Page 20 - Feasibility Study of New Media Technology on Constructing Online Public Sphere

Feasibility Study of New Media Technology
on Constructing Online Public Sphere

acquisition and public expression. Scholars began to explore the position of ICT in

public participation about two decades ago, and it has been acknowledged that, as in-
formation technology removes the limitation of physical proximity, it can enhance peo-
ple’s engagement with democratic affairs (Barber, 1998). However, the public is not the
only beneficiary; the government can also gain advantages from this change, as can the
media companies, and a mutual empowerment exist between the state and enterprises

regarding internet-driven economic development: the Chinese government allows the
development of internet companies which produce and deliver goods to the people, and
thus maintain and even reinforce its legitimacy (Zheng, 2008). This book seeks to es-

tablish the Chinese government’s evolving attitudes towards the rapid development of
ICTs and the accompanying ICT-mediated public participation.
The progression of new media in China, especially from the Bulletin Board Sys-
tem (BBS) to the Weibo age, has attracted much attention in the last two decades. It has
greatly affected Chinese society in various aspects, among them public participation

and government policy. In countries where authoritarianism is deeply rooted, a sys-
tematic and reliable mechanism for gauging public sentiment on key issues is usually
absent. The internet allows public participation as it has fewer barricades, and so it

may be the closest alternative for the government to take the public pulse (Tai, 2006).
Internet platforms have provided opportunities for the public to express their voices
and demands, which further foster public participation. Therefore, a primary task is to
investigate this technological empowerment and how social media service contributes
to the public participation in China.

From the dawn of the internet, the Chinese government has undergone a process
of establishing and modifying rules to cope with the evolution of technology. With the
public’s evolving attitudes towards public participation, the government’s monitoring

and managing approaches have shifted over time; for example, Esarey and Xiao (2011)
applied information regime theory to explain the political and social effects of digital
media in China. They argued that with the advance of ICTs and the development of
the media market it has gradually unleashed the state’s information control and public
movements. Though established approaches of monitoring and controlling media have

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