James Griffiths is a producer for CNN International in Hong Kong and author of The Great Firewall of China: How to Build and Control an Alternative Version of the Internet (2019), which explores how China developed the world’s most sophisticated online censorship system and was released in Chinese on June 4 (游擊文化). He was previously an editor at the South China Morning Post, and his work has been featured in The Atlantic and the Daily Beast. What follows is a lightly edited Q&A.
James Griffiths
Illustration by Lauren Crow
China's internet is heavily censored in terms of access to taboo topics like the Tiananmen Square Massacre, but you argue in your book that what most people overlook is how China’s “Great Firewall” is more about preventing solidarity and organization. Can you explain why that distinction matters so much?
A lot of the conversation around internet censorship gets lost in the weeds of talking about individual pieces of content. That mi
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