Page 129 - Feasibility Study of New Media Technology on Constructing Online Public Sphere

Chapter 5. The Sun Zhigang incident

portant to know how they participate in online public events. In Figure 10, 68.7% of

the respondents tend to follow and comment on events, 60% prefer to forward and
disseminate the events, and 49.57% have participated in online or offline discussions
about events before. These online activities are effective in publicising the events and
increasing people’s concern about the developing process of the related events. In terms
of online activities, the participants are free to choose the form of participation, which

can protect them from censorship while trying to support the campaign. The offline dis-
cussions and other activities in the physical world create a private environment for the
public to receive and exchange information. If people are attracted by the event, they

may search for related news online, which forms a cycle of online and offline activities
and elaborates the mutual support between the online and offline campaign.
Zheng (2008, p.136) stated that if a collective action or social movement is con-
sidered to impede the legitimacy of the state or pose a threat to the authority, it invites
a crackdown or suppression by the state, but if the movement is perceived to be bene-

ficial to the state, it is more likely to succeed (ibid). Given the context in China, since
protests in the physical space are under strict surveillance and sometimes dangerous,
the internet becomes an attractive medium for the organisation and practices of similar

actions (Tai, 2006). An evident change is that the government now holds a relatively
tolerant attitude towards online protests, partly because they are less likely to pose real
threat to the regime and the stability of society, and partly because of the difficulties in
detecting and eliminating gatherings in cyberspace (ibid, p.291).
Hence, there are still 38.26% of respondents ‘just browsing information about

the event’. This is partly the result of China’s special online environment and the gov-
ernment’s censorship policy. Some internet users may just browse information without
having any actual participations in ‘sensitive’ events or public affairs. This situation

also explains why only 11.3% of the respondents chose to take part in real-life activities
around the events. People worry about the punishment and negative influence that may
result from real-life participation.
Taking the public figures and law experts’ participation in the Sun Zhigang case
as an example, they initially acquired information from the online platforms and then

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