ORGANISATION:
The Law & Technology Centre of The University of Hong Kong
The Law & Technology Centre is a joint Centre of the Department of Computer Science and the Faculty of Law at The University of Hong Kong. The Centre’s mission is to provide public service in the interdisciplinary area of information technology and law, and to advance research in the relationships between information technology and law.
PROJECT:
Blogging in China
Blogging in China studies and analyzes blog posts written by judges, lawyers and the NGO community in China. This will allow for a better understanding of whose voices are heard, what is being discussed and how they are being channelled. In the context of mainland China, it also enables us to investigate what is being suppressed and allowed.
- The study examines more than 1,000 posts written by 42 judges, and more than 2,000 posts written by 14 lawyers during the period 2007-2008.
- Judges and lawyers have been fighting hard as advocates for legal and social reform.
- Despite the apparent tight control of censorship, the Internet has provided a comparatively free platform for citizens to express themselves in alternative voices in a cat-and-mouse game with the authorities.