responsible than credit cards because they are more inclusive and have fairer loan terms, and that these claims are made possible by the platformed nature of BNPL products. At the same time, these BNPL companies define responsible consumers as those who make their repayments on time. This redefinition of responsible consumption encourages increased spending and normalises the use of BNPL credit for that consumption. These products, which challenge traditional regulatory responses to consumer credit, are disproportionately used by lower-income families, who are increasingly reliant on credit for everyday purchases.","PeriodicalId":48335,"journal":{"name":"Information Communication & Society","volume":"26 1","pages":"941 - 956"},"PeriodicalIF":4.2,"publicationDate":"2022-12-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44227781","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-12-28DOI: 10.1080/1369118X.2022.2159487
Mengyang Zhao, Kecheng Fang
ABSTRACT The goal of this article is to reflect on and challenge some key presumptions in the existing research on digital China, and to critically extend this line of inquiry by engaging with the transnational perspective. We argue that the transnational lens, while acknowledging the vital role of the state, can reveal a more diverse set of actors and their dynamics. Theoretically, we borrow from critical studies that conceptualize and repackage Chinese-ness as Sinophone communities and expression, a more progressive, inclusive, and grounded perspective. To substantiate our arguments, we introduce two cases derived from our own empirical studies: the multi-faceted border transgression of platform game workers, as well as the transnational production and boomerang diffusion of disinformation to undergird the less visible service and content supply chain. We propose that future research should recenter the fluid and intersectional identities of actors involved in the digital presumption, and utilize a multi-platform and relational approach to shed light on the dynamic evolution of transnationalism.
{"title":"Extending the research on digital China: the transnational lens","authors":"Mengyang Zhao, Kecheng Fang","doi":"10.1080/1369118X.2022.2159487","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2022.2159487","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT\u0000 The goal of this article is to reflect on and challenge some key presumptions in the existing research on digital China, and to critically extend this line of inquiry by engaging with the transnational perspective. We argue that the transnational lens, while acknowledging the vital role of the state, can reveal a more diverse set of actors and their dynamics. Theoretically, we borrow from critical studies that conceptualize and repackage Chinese-ness as Sinophone communities and expression, a more progressive, inclusive, and grounded perspective. To substantiate our arguments, we introduce two cases derived from our own empirical studies: the multi-faceted border transgression of platform game workers, as well as the transnational production and boomerang diffusion of disinformation to undergird the less visible service and content supply chain. We propose that future research should recenter the fluid and intersectional identities of actors involved in the digital presumption, and utilize a multi-platform and relational approach to shed light on the dynamic evolution of transnationalism.","PeriodicalId":48335,"journal":{"name":"Information Communication & Society","volume":"26 1","pages":"270 - 285"},"PeriodicalIF":4.2,"publicationDate":"2022-12-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48389121","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-12-11DOI: 10.1080/1369118X.2022.2155486
Lin Zhang, E. Yuan
ABSTRACT This study problematizes the paradox of coexisting market dynamisms and the strong state in China’s ICT industry through an empirical inquiry into the history and practices of ICT entrepreneurship in Beijing’s Zhongguancun (ZGC), an alternative geo-imaginary to that of Silicon Valley. Drawing on archival research as well as interviews and participant observations between 2015 and 2020, we situate the post-2008 rise of ICT entrepreneurship in ZGC in the history of its decades-long transformation. We highlight two new ways in which the state has become intertwined with the market in the ICT sector. First, state agents at various levels have transformed themselves into ‘market agencies,’ acting through the market instead of governing it at a distance. Second, the state has increasingly taken a financialized approach to ICT governance, assuming the role of a capital investor to guide and facilitate rather than directly managing a market-driven entrepreneurial economy. We show how these macro political economic shifts have shaped mezzo level institutional changes and the micro, lived experiences of entrepreneurs variously situated along the elite-grassroots spectrum in ZGC, who rode waves of ‘mass entrepreneurship and innovation’ under the current Xi-Li administration.
{"title":"Entrepreneurs in China’s ‘Silicon Valley’: state-led financialization and mass entrepreneurship/innovation","authors":"Lin Zhang, E. Yuan","doi":"10.1080/1369118X.2022.2155486","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2022.2155486","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT This study problematizes the paradox of coexisting market dynamisms and the strong state in China’s ICT industry through an empirical inquiry into the history and practices of ICT entrepreneurship in Beijing’s Zhongguancun (ZGC), an alternative geo-imaginary to that of Silicon Valley. Drawing on archival research as well as interviews and participant observations between 2015 and 2020, we situate the post-2008 rise of ICT entrepreneurship in ZGC in the history of its decades-long transformation. We highlight two new ways in which the state has become intertwined with the market in the ICT sector. First, state agents at various levels have transformed themselves into ‘market agencies,’ acting through the market instead of governing it at a distance. Second, the state has increasingly taken a financialized approach to ICT governance, assuming the role of a capital investor to guide and facilitate rather than directly managing a market-driven entrepreneurial economy. We show how these macro political economic shifts have shaped mezzo level institutional changes and the micro, lived experiences of entrepreneurs variously situated along the elite-grassroots spectrum in ZGC, who rode waves of ‘mass entrepreneurship and innovation’ under the current Xi-Li administration.","PeriodicalId":48335,"journal":{"name":"Information Communication & Society","volume":"26 1","pages":"286 - 303"},"PeriodicalIF":4.2,"publicationDate":"2022-12-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45610045","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-12-10DOI: 10.1080/1369118X.2022.2077125
Darcy Pan
ABSTRACT Examining the emerging data center industry in Guizhou, Southwest China, this article investigates the infrastructure-making processes that are initiated to implement cloud infrastructures, and how they are mobilized to reconfigure Guizhou’s nature. It discusses how these processes have come about in tandem with the expansion of China’s cloud geography, and how they are impacting the region. Contextualizing and historicizing these processes, this article argues that the developing data center industry in Guizhou is part of the broader process of state-building. These processes of implementing cloud infrastructure in Guizhou lead to the co-production of further state legitimation and continued marginalization of Guizhou, thus calling into question the common claim that technology bridges economic disparities and enhances connectivity.
{"title":"Storing data on the margins: making state and infrastructure in Southwest China","authors":"Darcy Pan","doi":"10.1080/1369118X.2022.2077125","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2022.2077125","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT Examining the emerging data center industry in Guizhou, Southwest China, this article investigates the infrastructure-making processes that are initiated to implement cloud infrastructures, and how they are mobilized to reconfigure Guizhou’s nature. It discusses how these processes have come about in tandem with the expansion of China’s cloud geography, and how they are impacting the region. Contextualizing and historicizing these processes, this article argues that the developing data center industry in Guizhou is part of the broader process of state-building. These processes of implementing cloud infrastructure in Guizhou lead to the co-production of further state legitimation and continued marginalization of Guizhou, thus calling into question the common claim that technology bridges economic disparities and enhances connectivity.","PeriodicalId":48335,"journal":{"name":"Information Communication & Society","volume":"25 1","pages":"2412 - 2426"},"PeriodicalIF":4.2,"publicationDate":"2022-12-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48380172","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-12-05DOI: 10.1080/1369118X.2022.2136856
J. Qiu, Philip S. Yu, Elisa Oreglia
ABSTRACT This introductory essay summarizes how our understanding of Chinese internets – in the plural – has shifted in the past two decades. The incumbent approach sees ‘Chinese tech’ as a unitary and statist monolith, an incomplete view whose utility has declined. By contrast, the articles in this special issue collectively substantiate a novel geopolitical approach that analyzes ‘Chinese internets’ as internally diverse and externally border-crossing; as both public (governmental and non-governmental) and private (e.g., corporate); as discursive and policy entanglements beyond the dichotomy of multistakeholderism and multilateralism; and as global, regional, and local formations that are connected to, but not entirely constrained by, their national counterparts. Pluralist and multilayered, this new approach to analyzing Chinese techno-geopolitics shall provide a better fit for contemporary internet research involving state and nonstate actors in China, including Chinese companies operating both overseas and globally.
{"title":"A new approach to the geopolitics of Chinese internets","authors":"J. Qiu, Philip S. Yu, Elisa Oreglia","doi":"10.1080/1369118X.2022.2136856","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2022.2136856","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT This introductory essay summarizes how our understanding of Chinese internets – in the plural – has shifted in the past two decades. The incumbent approach sees ‘Chinese tech’ as a unitary and statist monolith, an incomplete view whose utility has declined. By contrast, the articles in this special issue collectively substantiate a novel geopolitical approach that analyzes ‘Chinese internets’ as internally diverse and externally border-crossing; as both public (governmental and non-governmental) and private (e.g., corporate); as discursive and policy entanglements beyond the dichotomy of multistakeholderism and multilateralism; and as global, regional, and local formations that are connected to, but not entirely constrained by, their national counterparts. Pluralist and multilayered, this new approach to analyzing Chinese techno-geopolitics shall provide a better fit for contemporary internet research involving state and nonstate actors in China, including Chinese companies operating both overseas and globally.","PeriodicalId":48335,"journal":{"name":"Information Communication & Society","volume":"25 1","pages":"2335 - 2341"},"PeriodicalIF":4.2,"publicationDate":"2022-12-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45976006","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-10-30DOI: 10.1080/1369118X.2022.2128600
Weishan Miao, Jiacheng Liu, Shangwei Wu
ABSTRACT Studies on the Chinese internet mostly focus on how the government censors content and regulate digital platforms. We rarely know how internet companies understand, respond to and negotiate the relationship with the government. This study examines Danlan, the company that runs the world’s largest gay dating app Blued. We approach the interaction between Danlan and the government with an institutional perspective, treating them both as organizations seeking resources and legitimacy. Drawing on fieldwork, we develop the concept of embedded symbiosis, which characterizes the collaborative government-business relationship, and explore how Danlan, the seemingly weak side in this relationship, plays an active role in initiating, negotiating, and maintaining such relations at different stages of embeddedness. Danlan endeavors to form a symbiosis with the government to pursue its survival and development, yet eventually risks alienating from the gay community and colluding with the state in governing homosexuality. The case of Danlan shows the possibility for internet companies to seek legitimacy in an ever-changing political environment through working closely with the authorities and even becoming part of the governmental system itself.
{"title":"Embedded symbiosis: an institutional approach to government-business relationships in the Chinese internet industry","authors":"Weishan Miao, Jiacheng Liu, Shangwei Wu","doi":"10.1080/1369118X.2022.2128600","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2022.2128600","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT Studies on the Chinese internet mostly focus on how the government censors content and regulate digital platforms. We rarely know how internet companies understand, respond to and negotiate the relationship with the government. This study examines Danlan, the company that runs the world’s largest gay dating app Blued. We approach the interaction between Danlan and the government with an institutional perspective, treating them both as organizations seeking resources and legitimacy. Drawing on fieldwork, we develop the concept of embedded symbiosis, which characterizes the collaborative government-business relationship, and explore how Danlan, the seemingly weak side in this relationship, plays an active role in initiating, negotiating, and maintaining such relations at different stages of embeddedness. Danlan endeavors to form a symbiosis with the government to pursue its survival and development, yet eventually risks alienating from the gay community and colluding with the state in governing homosexuality. The case of Danlan shows the possibility for internet companies to seek legitimacy in an ever-changing political environment through working closely with the authorities and even becoming part of the governmental system itself.","PeriodicalId":48335,"journal":{"name":"Information Communication & Society","volume":"25 1","pages":"2447 - 2464"},"PeriodicalIF":4.2,"publicationDate":"2022-10-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46025545","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-10-01DOI: 10.1080/1369118X.2022.2128599
Hong Shen, Yujia He
ABSTRACT Contemporary digital platforms have become increasingly infrastructuralized, and started to raise geopolitical tensions with their global expansion. Amidst the heightened geopolitical competition between the US and China, the growing power of Chinese infrastructuralized platforms has made them the center of recent geopolitical dynamics. Drawing from an exploratory case study, this paper discusses Alibaba, one of the most prominent Chinese Internet giants, as an infrastructuralized platform, and highlights its geopolitical struggles. Often perceived as an e-commerce company, Alibaba has become ‘infrastructuralized’: its now-massive digital empire has moved beyond e-commerce, expanding into almost every aspect of China’s and global digital economy such as logistics, finance, offline retailing, and cloud computing. This paper traces three highly visible cases in Alibaba’s global journey – its failed deal with MoneyGram in 2017, the uneven global journey of Alibaba Cloud, and the construction of the electronic World Trade Platform – to illustrate three key dimensions of the geopolitics of infrastructuralized platforms – namely, the geopolitics of everyday data, the geopolitics of the visibility-invisibility tension, and the geopolitics of modularity. By doing so, it contributes to the following two areas of scholarship. On the one hand, it contributes to the growing literature on ‘infrastructures and platforms’ by foregrounding the geopolitical dimensions of Chinese infrastructuralized platforms. On the other hand, it adds to the literature on the ‘geopolitics of infrastructures’ by bringing in a new type of infrastructure, complementing previous discussions on the geopolitics of traditional material infrastructures.
{"title":"The geopolitics of infrastructuralized platforms: the case of Alibaba","authors":"Hong Shen, Yujia He","doi":"10.1080/1369118X.2022.2128599","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2022.2128599","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT Contemporary digital platforms have become increasingly infrastructuralized, and started to raise geopolitical tensions with their global expansion. Amidst the heightened geopolitical competition between the US and China, the growing power of Chinese infrastructuralized platforms has made them the center of recent geopolitical dynamics. Drawing from an exploratory case study, this paper discusses Alibaba, one of the most prominent Chinese Internet giants, as an infrastructuralized platform, and highlights its geopolitical struggles. Often perceived as an e-commerce company, Alibaba has become ‘infrastructuralized’: its now-massive digital empire has moved beyond e-commerce, expanding into almost every aspect of China’s and global digital economy such as logistics, finance, offline retailing, and cloud computing. This paper traces three highly visible cases in Alibaba’s global journey – its failed deal with MoneyGram in 2017, the uneven global journey of Alibaba Cloud, and the construction of the electronic World Trade Platform – to illustrate three key dimensions of the geopolitics of infrastructuralized platforms – namely, the geopolitics of everyday data, the geopolitics of the visibility-invisibility tension, and the geopolitics of modularity. By doing so, it contributes to the following two areas of scholarship. On the one hand, it contributes to the growing literature on ‘infrastructures and platforms’ by foregrounding the geopolitical dimensions of Chinese infrastructuralized platforms. On the other hand, it adds to the literature on the ‘geopolitics of infrastructures’ by bringing in a new type of infrastructure, complementing previous discussions on the geopolitics of traditional material infrastructures.","PeriodicalId":48335,"journal":{"name":"Information Communication & Society","volume":"25 1","pages":"2363 - 2380"},"PeriodicalIF":4.2,"publicationDate":"2022-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45085081","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-10-01DOI: 10.1080/1369118X.2022.2129270
Riccardo Nanni
ABSTRACT (How) are Chinese actors contributing to increased state influence in Internet standard-making? In its open and private-based dimension, the Internet is possibly the twenty-first century’s epitome of the liberal international order in its global spatial dimension. Therefore, many see deep normative challenges deriving from the rise of powerful, non-liberal actors such as China. In particular, China and Chinese stakeholders are often portrayed as supporters and promoters of a multilateral Internet governance model based on digital sovereignty aimed at completely replacing the existing multistakeholder, private-based model. Academic views on this topic have become less dichotomous throughout the years, especially as China’s position on it has become more nuanced. However, this academic and policy debate is still open. This article analyses Chinese stakeholder actions in the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), the key venue for Internet standard-making. Through network analysis, this article maps the engagement of Chinese stakeholders in selected working groups of the IETF over time. Through expert interviews, this article interprets the drivers, evolution, and impact of such engagement. This research yields two main findings: first, it shows that the Chinese government does not have full control of its domestic private actors, among which there is both collaboration and conflict. Second, it concludes that Chinese stakeholders have increasingly accepted the existing functioning of IETF standard-making as they grew influential within it.
{"title":"Digital sovereignty and Internet standards: normative implications of public-private relations among Chinese stakeholders in the Internet Engineering Task Force","authors":"Riccardo Nanni","doi":"10.1080/1369118X.2022.2129270","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2022.2129270","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT (How) are Chinese actors contributing to increased state influence in Internet standard-making? In its open and private-based dimension, the Internet is possibly the twenty-first century’s epitome of the liberal international order in its global spatial dimension. Therefore, many see deep normative challenges deriving from the rise of powerful, non-liberal actors such as China. In particular, China and Chinese stakeholders are often portrayed as supporters and promoters of a multilateral Internet governance model based on digital sovereignty aimed at completely replacing the existing multistakeholder, private-based model. Academic views on this topic have become less dichotomous throughout the years, especially as China’s position on it has become more nuanced. However, this academic and policy debate is still open. This article analyses Chinese stakeholder actions in the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), the key venue for Internet standard-making. Through network analysis, this article maps the engagement of Chinese stakeholders in selected working groups of the IETF over time. Through expert interviews, this article interprets the drivers, evolution, and impact of such engagement. This research yields two main findings: first, it shows that the Chinese government does not have full control of its domestic private actors, among which there is both collaboration and conflict. Second, it concludes that Chinese stakeholders have increasingly accepted the existing functioning of IETF standard-making as they grew influential within it.","PeriodicalId":48335,"journal":{"name":"Information Communication & Society","volume":"25 1","pages":"2342 - 2362"},"PeriodicalIF":4.2,"publicationDate":"2022-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44586791","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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