Cultivating Compliance: E-Government and Behaviour Control in a Chinese Municipality

This article examines a novel e-government platform in a Chinese city to understand how local authorities address the dual challenge of monitoring their subordinates and enforcing “civilised” behaviour among the population. As traditional campaign-style policy enforcement often yields only temporary compliance, this city's platform co-opts citizens into a system of mutual surveillance where they monitor both officials and each other. Drawing on interviews and platform data analysis, the study illustrates how this tool, run by the Propaganda Department, functions as a mechanism through which citizens engage in self-regulation aligned with state objectives. It uses citizen-generated content for propaganda, employs public shaming to enforce norms, and incentivises participation to align public behaviour with state objectives. The findings demonstrate how authoritarian regimes can leverage digital platforms to create a technologically mediated form of social disciplining, transforming citizens into both agents and subjects of governance and reinforcing state control through controlled participation.