University of Groningen
Engaging in politics
Sun, Yu
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Publication date:
2018
Link to publication in University of Groningen/UMCG research database
Citation for published version (APA):
Sun, Y. (2018). Engaging in politics: Everyday political talk in online China. University of Groningen.
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Propositions
1. Unlike the Western public sphere, the public realm in Chinese society is not composed of autonomous communicative structures.
2. Being part of the state-led program of modernization, the notions of civil society and the public sphere are translated from the West but have not been sufficiently grounded in the local political and cultural context of China.
3. The current Chinese public sphere has a state and elitist nature, promoting the liberal-civil ideals selectively adopted in the state’s modernization project. It does not guarantee non-elites and marginalized individuals entry into it.
4. The everyday sphere, as an alternative to the elitist public sphere, connects citizens to public life, functioning as an agent of social change. 5. The personal is the political. Everyday online political talk serves as an
effective way to bridge the private and the public.
6. Government-run political online forum offers citizens a constrained space to talk about everyday life issues. Under soft control from the state, citizens are not encouraged to practice authentic deliberation but they develop other civic forms of communication in political talk to express their political wills.
7. Everyday online spaces are more open and inclusive than explicitly political spaces. They provide ordinary citizens with better chances to empower themselves because they enable the transformation of the taken-for-granted everyday life details into discursive power.
8. Drawing upon the Chinese philosopher Laozi’s idea of “无为而治”
which means to govern by doing nothing that is against nature, the government should learn to govern by giving people the chance of self-governance.
