[ecrea] CJC CFP: China's Globalizing Internet

*Special Issue of Chinese Journal of Communication*

*_CALL FOR PAPERS_*

*China’s Globalizing Internet: Origins, Trajectories, and Ramifications*

*/Submission deadline: December 31, 2018/*

*Guest Editors: *

Prof. Yu HONG (Ph.D., College of Media and International Culture, 
Zhejiang University, China)

Prof. Eric HARWIT (Ph.D., Asian Studies, University of Hawaii, USA)

*The general aims and scope of this special issue: ***

It is well known that the Chinese state is adept at domesticating the 
Internet as a global medium into the so-called Chinese Internet. While 
acknowledging this Chinese particularity, we see the Chinese Internet 
not so much as a singular space as an ensemble of ownership, policies, 
laws, and interests that intersect with pre-existing global elements 
and, increasingly, with deepening globalizing imperatives. Thus, this 
special issue aims to develop “China’s globalizing Internet” as a 
conceptual/analytical device, to complicate the apparently unambiguous 
historical relationship between China and the Internet, to assess global 
interlinks and their ramifications on China’s cyberspace and 
digitalization, and, just as important, to follow the Internet’s 
ongoing, complex interweaving with the process of Chinese-style 
globalization in the so-called post-American world.

China’s globalizing Internet has raised several conundrums: first, with 
the world’s largest geo-linguistic and national cyberspace, it is 
dominated by corporate players and funded by transnational capital; 
second, although guarded by the Great Firewall and massaged by 
censorship, a multitude of cyber businesses and communities have 
blossomed within a largely decentralized milieu; third, having expanded 
thanks to insatiable domestic demand, Chinese cyber giants are keen to 
explore extra-territorial market spaces, seeking out opportunities from 
the government’s One Belt One Road Initiative; lastly, the state has set 
out to re-regulate the Internet as the network becomes ubiquitous during 
the web-oriented digital transformation of China. Such a state-centric 
Internet governance model, however, is likely to affect China’s 
globalizing Internet in a transnational context, apart from the fact 
that the Chinese state is taking an active interest in global Internet 
governance.

To date, policy and academic communities have narrowly conceptualized 
the Internet as a tool used either by the state or by society, while 
assuming the Chinese Internet to be a “giant cage,” a counterpoint to 
the “free, neutral, and borderless” global Internet. But with the 
expansion of the Chinese Internet beyond the mainland, such an approach 
fails to address the complex processes and dynamics of what we see as 
China’s globalizing Internet. In light of the complexities the Chinese 
Internet manifests, and in view of China’s rising influence over global 
digital development, it is time to re-examine the origins, trajectories, 
andramificationsof the Chinese Internet in relation to the global 
Internet, to account for not only differences between the two but also 
the points of intersection. Ultimately, on what terms, and on whose 
behalf, has China’s globalizing Internet been linked with the political 
economy of the global Internet?

In order to start filling the gap, this special issue aims to map out, 
explain, and theorize China’s globalizing Internet, broadly defined. We 
encourage scholars to delve more deeply into intersecting dynamics of 
China’s globalizing Internet, which include but are not limited to 
states and capital, subnational and transnational processes, interstate 
relations and social formation, master narratives and social 
imaginations. In particular, we welcome history- and theory-informed 
empirical studies that examine the policy, politics, and political 
economy of China’s globalizing Internet and its implications. We also 
welcome theoretical interventions that move beyond the increasingly 
inconsistent either-or, domestic versus global distinction that has 
defined the Chinese Internet research.

Specifically, we invite contributions including but not limited to the 
following questions:

·What roles have subnational and transnational actors played in shaping 
Chinese Internet development?

·To what extent has global hegemonic thinking influenced policy and 
social imagination of the Internet in China?

·How does the Chinese Internet facilitate transnational social 
formation, including but not limited to class formation?

·How does the rise of internationally financed cyber giants alter or 
sustain power relations in China’s state-led digital capitalism? How do 
cyber elites and Internet giants use their influence to push for change, 
and in what direction?

·How does the state contend, collaborate, and overlap with transnational 
and private capital in influencing and controlling cyberspace and 
digitalization?

·Howdo globalizing cyber businesses, such as e-commerce and online 
finance, affect digital practices and social-cultural formation?

·How do different social classes, including peasant and worker 
communities, negotiate the networked everyday life in a transnational 
milieu?

·How do Chinese laws, policies, and governing practices affect or become 
affected by the globalizing Internet?

·How do states and Internet-related companies interact under the 
auspices of building a networked “community of common destiny”?

·What are the geopolitical-economic dynamics of China’s digital 
globalization under the auspices of One Belt One Road?

All manuscripts should be submitted by *December 31, 2018*. All 
submitted manuscripts are subject to rigorous blind peer-review process. 
All accepted manuscripts will be published online first. The planned 
printed publication date is an issue of CJC in 2020. Submissions should 
conform to the editorial guidelines of the Chinese Journal of 
Communication found at http://www.informaworld.com/cjoc under 
“Instructions for Authors.” 


Papers for consideration in this special issue should be submitted 
online http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/rcjc and should indicate they are 
intended for inclusion in the special issue. For inquires, contact Yu 
Hong at (hong1 /at/ zju.edu).cnand Eric Harwit at (harwit /at/ hawaii.edu).


洪宇 Yu Hong <https://yuhong.academia.edu/cv> (PhD, U of Illinois)
Author of Networking China 
<http://www.press.uillinois.edu/books/catalog/78hhc2pr9780252040917.html>
College of Media and International Culture
Zhejiang U <http://person.zju.edu.cn/hong1>, China

Contact:
(hong1 /at/ zju.edu.cn) <mailto:(hong1 /at/ zju.edu.cn)> [my gmail inbox is almost full]

---------------
The COMMLIST
---------------
This mailing list is a free service offered by Nico Carpentier. Please
use it responsibly and wisely.
--
To subscribe or unsubscribe, please visit http://commlist.org/
--
Before sending a posting request, please always read the guidelines at
http://commlist.org/
--
To contact the mailing list manager:
Email: (nico.carpentier /at/ vub.ac.be)
URL: http://nicocarpentier.net
---------------