links for 2008-02-10

• Global Voices Online » China: Netizen Party announced
  John Kennedy brings us the details about a new political party for Chinese netizens...
  (tags: china chineseinternetresearch internet politics cnp cnwebwatch gfw censorship freespeech)
• Meta: No Sharism, No Democracy 2.0
  Isaac Mao writes: "There are still silent majority in our world( even in those so-called democratic countries) to eclipse the value of democracy."
  (tags: china internet democracy cnp chineseinternetresearch sharism ideas)
• Global Voices Online » Hong Kong: From Sex to Police Scandal
  Oiwan Lam discusses the free speech implications of Hong Kong's internet sex photo scandal.
  (tags: hongkong freespeech porn privacy internet censorship)
• Interlocals.net | Hong Kong: The Big Brother is Watching You!
  Oiwan Lam discusses how Hong Kong police have abused power in the Edison Chen sex photo scandal, and is concerned about the precedent this incident sets.
  (tags: hongkong porn privacy freespeech censorship)
• EastSouthWestNorth: Sexy Photos Gate - a chronology
  Roland Soong has naturally been hot on the case of the Edison Chen sex photos scandal and all its twists, turns, concerns and implications. He has put together a chronological archive of his posts on the issue since it began.
  (tags: hongkong porn privacy internet freespeech)
• Behind the Great Firewall | Technology | The Guardian
  "210 million Chinese have web access and any day now China will have more users than the US. But instead of spreading freedom, the net has been tamed by Beijing's iron grip"
  (tags: gfw cnwebwatch chineseinternetresearch china internet censorship freespeech)
• James Fallows: “The Connection Has Been Reset”
  "China’s Great Firewall is crude, slapdash, and surprisingly easy to breach. Here’s why it’s so effective anyway."
  (tags: china gfw internet chineseinternetresearch censorship freespeech)

Comments

[mahathir_fan]

Nice effort. Good luck to this party.

But as always, it does not matter how democratic China becomes. China can have many many political parties. China is already having regular elections every 5 years. But as long as the Communist Party continues to enjoy popular support and win these elections, the West will refuse to call China a Democracy.

It is like in Singapore. The ruling party wins every election, but they don't call Singapore a democracy despite they having elections and enjoying popular support, instead they give it some junkie other name like "Authoritarian". Or in Iran where they have so many candidates and a very competitive electorate, at the end of the day, they still don't call Iran a democracy but some other name - a "theocracy".

When they finally have to admit China is a democracy, they will invent some other name to give to describe China's political system instead of just calling it a democracy because they will refuse to admit it, because only they can be called Democracy.