How to think about cyber sovereignty: the case of China

Abstract

The cybersphere constitutes a global disagreement space where the contested, ongoing ties that link states and the internet come into being. In this paper, a critique of sovereignty and political economy is offered to evaluate contemporary controversies concerning authority, independence, regulation, and access to communications as matters of relationality, materiality, and disagreement. We review China’s promotion of cyber sovereignty as a complicating episode that reflects the development stresses of the sphere. China wishes to establish guardrails for the practices of multipolar global digital capitalism; yet, it has ushered in a variety of internet-related global issues, including in security, privacy, material well-being, developmental justice, and planetary futures. These complex aims invite and expand the dialectical spaces animating the cybersphere.

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