A succinct note was put out by the Eurasia Group over the recent spat between China and Google. China has renewed the license of Google after the recent standoff of the web site for the Chinese cyber space. Although, Google has agreed with the Chinese government that it will not reroute its users to its Hong Kong web site. Actually, the Hong Kong web site does not come under Chinese censorship norms. Scientists and the techno-savvy population of China had a major role in getting the issue resolved between China and Google.
Well the entire issue started about 6 months back. According to the note from Eurasia Group, China had accused Google for breaking 3 censorship rules. Firstly, Google was accused of tolerating and promoting cyber spying. Secondly, China’s information police had hard time since Google had lifted filters from the web results. Thirdly, Google had upset China since it had had a full contact diplomatic spat with US that was a matter of concern for China.
It was not an easy task for Google to win back its license to operate in Chinese cyber space amidst the situation when US was using Google as a means to beat China. However, Google had three favorable points that made the bargain with China possible.
First, Google is undoubtedly the best search engine. Moreover, for the Chinese companies, Google is more than just a search engine. Google is used by major Chinese companies in important arenas like smart grids. Secondly, Google had a backing of huge number of netizens of China. It should be known that Chinese have a highest number of online population in the entire world. Third but the most important reason that brought back Google in China’s cyber space was that Google had won the loyalty of huge number of Chinese science force including engineers and scientists. The Chinese scientists and engineers are amongst most powerful constituency for the modern China. The science force of China prefers using Google over the Chinese search portal called ‘Baidu’. ‘Baidu’ is actually a Chinese search engine that cannot compete with Google by any means. Google offers superior search option and better search results as compared to Baidu. Moreover, Baidu has limited search capabilities and hence scientists cannot access various technical papers, data, international researches and web sites using Baidu. The Google’s translation tool is incomparable to any search engine like Baidu.
China has always aimed high to achieve technological prowess. Upsetting the scientists, engineers and other people related to science arena meant a lot to China. Therefore, we can always conclude that the science geeks had a big hand in getting the services of Google revived in the country. The issue between China and Google can be a lesson to many international companies that there are good chances to succeed in China even while the state’s political forces are against them. China is much more adaptive than it seems to be. There is a good possibility that the Chinese government will always try to foster a balance among the competing interest groups of the country.
