In the past decade, China has emerged as a high-tech and cyber power with immense potential to reshape cyber governance regionally and globally. Hosting the world’s largest internet user community and comprising the second-largest digital economy, China has increasingly sought leadership in reshaping the global cyber governance regime. In this light, scholars and policy analysts have debated the extent of China’s newfound emergence as a norm entrepreneur in global cyber governance and the nature of its attempts to diffuse its norms and approaches to cyber governance in the international arena.
In our research paper ‘Norm diffusion in cyber governance: China as an emerging norm entrepreneur?’ (forthcoming in International Affairs), we argue that, given the elastic and evolving nature of China’s norms in the sphere of cyber governance, the substance of Beijing’s vision and approach to global cyber governance can be better understood as a constellation of problems, values, and appropriate behaviours. Specifically, close scrutiny of China’s official discourses reveals a tendency to emphasize at least two major problems concerning global cyber governance. First, China has identified and acknowledged an expanding range of security concerns derived from the rapid development of Information and Communications Technology and the increasing interconnectedness between the physical and cyberspace. Second, China has increasingly highlighted that problems with the internet such as unbalanced development, unsound regulation, and unreasonable order are becoming more prominent, with ‘cyber-hegemonism’ posing a new threat to world peace and development. This demonstrates Beijing’s growing discontent with the current framework and global cyber-governance rules. To overcome these problems, China has sought to promote three core values—cyber sovereignty, multilateralism and balance between security and development. These core values have laid the foundation for China’s normative underpinnings, behaviours, and policies in the sphere of cyber governance. It is particularly interesting to observe that, over the past few years, Beijing has toned down its rhetoric on the norms of cyber sovereignty, while highlighting the importance of striking a balance between security and development in cyber governance. Framing its commitments to cyber security from a developmental perspective can be regarded as China’s effort to push back against the growing trend of securitization of China’s cyber governance in the West, especially against the backdrop of the US–China tech war. Nevertheless, in international organizations, China faces a more diverse audience that does not share similar or common cyber-governance values and regulations. The developmental frame has enabled China to resonate with a broader audience from the international community. In particular, international organisations have tended to emphasize the synergies between the Digital Silk Road (DSR) and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Partly as a result of China’s efforts to connect these, the United Nations Department of Economics and Social Affairs is implementing a multi-country project to strengthen national capacities for jointly building the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) towards the SDGs.
China has also utilized a dynamic combination of socialization and positive incentive strategies to externalize its cyber norms. Specifically, China often utilizes socialization actions within regional organisations as the initial stage of its attempts to disseminate its cyber norms internationally. This is because regional organisations, which are usually characterised as having a limited number of participants sharing similar norms and values, are likely to generate support for an emerging norm. As a result, regional organisations’ member states often adopt a unified stance on norms, consequently increasing the likelihood of norm acceptance at the international level. China’s implementation of this strategy has achieved certain successes. Within these regional organisations, given the high level of convergence of cyber norms aligning with China’s preferred norms, China has unsurprisingly leveraged its socialization actions as the initial step in disseminating its cyber norms globally. One notable example is the SCO’s defence of state sovereignty in cyberspace at the international level. In 2011, China and Russia, with the other SCO member states, jointly submitted a first draft of an ‘International code of conduct for information security’ to the UN, emphasizing the respect of sovereignty in cyberspace, which most Western states subsequently rejected. Despite this initial failure, an updated version was submitted to the UN in 2015, stressing the importance of internet sovereignty. In addition, the creation of new bilateral and multilateral institutions and initiatives forms part of China’s wider socialisation strategy. A critical example is the World Internet Conference (WIC), held in Wuzhen, China, since 2014, as a major platform for China to promote its cyber governance vision.
China’s socialisation actions are often intertwined with positive incentive mechanisms, especially when Beijing promotes its cyber norms vis-à-vis likeminded actors. Specifically, these mechanisms can be divided into the following two main categories: providing financial support and digital infrastructure and facilitating information exchange and collaborative actions. For example, the Digital Silk Road (DSR) project can be regarded as a critical component of China’s positive incentive mechanisms. Under the DSR umbrella, China is seeking to strengthen its discursive power and to expand its cyber norms and regulations by providing physical infrastructure, including 5G technology, fibre-optic cables that transmit data and data centres that store data, in the digital sphere. China is engaged in digital infrastructure projects in approximately 80 countries and has invested $79 billion in DSR projects globally, setting the stage for it to further its own standards in these countries.
China’s positive incentives also occur in the form of exchanging information, providing technical assistance and undertaking joint actions. For example, one critical area of SCO cooperation encompasses exchanging experience, training of specialists, holding working meetings, conferences, seminars and other forums. The Regional Anti-Terrorist Structure (RATS)—the SCO’s operational unit formed to promote the cooperation of member states—is China’s major channel for mobilizing socialization by sharing information and through joint action. Beijing also proactively promotes information exchange by signing memorandums of understanding with DSR countries, calling for the mutual recognition of standards.
As a result, a more nuanced investigation and a deeper understanding of the diverse nature of China’s cyber-governance norms and behaviours among policymakers and policy analysts could facilitate a better comprehension of the rationale and normative considerations that underpin Beijing’s rapidly developing policy formation and external strategies in the realm of cyber governance.
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This article gives the views of the author, and not the position of the China Foresight Forum, LSE IDEAS, nor The London School of Economics and Political Science.
The cover image “Computer Codes” by Pixabay is licensed under the CC0 licence.
