There is much talk at the moment of Google’s move to stop its self-censorship of its China-based service. In the light of that move and the ongoing discussion of internet censorship by the Chinese government, fearful that its citizens will either find out things that they don’t want them to know, or read what “the West” really thinks of them, I’m curious to know if the law, too, is  “filtered” in the PRC.

I have no idea to what extent, if at all, Chinese lawyers, legal academics and law students use commercial services like Lexis and Westlaw, but there are a host of free Web-based sites that provide full text access to the law that could, presumably, be accessed via any Chinese citizen. I spent a few minutes running some simple searches in Canlii, Bailii and Austlii and found that the case law on the Web is replete with reference to subjects that, so we are told, are verboten to the Chinese cyber surfer. Try searching for “Falung Gong”, “Tibet”, “Tiananman Square” or “Uigur”, for example. All of these searches find cases from the courts and tribunals of several Western countries (at levels from first instance to final appellate). Many of them are related to consideration of requests for refugee status based on the activities of the applicant and their likely treatment if returned to China. As is the case in decisions of common law countries, background information is usually provided (the sorts of details that would presumably be suppressed in China) and, in discussing the merits of the applications criticism of PRC policies is either explicit or implicit.

I mentioned Lexis and Westlaw. As any user of these services knows they provide far more than just legal information, although the legal journal literature alone that is available through those databases would contain a vast number of words on topics of concern to the PRC authorities. But Lexis and Westlaw also provide access to the full text of an array of newspapers and magazines. It’s been a while since I looked at Nexis, but, just as one example, the New York Times used to be there. One wonders, too, about all the students in China taking correspondence courses from foreign countries, with, in many cases, access to online libraries. Are these blocked? And, heck, how many tens, or is it hundreds of thousands, of Chinese students study overseas, access the internet with no fear of censorship, read forbidden topics, and send emails home? These students are the future of their country. They’re highly intelligent. Do they just forget what they’ve learned when they go back? Of course they don’t. As I’ve been writing this over my morning coffee, one image keeps recurring to me: the little Dutch boy with his finger in the dyke. Unlike little Hansie though, the Chinese authorities have been too late sticking their fingers in; the flood is simply too big.