
A scholar and activist tells the story of change makers operating within the Chinese Communist system, whose ideas of social action necessarily differ from those dominant in Western, liberal societies. The Chinese government has increased digital censorship under Xi Jinping. Why? Because online activism works; it is perceived as a threat in halls of power. In The Other Digital China, Jing Wang, a scholar at MIT and an activist in China, shatters the view that citizens of nonliberal societies are either brainwashed or complicit, either imprisoned for speaking out or paralyzed by fear. Instead, Wang shows the impact of a less confrontational kind of activism. Whereas Westerners tend to equate action with open criticism and street revolutions, Chinese activists are building an invisible and quiet coalition to bring incremental progress to their society. Many Chinese change makers practice nonconfrontational activism. They prefer to walk around obstacles rather than break through them, tactfully navigating between what is lawful and what is illegitimate. The Other Digital China describes this massive gray zone where NGOs, digital entrepreneurs, university students, IT companies like Tencent and Sina, and tech communities operate. They study the policy winds in Beijing, devising ways to press their case without antagonizing a regime where taboo terms fluctuate at different moments. What emerges is an ever-expanding networked activism on a grand scale. Under extreme ideological constraints, the majority of Chinese activists opt for neither revolution nor inertia. They share a mentality common in rules are meant to be bent, if not resisted.
Author

Jing Wang is Professor of Chinese media and Cultural Studies and S.C. Fang Professor of Chinese Language & Culture at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She is jointly appointed to MIT's Comparative Media Studies and Global Studies & Languages. Jing Wang is the founder and organizer of MIT’s New Media Action Lab. In spring 2009, Professor Wang launched an NGO2.0 in collaboration with four Chinese universities including the University of Science and Technology of China, two Chinese NGOs, and corporate partners including Ogilvy & Mather China and Milward Brown. The project, funded by Ford Foundation in Beijing, is designed to enhance the digital and new media literacy of grassroots NGOs in the underdeveloped regions of China and deliver an interactive mapping platform built on Ushihidi, complete with Web 2.0 training courses and a Chinese field guide to best practices and software of social media for nonprofits. Professor Wang started working with Creative Commons in 2006 and serves as the Chair of the International Advisory Board of Creative Commons Mainland China. She was appointed to serve on the Advisory Board for Wikimedia Foundation in 2010. She serves on the editorial and advisory boards of ten academic journals in the US, Australia, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and the UK, which include journals such as Global Media and Communication; Advertising & Society Review; positions: east Asia cultures critique; Chinese Journal of Communication; Inter-Asia Cultural Studies Journal: Movements; The Chinese Journal of Communication and Society, etc. (from Wikipedia)