When it comes to Google and China, perspective matters

It’s been nearly a month since Google’s initial announcement to “review the feasibility of business operations in China” and stop censoring search results. But as a simple test search demonstrates, nothing has changed in Google’s search results: content is still being censored. In a recent conversation with a few Chinese students visiting the U.S., I was told that the Chinese public generally believes their government is negotiating with Google, and that neither side is taking substantive action.

Over the last month, commentators in the U.S. and China have reacted with both applause and suspicion to Google’s controversial announcement. Some Chinese see this move as a business strategy to increase Google’s market share in China’s booming internet market, while many Americans think the attack demonstrates China’s totalitarianism and encourage Google (even all Western firms) to get out of China. Others have suggested that the incident is a way for the US government to conspire against China in the political arena.

As someone who has lived in China, Canada, and now the United States, I cannot say that I fully accept any of these views. But I can say a few things about how, as students at a liberal arts university, we should approach the incident.

Often times in Western countries, we begin our analysis of such an incident with the assumption that the Internet is supposed to be entirely “free.” But in my experience, freedom—and the desire for it—are simply not the same in the East and West.

During the Beijing Olympics of 2008, Western supporters of human rights utilized the opportunity to bash China’s one-party rule. Businesses like Lenovo, Coca-Cola, and McDonald’s all faced pressure from the human rights activists, while Chinese students around the world criticized media giants like CNN for issuing biased reports on China. The contention was so intense that top political leaders of China had to publicly urge the country to “keep a sober mind.” While the Google incident has not produced the same strong reactions as the Olympics did, it nonetheless provides another example of the cultural misunderstanding that can take place between Chinese and American students. In the minds of some free speech advocates, controlling one aspect of freedom is controlling all aspects.

For example, when China calls for implanting sophisticated software in all computers sold in China, these advocates probably imagine software that can limit access to applications, names of email recipients, profanity in dictionaries, adult content on websites, names and addresses of the people one chats with online, and even set time limits on the user’s access to the computer. Oh, and to further the paranoia, they contend that the software may check back for a log of all activities whenever the government wants. Sound familiar? Well, the same system is actually built in a Mac OS 10.6.2 under System Preferences—it’s called “Parental Control.”

With the level of globalization in China today, it is not possible for this “1984” type of control to be exerted on anyone, let alone the hundreds of thousands of people who constantly travel in and out of China. As the government builds roads, power stations, and cell phone towers to deliver information to every citizen, what makes people think that the Chinese government prioritizes limiting individual freedom above all?
I cannot honestly say that when I lived in China 10 years ago, even as a child, having some web content blocked compromised my freedom. I enjoyed upward social mobility and I could travel around the nation. And my PC did not have “Parental Control” either. I came out just fine.

Google probably will not pull out of China, and this incident will simply be remembered as a juicy early 2010 controversy. But what I see repeatedly in discussions of this and other similar incidents is a fundamental lack of cultural understanding and a tendency of both parties to cling to a certain ideology. But if we can back out of our own history and past experience—just for a brief moment—and peek into the cultural background of the person or nation that we are trying to judge, we can probably create a much more meaningful dialogue that will make a real difference.

The author is a Columbia College junior majoring in Economics and East Asian Languages & Cultures. He is Director of Network Management for the Global China Connection.