Can China make its mark in cyberspace?
Preparations for the ninth BRICS summit to be held at Xiamen from September 3 to 5 this year were launched in late February with the first BRICS Sherpas meeting in Nanjing to kick- start consensus- building in several specific areas, while enhancing cooperation in security, development and people- to- people exchange through sports and cultural activities. Over 100 delegates, including bankers, experts and diplomats, attended the opening ceremony where State Councilor Yang Jiechi emphasized BRICS’ endurance in evolving from an investment term once coined by Jim O’Neil of Goldman Sachs to emerging as a shining example of cross- continental cooperation among the world’s major emerging economies.
For the Xiamen summit, Yang outlined four priority areas: shifting from being participants to becoming trend setters in global governance, further enhancing financial integration and infrastructure connectivity, boosting cultural cooperation among diverse and physically distant societies, and building as well as harmonizing newer mechanisms for political, economic and cultural partnerships.
Sherpas will now work overtime to build consensus on dozens of areas within these four defined priorities. However, China can make its mark in 2017 on one of the issues – promoting the concept of “cyber sovereignty,” on which a white paper was released in Beijing in early March.
Cyberspace has exploded upon us as a vast new area, accelerating both the magnitude and the pace of synergies and discords in our lives. This technology infused shrinkage in time and space presents the most formidable challenges in making guidelines for global governance and mechanisms to harness opportunities to mitigate conflicts and ensure peaceful development. A cyber security working group within BRICS is expected to meet and discuss challenges of cyberspace governance.
China has been working on its own to convince international organizations including the UN to adopt the principle of “cyber sovereignty” and allow each state to govern their Internet without interference from foreign players. Just as the sovereignty of state was extended from land to territorial waters and then to air, it now seeks an extension into cyberspace which is increasingly being used by denizens to communicate with each other and also as a tool in various state and non- state agencies including e- banking, e- commerce, e- governance or booking hotels, travel and etc.
But, the same cyberspace is vulnerable to cyber attacks, cyber espionage, surveillance and has become a dangerous tool for hate crimes and terrorism, making knee- jerk national reactions harsh and yet ineffective. Meanwhile, polemical debates are being held on citizens’ needs for security and privacy.
Though cyberspace has made international organizations and multinationals increasingly powerful in shaping global trends, their influence is shrinking against increasingly assertive citizenry. This sudden infusion of technology has made people far too restive and international organizations are returning to nation- state to legislate and implement newer global governance practices enforceable through national sovereignty.
Countries like China and India, with the world’s highest number of Internet users, have little control in auditing global giants like Google, Facebook, Twitter or Amazon etc. While China has successfully promoted its own versions like Baidu and Sina Weibo, the Indian IT companies, on the other hand, remain deeply intertwined and dependent on Western markets and foreign direct investments. Indeed, various Chinese firms today are mostly funding e- commerce platforms in India’s attempt to shift to a cashless economy.
However, the search for solutions is not going to be easy. Unlike land and air, cyberspace is difficult to manage within national territories as cyber crimes are often inflicted by lonewolves from across the globe. Second, West- dominated cyberspace provides countries like the US seamless global access and reach, making it difficult to address issues of political and cultural sensitivities in non- Western societies.
Can effective mechanism be created without involving parties outside of BRICS? With Donald Trump as the US president, Brexit and internal turmoil in South Africa and Brazil, Beijing’s coordination with Moscow and New Delhi can become tricky especially as the latter of these two will also be seeking give- and- take on certain issues.