lecture 10

Question 1

Why do governments censor?

Answer 1

• Info may be dangerous & threaten their survival
• It can hold political actors accountable (why we need free press)
• facilitate coordination and collective action

Question 2

dictators dilemma

Answer 2

trade-off between the benefits and costs of repressing the free flow of information
→ potential backfire, loss of valuable info (who opposes you etc), lack of economic growth

Question 3

Censorship

Answer 3

Restriction of the public expression of or public access to information by authority

Question 4

Restriction

Answer 4

imposing any type of cost on expression or access to information purposefully to decrease the accountability of the authority

Question 5

**The Mechanisms of Censorship

Answer 5

fear
friction
flooding

Question 6

fear

Answer 6

deterring the media and individuals from distributing or consuming info
E.g. legal deterrence, intimidation]
Paradox → because it is visible, it is more likely to backfire and create information-gathering problems.

Question 7

friction

Answer 7

tax on information by directly increasing the costs of distributing and accessing info
E.g. blocking websites
Less observable, less backlash
can be circumvented

Question 8

flooding

Answer 8

Vastly decreases the cost of information to increase the relative cost of competing information, thus creating distractions
E.g. tabloids, Twitter
Even less visible, has indirect effects
highly porous

Question 9

internet censorship in china

Answer 9

aims at maintaining the status quo
more concerned with collective action than with criticism of the government

Question 10

goals of censorship in china?

Answer 10

State Critique Theory: silence dissent

Theory of Collective Action Potential: prevent successful collective action

Question 11

Three Types of Censorship in china

Answer 11

‘The Great Firewall of China:’
Keyword Blocking
Manual Content Filtering

Question 12

‘The Great Firewall of China:’

Answer 12

disallows entire websites and platforms (e.g. Facebook, Twitter)
but Chinese alternatives exist for its citizens (e.g. RenRen, Sina Weibo)

Question 13

Keyword Blocking

Answer 13

stops a user from posting text that contain banned words or phrases
but users can outwit automated programs, e.g. by using ‘homophones’ or ‘homographs’

Question 14

Manual Content Filtering

Answer 14

censors read and remove text that they find objectionable
censoring by hand is not easily evaded
most extensive form of censoring in China

Question 15

Magnitude of censorship in china

Answer 15

13 % of all social media posts are censored

Question 16

Volume Burst

Answer 16

sudden, significant increases in the volume of online content, such as social media posts, articles, or discussions, often triggered by specific events or topics → breaking news, political events, or other

associated with dramatically higher levels of censorship

Question 17

impact of the digital age

Answer 17

With many online users, fear-based censorship becomes more costly and much less credible.

Both friction and flooding become much cheaper

More porous and less visible censorship strategies in the digital age.