global voices, one world

Moral Panics and Nationalism

Examining the Factors that Influence College Students’ Attitude towards Human Flesh Search in Mainland China, LU Chen, The Chinese University of Hong Kong
Chinese Cyber-Nationalism: The Case of 2008 Tibet Uprising Discussions on Facebook, Dian PARAMITA, London School of Economics
From nationalism to emerging public sphere: The case of global Olympic torch relay dispute online, FAN Dong, Annenberg School for Communication, USC
Respondent: Hongmei LI, University of Pennsylvania/Georgia State University
Moderator: ANG Peng Hwa, National University of Singapore

Quick history: the Tibet uprising of March 2008 led to a crackdown, then criticism of China, followed by a response by Chinese netizens, such as Anti-CNN. The goal of Paramita’s research is to identify the characteristics of Chinese cyber-nationalism and whether it contains enough “flaming” to impact on political discussion. Yang Guobin’s notion of an online cultural sphere refers to the ability of the Internet to create transnational discussions between Chinese netizens throughout the world, in PRC, HK, Taiwan, Singapore, the diaspora, and non-Chinese parties of interest. Wu describes Chinese cyber-nationalism as non-government sponsored, grassroots, based on modern ideology and reactive (in this case towards Western media). “Flaming” refers to ridiculing those with opposing points of view.

Political expression on platforms such as Facebook has increased and become more important as it facilitates political discussion. Paramita’s sample was the Facebook group Tibet WAS, IS, and ALWAYS WILL BE a part of China – the largest group of its kind. She found that there were posts both supporting, opposed and neutral to the PRC government stance on the group from Chinese and non-Chinese surnamed members. 64.9% were positive arguments contributing to the discussion, but 18.5% were flaming (categories range from “unfriendly” to “insulting” and “confrontational” and “aggressive”). The lesser were categorized as “uncivil”, which was 12.5% of total posts, leaving 6% as “impolite” or more severe categories.

Paramita concludes the term “flaming” needs to be deconstructed, since it doesn’t necessary harm the overall debate, and that the discussion was overall productive and civil.