Censorship or Protectionism? Reassessing China’s Regulation of Internet Industry

The Chinese government has blocked domestic access to worldwide influential websites such as Google, YouTube, Twitter, and Facebook to different extent for the reason of speech censorship in terms of national security, but the vacancy left by these foreign websites was well fulfilled with China’s indigenous ones, including Baidu, Youku, Sina Weibo, and Renren which provide similar services to their foreign counterparts respectively. The interaction among the Chinese government, those foreign websites, and their Chinese equivalents is reviewed in the current research through critical analysis of political and economic records regarding the development of China’s Internet industry. In the conclusion of this research, economic protectionism is proposed as a complementary or alternative way to interpret the regulatory implications of China’s Internet governance.