Descripción del proyecto
Ambiciones de China en materia de internet
La Ruta de la Seda Digital forma parte de la iniciativa china del Cinturón y la Ruta (BRI, por sus siglas en inglés) que se centra específicamente en inversiones en tecnologías digitales, comercio electrónico e infraestructuras en países situados a lo largo de una Ruta de la Seda (la antigua ruta comercial que conectaba China con Europa) reinventada con bastante flexibilidad. Se considera que este programa tiene potencial para crear un internet liderado por China, caracterizado por el control estatal y las fronteras y la gobernanza nacionales de lo que empezó siendo un nuevo espacio sin fronteras y que ahora está dominado en gran medida por las fuerzas del mercado. El proyecto financiado con fondos europeos DIGISILK cartografiará la Ruta de la Seda Digital en China, Kazajistán, Camboya y Myanmar/Birmania, con el fin de comprender los valores y la política vinculados a este segundo internet de nueva aparición, de forma que contribuirá a un debate más amplio sobre valores, ética y tecnología.
Objetivo
As part of its Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), China has recently launched the “Digital Silk Road” program, focused on investments in digital technologies and infrastructure in countries that are part of its loosely reimagined Silk Road. This program is seen as having the potential to create a second, China-led internet, which splits from the US-centered one and is ruled by a different set of priorities and values. Are the Digital Silk Road and the global expansion of Chinese tech companies prefiguring a future with two internets: an existing one that is US-led and founded on market-driven ideology, and a new, alternative one that is China-led and characterized by state control, national boundaries, and national governance over what began as a borderless new space? What values and politics are built into the various components of the Digital Silk Road, and is - or how is - the internet they are creating fundamentally different from the current one?
The project will employ qualitative and ethnographic methods, digital methods, and document analysis to understand the emergence of the Digital Silk Road from the ground-up and from the comparative perspective of business, governments, and ordinary people in four countries: China, where Digital Silk Road policies, finances, devices, online platforms and apps originate; Kazakhstan, a key player in Central Asia; Myanmar, whose economic dependence on China is the cause of considerable ambivalence; and Cambodia, that under Prime Minister Hun Sen has been one of the most enthusiastic supporters of Chinese investments.
The project aims at illuminating the deployment of the Digital Silk Road to see what this second internet might consist of; seeks to understand what values and politics are embedded in it; and explores how they are received and negotiated in the countries concerned, thus contributing to the wider debate on values, ethics, and technology.
Ámbito científico
Palabras clave
Programa(s)
Régimen de financiación
ERC-STG - Starting GrantInstitución de acogida
WC2R 2LS London
Reino Unido