The Internet has developed rapidly since China was connected in 1994. An important part of China's economic miracle, the Internet has also transformed Chinese politics, culture, and society. Full of contradictions and ambivalence, however, these transformations present many baffling questions: Why and how has the Chinese government attempted to control the Internet? How do Chinese Internet users engage in social activism using digital technologies? What explains the paradox of increasing Internet control and growing digital activism in China?
On October 13, 2010, Xiaobo Lu, Barnard professor of political science, and Guobin Yang, Barnard professor of Asian and Middle Eastern cultures and author of The Power of the Internet in China: Citizen Activism Online, met to discuss these questions in a wide-ranging intellectual conversation between themselves and with the audience.