UPDATED 10:00 EDT / AUGUST 07 2013

NEWS

China’s Leaders Warm Up to Big Data for Better Governance

China’s repressive internet regime is famous the world over, what with its “Great Firewall of China” put in place to block any sites that censors deem critical of the regime, not to mention the increasingly sophisticated systems it employs to suppress discussion of controversial subjects.

China has long seen the internet as something dangerous, something that needs to be controlled and restricted, but could it be that this attitude is changing? Is it possible that China’s overlords are beginning to see the web as something that it can use to its advantage?

Recent developments suggest that this could be true – that the policymakers in Beijing are no longer afraid of the internet, and are in fact grateful for what is proving to be a valuable source of information about its citizen’s sentiments, and how they feel about government reforms. Simon Denyer of the Washington Post reports that rather than trying to shut down as many sites as possible, party leaders are now vacuuming up as much data from the web as they can, getting access to summaries of online discussions in real-time.

“Opinion monitoring centers have sprung up in state-run news organizations and universities to mine and interpret the vast rivers of chatter on the Internet,” writes Denyer.

“At People’s Daily, algorithms churn out real-time data on what people are talking about online, and daily and weekly reports summarize the dominant views on hot issues. Most of the “opinion mining” work carried out by the People’s Daily team is for consumption by officials or state-owned enterprises. The monitoring center advises officials on how to deal with crises — what language to use and how to conduct themselves in public,”

This kind of Big Data-driven approach is nothing new for politicos in the west. In last year’s US presidential elections, Barack Obama sourced masses of data from the web to use to his advantage, employing a team of technology whizz kids to optimize voter turnout and messaging. But in China, this kind of approach appears to be an entirely new thing – previously its web monitoring efforts have been all about spying on or blocking citizen’s online activities, rather than listening to what they want to say.

As well as monitoring online forums, China has also begun sourcing opinions from elsewhere too, hiring firms to carry out opinion polls to gauge citizen’s sentiments on certain critical issues. While various ministries in China’s government have their own research departments to assess people’s opinions, these have traditionally only been used as a way of justifying whatever it was they wanted to do in the first place. Now things are different, with the government hiring third-parties like the Horizon Research Consultancy Group to carry out surveys on proposed changes to government policy.

Of course, China has a long way to go before it becomes anywhere near as open or accountable as western democracies do. As the Washington Post points out, key foreign policy issues or political reform are almost never discussed, and certainly citizen’s opinions on these matters are never solicited. Even so, it’s ironic that while China’s policymakers now have unfettered access to the country’s internet forums, and are gleaning lots of useful tips on better governance, they continue to censor those same forums in the most ruthless fashion.


A message from John Furrier, co-founder of SiliconANGLE:

Your vote of support is important to us and it helps us keep the content FREE.

One click below supports our mission to provide free, deep, and relevant content.  

Join our community on YouTube

Join the community that includes more than 15,000 #CubeAlumni experts, including Amazon.com CEO Andy Jassy, Dell Technologies founder and CEO Michael Dell, Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger, and many more luminaries and experts.

“TheCUBE is an important partner to the industry. You guys really are a part of our events and we really appreciate you coming and I know people appreciate the content you create as well” – Andy Jassy

THANK YOU