This book considers the interplay between the affordances of technologies, the experiences and processes of technological systems, and the process of learning and adaptation by state actors as part of governance reform in China. It offers detailed studies of specific projects and applications that are automated or quasi-automated in organising and governing social, economic, and cultural lives in the world’s largest techno-authoritarian regime. Written by scholars from six countries across four continents, case studies illustrate new modes of digital governance employed by the Chinese government, as it interacts and collaborates with technology companies, ordinary citizens, and other key stakeholders. They offer new insights on the deployment of automated decision-making in authoritarian governance, and on its application and implementation in real-life scenarios. In a broader sense, the book contributes to global debates about the integration of decision-making technologies in governmental practices.
Automating Governance in China?' offers new insights on the deployment of automated decision-making in authoritarian governance and on its application and implementation in real-life scenarios.
1. Automating Governance and Data-Driven Scoring in China: A Critical
Introduction - Haiqing Yu and Rogier Creemers;
2. Locating and Localising Automated Decision-Making Failures in China - Xin
Dai;
3. A Democratic Ethos? Explorations of Blockchains and Governance in China -
Warwick Powell;
4. Techno-Utopia or Techno-Trap? Unveiling the Enigma of Smart Courts in
China's Judicial Reform - Fan Yang;
5. Balancing Control and Engagement: China's Sociotechnical Imaginary in
Facial Recognition Technology - Xin Gu, Gavin Smith, Neil Selwyn, Mark
Andrejevic, and Chris ONeil;
6. The Social Credit System as a Law-Enforcing Tool: Pillars of Local
Implementations - Haemin Jee;
7. Scientific Fairness: Experimentation and Critique of Points Systems in
Shenzhen - Anne-Christine Trémon;
8. Queer Social Sorting: Control and Criminalization in Chinas LGBTQ+
Activism - Ausma Bernot;
9. Regulating Price Discrimination on Chinese Digital Platforms - Haiqing Yu
and Xuanzi Xu;
10. The Algorithmic Divide in China and an Emerging Comparative Research
Agenda - Peter Yu
Haiqing Yu is a Professor of Media and Communication and an Australian Research Council Future Fellow at RMIT University, Australia. She is a critical media studies scholar with expertise on Chinese digital media, technologies and cultures, with a focus on their sociopolitical impacts in China, Australia and the Asia Pacific. " Rogier Creemers is an Associate Professor in the Law and Governance of China at Leiden University. His research investigates Chinas domestic technology policies, as well as Chinas participation in global cyber affairs. He is a founding member of DigiChina, a project run in cooperation with New America, as well as a frequent contributor to international news media. "
