The ideological battle between Google and the People’s Republic of China

Two weeks ago, Google publicly opposed the Chinese government by declaring that it would no longer censor its online services in China. It made this announcement shortly after a cyber-attack targeted the Google email accounts of Chinese dissidents, an attack which reports suggest may have originated from the Chinese government. Google went so far as to threaten to leave China if the government does not relax its internet censorship laws, sparking an angry response.

This latest crisis in Sino-Google relations has taken on international significance beyond just the opening of another front in the ongoing trade disputes between China and the United States, and it represents more than just the latest development in the long-lasting ideological clash between the Chinese government and western internet service providers Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft. And while this isn’t the first time an American corporation has sought to impose its will on a foreign government, this may be the first such standoff that has an ideological or public international law dimension to it. Among other things, it prompted US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to declare last week that the United States intends to advance “internet freedom” at the United Nations.

One interesting question that comes out of this is whether corporations of Google’s stature will be able to shape the policies of state actors in much the same manner as they can those of industry players. For example, Apple and then Google transformed the wireless industry when they required cellular providers to significantly alter their practices which restricted free access to information as a condition to carrying their newly-developed cell phones; will Google similarly be able to compel the Chinese government to alter its policies concerning access to information by threatening to leave the country? It is a threat the Chinese government must take seriously; aside from the direct economic benefits that China gains from having Google offices in the country, China to some extent relies on services like Google’s to connect its citizens with the rest of the world in areas like business, science, and art – and thereby fuel China’s cultural and economic growth.

Of course, the flip side of this is the vast amount of profits Google stands to forego by removing itself from the Chinese market. China is by far the world’s largest online community, with close to 400 million internet users. Notwithstanding its corporate motto of “don’t be evil,” it seems unlikely that Google would threaten to turn its back on such a large market over a silly ideological dispute over free speech unless 1) the move is nothing more than a negotiating tactic, or 2) it considered its operations in China to lack growth potential. If the move is just a negotiating tactic vis-à-vis the Chinese government, it can be seen as evidence of Google’s footprint in international affairs, even if the bid is ultimately unsuccessful. And if Google doesn’t foresee long-term growth potential in China, one must ask to what extent a free-flowing marketplace of ideas is central to what Google does.

If Google proves incapable of bending China to its will through the sheer force of its economic clout, there are a number of international forums through which Google could further exert pressure on Beijing. The most likely, perhaps, is the WTO. Indeed, a number of American business interests have already begun lobbying for the US Trade Representative to invoke WTO treaties to compel China to relax its internet censorship. These groups allege that China has violated its commitment to allow unlimited and equal access to foreign internet services by essentially requiring such services to either self-censor, in compliance with government guidelines, or relocate outside of China’s borders where they would be subject to limited accessibility behind the “Great Firewall of China” or potentially banned altogether.

Access to information is an area that is currently woefully under-regulated, with norms varying enormously from one place to another based on cultural and market factors. It could be argued that in an information-based and globally-linked society like ours, this is an impediment to trade that the WTO is well-placed to address.

Most countries censor or control information on the basis of moral or political grounds; from a positivist standpoint, it is no less legal for the Chinese government to intercept dissidents’ emails or block news pertaining to certain political events than it is for the US government to monitor the conversations of suspected terrorists or block access to child pornography. However, the ethical question of who should lawfully be able to restrict the flow of information, and on what basis, is still very much open, as evidenced by the ongoing net-neutrality debate in the US and the expanded debate on legitimate limits of free speech. If the present matter is brought before the WTO for mediation, it would first prompt a much-needed general discussion on the question of whether there is a need to regulate access to information on a global level in today’s technological climate, and second go a long way toward determining the principles by which it might be regulated (for example, appealing to UN declarations such as the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights).