US Media Support Tech Regulation—Unless It Comes From China
Recently, US media have been aghast at legislation affecting China’s tech sector.
As part of a comprehensive economic initiative, Beijing has instituted a series of regulations—including fines, IPO suspensions, data-collection laws and other measures—for technology businesses that have raised concerns regarding power consolidation, labor rights, privacy, cybersecurity and user safety, among other issues. Offenders include ride-hailing giant Didi, the finance-tech Ant Group and multinational conglomerate Tencent Holdings Ltd.
According to major US news sources, the directives are an instance of government overreach, a transgression of which China is routinely accused. Beijing has sent a “stark message” (New York Times, 7/5/21) with an “authoritarian tinge” (Bloomberg, 7/27/21). Its multi–billion–dollar corporate targets are thus “casualties” of “Beijing’s crackdown on private enterprise” (CNN Business, 9/1/21), from which the government expects “total surrender” (New York Times, 7/19/21).
These reports, curiously, arise as US media and policymakers continue a protracted process of advocating for restrictions on the “Big Four” homegrown tech companies—Google, Facebook, Apple and Amazon—citing many of the categories of malfeasance associated with Chinese tech companies. (Normally, US media aren’t this enthusiastic about corporate regulation; tech companies’ increasingly large share of ad revenues, which renders them a major competitor for traditional corporate-owned outlets, may help explain this stance.)
Yet no matter how much overlap there may be between each country’s regulatory posture, US media maintain a double standard for corporate tech law in the US and China: In the former, it’s in pursuit of democracy; in the latter, of autocracy.
