Will the real Weibo please stand up? Chinese online contention and actor-network theory

Abstract

Social media platforms have become key participants in Chinese political contention. Global media eagerly report on cases involving social media, often celebrating them as signs of political change. This article analyzes the involvement of Sina Weibo in two instances of political contention: one concerns the Huili picture scandal of June 2011, and the other a controversy around the popular rally racer and novelist Han Han that started in December 2011. Drawing inspiration from actor-network theory (ANT), we show how Sina Weibo's particular technological features, the related user cultures, and the platform's systematic self-censorship practices, in addition to the occasional government interventions, mutually articulate each other. By tracing how technological features and emerging practices become entangled, we gain insight into how new publics are constituted and how symbolic reconfigurations unfold.

Keywords::

• Internet
• China
• political contention
• actor-network theory
• Weibo

Notes

^1. Tianya Forum. (2011, June 26). Huili officials checking a newly-built road [Picture]. Retrieved from http://www.weibo.com/1650297492/eCR9q9Nj2Zq. Archived at http://www.jeroendekloet.nl/images-cjoc/.

^2. Dad Soysauce_Elder Bai (jiangyoubaba baizhanglao). (2011, June 27). A leadership on a space mission [Picture]. Retrieved from: http://www.weibo.com/1663619212/eCTuUxK5qQt. Archived at http://www.jeroendekloet.nl/images-cjoc/.

^3. Example of a text-as-image add on Weibo. Zuo, Z. 2012, January 31. Screenshot of text posted on Weibo in relation to the Han Han controversy [Screenshot]. Retrieved from: http://www.weibo.com/1649259794/y3nfcnLSi. Archived at http://www.jeroendekloet.nl/images-cjoc/.

^4. Chen, Z. (2011, June 27). The Huili leaders with Guo Meimei. Retrieved from: http://www.weibo.com/1684409631/eCTyEuXgLUa. Archived at http://www.jeroendekloet.nl/images-cjoc/.

^5.http://www.weibo.com/2203793661/eCUjWSnyuzR.

^6.http://e.weibo.com/1650297492/eCR9q9Nj2Zq.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Thomas Poell

Thomas Poell is Assistant Professor of New Media and Digital Culture at the Department of Media Studies (Faculty of Humanities) at the University of Amsterdam. His research focuses on social media and political contention. He has published on various topics: social media as platforms of alternative journalism (Journalism), Twitter as a multilingual space (Necsus), and Android and the political economy of the mobile Internet (First Monday). http://home.medewerker.uva.nl/t.poell

Jeroen de Kloet

Jeroen de Kloet is Professor of Globalisation Studies at the Faculty of Humanities of the University of Amsterdam and Director of the Amsterdam Centre for Globalisation Studies (ACGS). His work focuses on cultural globalization, particularly in the context of China. His recent books are China with a Cut: Globalisation, Urban Youth and Popular Music (Amsterdam UP, 2010) and, with Yiu Fai Chow, Sonic Multiplicities: Hong Kong Pop and the Global Circulation of Sound and Image (Intellect, 2013). http://jeroendekloet.nl/

Guohua Zeng

GuohuaZeng received his PhD from the Department of Media Studies, University of Amsterdam in 2013. Before that, he received his BA and MA in Cultural Anthropology from Sun Yat-sen University in China. His doctoral dissertation focuses on how a new version of “Chineseness” was articulated during the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games and how this concept was circulated and received by local, regional, and global media. His research interests include mega-sporting events, night-time economy, new media, and China.