International security issues lurk in cyberculture
Cyberculture is closely related to international security in the era of globalization. Photo: FILE
The study of cyberculture is usually analyzed from a single cultural perspective, such as campus cyberculture. There are also some studies of cyberculture focusing on the social level, such as online consumption culture. Closely related to people’s daily lives and having very distinct social attributes, cyberculture is also related to security. The problems, contradictions and challenges involved in cyberculture prove that it is not simply a cultural problem.
The security conundrums involved in cyberculture, such as the security of network ideology, cyber terrorism, hacker culture, international competition and cultural security regarding cyberculture products, affect a country’s influence and discourse power in the global cyberspace. While the study of international security needs to focus on military relations among major powers, local regional conflicts, and security disputes between countries in territory and territorial waters, it should also pay attention to non-traditional security issues such as financial crises, environmental deterioration, refugee problems and so on. But in our complex world, areas such as cyberculture that seem to have little to do with senior politics actually conceal many security issues that need to be studied.
Government plays an indispensable role in shaping cyberculture. The national contest in cyberspace reflects a country’s strength of soft power in the space. Therefore, in building cyberculture, it is an important task to improve a country’s cyberspace soft power from the perspectives of information, science and technology, art, institution and morality.
It is also necessary to explore the domestic and international actors in the context of the growing links between cyberculture and international security issues. These actors include the government of a certain country, native non-governmental organizations, native internet users, enterprises, the governments of other countries, international intergovernmental organizations and international internet users. One of the major root causes of the interconnection between cyberculture and the international security situation is that the subjects which participate in shaping cyberculture are increasingly diverse. The cyberspace is fraught with different individuals, groups, organizations and entities, each with different security demands. Governments are concerned about the security orders both home and abroad, and international organizations try to shape security norms, while transnational online social movements may affect the security of public opinion or information security.
In the globalization era, almost all problems have become not that simple. Domestic problems have more and more international foundations, and international problems are mixed with more complex domestic factors. Many of the problems that seem to belong to national politics and native development should actually be explored from an international perspective. Issues that seem to fall within the category of international politics or the international economy can only be expounded by delving into the structures within certain countries. This is especially true with the problems of cyberculture. The so-called wave of cyber-democracy in some countries appears to be the result of domestic political and economic contradictions (such as unemployment and corruption), but there are in fact hidden forces at the international level, which create and fuel waves in the network and contribute to domestic change in those countries. Issues at the international level, such as hacking and cyberterrorism, reflect the problems of nationality, race, religion, political thought, economic structure and national governance within one or several countries.
As China has become an increasingly influential force on the world stage, the popularity of the internet deeply affects the life of its people, its governance and its diplomacy.
The political turmoil in such countries as Egypt and Tunisia is ample evidence of the use of social networking sites by some Western countries to plan and mobilize anti-government movements and trends within the target countries, making these sites important platforms generating hype and influencing global public opinion. There exist cultural and discourse hegemonies as well as soft power gaps between countries in the cyber world. The process in which China cultivates its cyberculture and soft power is the process of catching up with technological frontiers in the wave of internet science and technology revolution, and it is also the process of participating in the construction of global network systems and rules.
The various cyber events in both China and other countries have provided many cases worthy of deep thinking as well as lessons and experiences for the building of cyberculture and software.
WikiLeaks, the Snowden event, the US ban on chip purchases from Chinese smartphone maker ZTE, and the external obstacles faced by Huawei in promoting its 5G technology all reflect the complexity of cyberculture issues, as well as the urgency of cybertechnology and information security issues.
Liu Xinghua is from the Zhou Enlai School of Government at Nankai University.
edited by BAI LE