ACADEMIC ENGLISH INTERNATIONAL POLITICS

Different Aspects on Google Leaving Mainland China:
An Experiment of Priming upon University Students

THIS ARTICLE IS AN EXEMPT FROM A BIGGER RESEARCH PROJECT

By Elvin Chuanye OUYANG

Tableof Contents

  1. Introduction
  2. Background
  3. Research objectives
  4. Literature review
  5. Different frames in understanding Google leaving mainland China
  6. Instantfactors and mechanismsinfluencing the fluctuation of public opinion
  7. Experimental design
  8. Experimental settings
  9. Variables
  10. Hypothesis
  11. Analyzing tools and procedures
  12. Results and discussion
  13. Demographic distribution among experimental groups
  14. Hypothesis test on effects and relative significance of treatments
  15. Conclusion
  16. Discussion
  17. Implications

APPENDIX REFERENCES

Abstract

This article focuses on the effects and mechanisms of utilitarianism and egalitarianism frames upon public opinion towards Google leaving mainland China, 2010. By the application of a contextual simulation of priming effects in the experiment, the research provides first hand empirical data towards the Google case. The results of the study suggest that different frames can have influenced differently upon the respondents, through different mechanisms. The priming of egalitarianism frame is believed to be more effective and significant than the priming of utilitarianism frame in instantly changing respondents’ opinions on the Google case. Findings of this study might shed light upon public diplomacy and global communication strategy of both Google and Chinese government.

Keywords

primingpublic opinionChinaGoogle

  1. Introduction
  2. Background

Since the beginning of 20th century, information technology has been enhancing communication among individuals, organizations and governments. The emergence of Social Networking Services (SNS), together with other Internet communication technologies, provides a chance of national image building through direct communication between governments and the public. Studies on the effects of optional public diplomatic policies or global public relation strategies are necessary in study of communication policy effectiveness, especially over cases with high public exposures.

Among cases of this kind, the story of Google leaving mainland China (thereafter "the Google case") provokes controversy that can shed light on national sovereignty and corporation interests.

OnMarch 3rd2010, Google claimed to pull its "Google.cn" service out of mainland China, drawing international attention on Internet Content Providers (ICPs) and Chinese Internet policy instantly. Despite official claim from Google that this action is due to consideration of hacker attacks from mainland China on its Gmail service, the following months have seen a hot debate over the reason of Google's withdrawal and Chinese internet sensorship policy. This controversy, however, is not an unprecedented one of its kind. As early as 2004, ICPs like Yahoo or MSN have complied with Chinese Internet codes by submitting private information of its dissendent users or close certain politically-incorrect websites upon Chinese government's request, which leads to fierce international criticism[1] focusing on their support of human rights violation of Chinese government.

The compliance of the ICPs, however, is not an unreasonable action; it is based on their agreement with the Chinese government before they can operate locally in mainland China. Since March 2002, ICPs operating in mainland China have signed “Public Pledge on Self Discipline for the Chinese Internet Industry” (thereafter “the Pledge”)“voluntarily”. By signing on the Pledge, ICPs operating in China agree to undertake self-censorship over any online information.They provide and submit information of customers who afford information which would "jeopardize state security and disrupt social stability"[2]. This pledge, with its non-mandatory appearance and self-administrated censorship contents, might seem flexible at the first glance; yet the decisions left by Chinese government to the ICPs would force them to be as cautious as possible, thus maximizing the censorship effects without much government involvement.[3]

Ingenious as it is, “The Pledge” is only the legal method among the three applied by the Chinese government when implementing public censorship. The other two more conventional methods are technical method and social method: the technical method includes firewalls, proxy servers, filtration software for Internet Service Providers (ISPs) and Internet cafes, email and search engine filtration, Web site blocking and surveillance of Internet cafes[4] while the social method includes controlling mass media, forming propaganda and shaping ideology. All three methods aim at controlling “the flow of information and social order at large”[5].

The Chinese government’s resort to censorship, however, has legitimacy considering the social stability or national security: the right of information restriction is part of the sovereignty which no country would totally abandon. The differences merely lie in subtle and ad hoc discussions of specific conditions. Hence on a broader scope, thiscontroversy between ICPs and Chinese government is not a specific situation; it is the manifestation of a more widespread conflict between globalization and national sovereignty.In an article discussing the Global Online Freedom Act (proposed to the House on February 16, 2006, by Rep. Christopher H. Smith, thereafter “GOFA”) and the possibility to contain foreign countries from violating freedom of information, William J. Cannici (Jr., 2009) claimed that it is impossible for American international Internet corporations to ensure freedom of information by refusing to comply with local governments; even more, United States would be doing the same as China does by intervening practices of private companies once passing the GOFA.[6]

Therefore censorship, either in China or other countries, has long posed dilemmas for international ICPs: they have to either comply with Internet censorship or abandon profits in the market. The compromises reached by the ICPs are claimed by some scholars to undermine potential interests in two ways: a “watered down” version of their services weakens their technological competitiveness and the so-called “human rights violation” caused by the submitted private customer information distained their corporate reputation.[7] Therefore ICPs have to strike a balance between the access of potential market and the distaining of their ethical corporate reputation, which leads us back to the Google case.

With the high profile reports of Google's exit out of China and the involvement of national government and international company, the public opinion towards either Google or Chinese government might be influenced by different rhetoric. The Chinese netizens would be deeply influenced by the withdrawal of Google.cn services, thus imposing pressure upon both the government and the company. The widespread news of Google's choice would subsequently induce immense international attention from the global community, leading to an even more complex involvement of other countries (mainly the United States, with its claim of 'strong concerns'[8]). Hence a study looking into the public reaction towards different media aspects of the issue might be suggestive to both the government and the company: in this study, the researcher provides empirical information which can shed light on what the government should stress in public diplomacy or what a company should emphasis in public relation.

1.2.Research objectives

Therefore this study focuses on the instant media effects and mechanisms upon people from different cultural backgrounds. Drawing onthe Google case, the study focuses on one question: to what extent different frames in understanding the Google case would change people’s opinion instantly.

To answer this question, an intervening experiment was designed, which analyzed Canadian and American university students’ opinions towards the Google case.

In the following sections, the article introduces the public opinion theories and research methods, explain the application and implementation of this study and discuss the results and further improvements.

  1. Literature Review
  2. Different frames in understanding Google Leaving mainland China

In order to answer the first question, possible frames feasible for understanding the Google case are needed. As illustrated in the background, the Google case has both national government and multinational corporations (MNCs) involved and is related to national censorship. Therefore it would be reasonable to search in the pool of Chinese and American political values for possible frames in explaining the Google case.

With regard to Chinese and American political culture differences, scholars of both Chinese and American background have done much work. Chinese scholars suggest that political cultural differences between Chinese and United States can be categorized into two kinds. First, Chinese and Americans take different positions on the spectrum of individualism vs. collectivism: Chinese tend to sacrifice individual interests for the sake of the community while Americans tend to focus more on individual interests.[9] Second, China and United States take contrary positions in foreign policy when dealing with Sino-American relations on the utilitarianism vs. idealism spectrum: conflicts are more likely to occur when China takes a utilitarianism position (which emphasizes economic interests) while United States takes an idealism position (which emphasizes human-rights-based moral standards).[10] These two spectrums are coherent with each other in that individualism emphasizes on freedom and rules which would lead to the protection of individual freedom and rights, while collectivism stresses collective interests and security which would lead to the pursuit of ultimate sovereignty and collective interest of the nation.

Although Chinese scholars have made conclusive remarks towards differences between Chinese and American political culture, empirical researches have scarcely been carried out to verify them. In contrast, American scholars have done a great amount of empirical studies on American political culture on the two spectrums. Egri and Ralston (1994) who studied the generation who grew up “during Communist China's closed-door policy”found that the biggest political culture difference between Chinese and Americans lies on the individual-community spectrum [11]; Lipset(1979),Mc Closky and Zaller (1984) and Feldman and Zaller (1992) pointed out that American’s controversial understanding on social welfare issues mostly lies in the conflicting values of freedom vs. equality and capitalism vs. democracy, which lies on the utilitarianism vs. idealism spectrum[12].

Prominent as they appear, these two spectrums, nonetheless, is not equally prevalent in international issues between Chinese and Americans. With the consideration of both economic and political interests behind the story of the Google case, it would be self-evident that the spectrum of utilitarianism vs. idealism is where the conflicting values lie. Google's choice can be interpreted either as a rational choice because of its low market share in China (a Utilitarianism frame, thereafter "U Frame") or as a symbolized protest because of the violation of its corporate values by complying with Chinese censorship (an Egalitarianism frame, thereafter "E Frame").

2.2.Instantfactors and mechanismsinfluencing the fluctuation of publicopinion

After identifying possible frames in understanding the Google case, our next question goes to through which ways these frames can affect the public opinion. This question requires reviewing the public opinion theories. Since the beginning of 20th century, public polls have gained strong credibility during elections with the application of statistical inference theories. Nevertheless, traditional public poll theories made a hasty assumption that stable collective opinion of the public exists and can be measured by scientific sampling methods. They took public opinion as a concrete entity and assume public polls would draw results both continuously and coherently over time.

This assumption, however, was questioned by latter researchers for its failurein explaining the instant variation and contradiction between public polls over same topics and populations, which were observed from time to time. By pointing out the traditional assumption's lack of consideration over social factors influencing the public opinion, Converse (1964) proposed a radical thinking which argues that the public mass de facto has no preexisting opinion and people hand over poll answers out of mere “polity”. Converse therefore denounced the assumption of traditional public research by exaggerating the instant social psychological effects on public opinion. Intriguing as it is, however, Converse went so far in destructing the basis of public polls that a theory combining traditional views and his criticism is necessary for the validity of public polls.

Hence in 1992, Zaller and Feldman proposed a “simple theory of the survey response” which explains both the instability and the validity of public polls by integrating the traditional public opinion assumptions and instant social factors upon the public. After an experiment of over 1000 respondents over a time span of six months, Zaller and Feldman proposed three axioms about public opinion:

Axiom 1: The ambivalence axiom. Most people possess opposing considerations on most issues, that is, considerations that might lead them to decide the issue either way.

Axiom 2: The response axiom. Individuals answer survey questions by averaging across the considerations that happen to be salient at the moment of response, where saliency is determined by the accessibility axiom.

Axiom 3: The accessibility axiom. The accessibility of any given consideration depends on a stochastic sampling process, where considerations that have been recently thought about are somewhat more likely to be sampled.[13]

With these axioms, Zaller and Feldman proposed that instead of having preexisting attitudes towards certain political issue, public opinion has a preexisting combination of values from which certain attitudes can be drawn upon instant outside stimulus, i.e. "salience". In addition, for the contradictory nature of values (freedom vs. equality for instance), they suggest it be possible that conflicting altitudes would appear from the same population in accordance with salience of opposite values.

Zaller and Feldman’s theory is supported by other researchers, either with individual case studies or with mass statistical analysis. A study on people's psychical process when answering subjective questions undertaken by Tourangeau and Rasinski (1988) indicated that people are more likely to respond with values easier to retrieve in their minds upon asked, thus substantiating the Response Axiom.[14]Another research on people's performance in an in-depth interview undertaken by Dennis Chong (1993) indicated that people tend to answer questions "hastily" when encountering new issues, thus substantiating the Accessibility Axiom.[15]

With our goals of comparing and evaluating people's response to different frames of the Google case, we lay our focus on the instant public opinion variation upon salience, which fits with Zaller and Felman's theory.

Furthermore, with the theory of Zaller and Feldman, we should clarify with what mechanisms the salience can impose effects upon the public opinion. Considering the existing political frames of ulititarianism and egalitarianism in understanding the Google case, we can infer that the most efficient way of influencing the public by saliency is to make one value more accessible than the other, which is called "priming". This effect can be imposed by mass media or social media efficiently for they communicate directly to the public mass.

Cross-sectional and time-series observatory studies between public opinion variations and mass media addresses imply that priming imposed by the media does relate to the directions of the public opinion. To take an example, John Zaller (1994) found that American political elites managed to prime certain frames for the public mass in understanding the Gulf War by appealing to the mass media.[16]Besides of observatory studies, large amounts of experiments also substantiate the effects of priming. Researchers simulate the priming effect by providing different contexts (reading materials with different frames, different pictures with opposite priming directions, etc.) to respondents before asking questions; then it would be possible to estimate the effects and mechanisms of priming. Nelson and Kinder (1996), Nelson, Clawsin and Oxley (1997), Nelson and Oxley (1999) and Jacoby (2000) made a series of intervening experiments on respondents' opinions upon racial discrimination, social welfare system, government spending and foreign affairs in which significant correlations have been found between priming and respondents' opinions.[17]

Apart from priming, another possible mechanism to instantly change public opinion is through make general impression salient. Regarding the Google case, we would notice that individual's impression towards the main actors, namely Chinese government and Google, would be a strong factor influencing his\her opinion. Preceding general impression about a subject would determine the attitudes towards an issue with that subject involved. In a research examining determinants of voters' opinions towards candidates, Lodge and McGraw (1989) argued that people tend to apply an impression-driven processing model in which they resort to the impression of candidates in evaluations. The preexistingimpression might have nothing to do with the issue itself.[18] This finding actually stresses the importance of influences from irrational and emotional factors. We therefore determine that general impression should also be considered as a possible mechanism in the salience of our study.