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China’s experiment in ranking and monitoring citizens has started

foreignpolicy.com

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Re: China’s experiment in ranking and monitoring citizens has started

#111

Post by everdev »

dqpb wrote: post #6

I understand the inclination to do this - I think it's natural to want to live in a meritocracy. But I just can't image this not backfiring. The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

To me, this high level news and the political system in China is terrifying because of the implications that they limit freedom. However, I rarely great about civil unrest in China. Is that because it's hard to get independent journalists to go there? Or, is the economic boom the greater good to most Chinese? Or something else?

Re: China’s experiment in ranking and monitoring citizens has started

#112

Post by dnoeuirc4334nt »

whatshisface wrote: post #95
meri_dian wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I see China envy online a lot, especially given our recent political disfunction as people look at the superficial stability of China and want that for their own societies.

China is emphatically not stable. The PRC was started in 1949. The US civil war ended in 1865. Revolution is a living memory for some in China and that does a great deal to help the population think that suppression at all costs is reasonable. While the US was having its civil war, China was suffering through the tail end of [1]. Historically (in the modern era), China may best be seen as a very violent place. [1] ht…

They said "superficial stability". The point is that it looks nice and stable if you don't look too closely.

Re: China’s experiment in ranking and monitoring citizens has started

#113

Post by jfaucett »

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #19
johnchristopher wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think it's natural to want to live in a meritocracy. That's a bold statement. Who defines the goals ? The one(s) who can attain them ?

Like school! And college! The folks that work there, are the ones that did well there. Not kidding. Its this circular 'meritocracy' argument that makes for insular, inbred organizations with few creative ideas.

> Not kidding. Its this circular 'meritocracy' argument that makes for insular, inbred organizations with few creative ideas.

Just thinking out loud here but what's the alternative? Random allocation of goods/power or random promotion of individuals/companies based on nothing?

At least in a meritocracy advancement of an individual/organization is based on some performance measurement - we can of course argue about different performance measures and sets of tasks - but we have some means of guiding society in a normative way.

Re: China’s experiment in ranking and monitoring citizens has started

#114

Post by defertoreptar »

jimmytidey wrote: post #29

Commentary on China's social credit system so often fails to note the many parallels in western societies. * The West has social credit scoring: money. A key principle of market economies is that accruing money is the just reward for contributing to society. Your bank account is your social credit score - yet we all know that many people get rich without rendering a useful service to society. * Intelligence agencies…

You're missing a glaringly obvious difference. In the west, your credit isn't used by the government to influence your political affiliation so directly.

Re: China’s experiment in ranking and monitoring citizens has started

#115

Post by krapp »

wu-ikkyu wrote: post #102
iovrthoughtthis wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess they meant peace as the opposite of war?

Right. The one who participates in and wins the most wars or murders the most people becomes the superpower.

>Right. The one who participates in and wins the most wars or murders the most people becomes the superpower.

If merely winning the most wars and murdering the most people automatically made one a superpower, then the United States would not have become a superpower, because they did not win the most wars, nor did they murder the most people, at the end of World War 2, when they gained superpower status.

You're trying so hard to be cynical here that you're abandoning rationality. I'm no fan of American military hegemony, or superpowers in general, but you make the US sound like a Mongol Khanate which is just absurd. The world is more complex than "whomever stands on the biggest pile of heads wins."

Re: China’s experiment in ranking and monitoring citizens has started

#116

Post by musage »

niccccccccc wrote: post #37

> The West has social credit scoring: money ??? as opposed to China which has no money?? China's credit system is paired with dictatorship, censorship, disappearance, and killing. Nowhere near the similarities with West Young Chinese activist missing after sharing plan to wear ‘Xitler’ t-shirt in public https://www.hongkongfp.com/2016/11/03/young-chinese-activist...

> His friend, named Gu Yi, who is a student studying abroad in the US, said he received a message from Kwon that said “something [bad] happened” on September 30. Gu has been unable to contact him since. An officer at the Yanji police department confirmed to US-backed Radio Free Asia that Kwon is currently in police custody. Officers at the same police department that answered the phone were unable to confirm Quan’s detention with HKFP.

Hannah Arendt, in "The Origins of Totalitarianism":

> The concentration camps, by making death itself anonymous (making it impossible to find out whether a prisoner is dead or alive), robbed death of its meaning as the end of a fulfilled life. In a sense they took away the individual’s own death, proving that henceforth nothing belonged to him and he belonged to no one. His death merely set a seal on the fact that he had never existed.

Re: China’s experiment in ranking and monitoring citizens has started

#117

Post by krona »

hliyan wrote: post #46
dqpb wrote: post #6

I understand the inclination to do this - I think it's natural to want to live in a meritocracy. But I just can't image this not backfiring. The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

Perhaps that is a good thing. There is no argument more convincing than a demonstration. So I'd rather observe this scheme's first failure in China than elsewhere. The rest of the world can learn a lasting lesson in what not to do. And if it succeeds, then I'd be glad to be wrong.

This experiment has been tried before. The main difference being this Cultural Revolution will be digitized, and the informants will be databases, not your neighbors.

Re: China’s experiment in ranking and monitoring citizens has started

#118

Post by klokoman »

hliyan wrote: post #46
dqpb wrote: post #6

I understand the inclination to do this - I think it's natural to want to live in a meritocracy. But I just can't image this not backfiring. The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

Perhaps that is a good thing. There is no argument more convincing than a demonstration. So I'd rather observe this scheme's first failure in China than elsewhere. The rest of the world can learn a lasting lesson in what not to do. And if it succeeds, then I'd be glad to be wrong.

What if it succeeds for the wrong people?

Re: China’s experiment in ranking and monitoring citizens has started

#120

Post by anontoday0406 »

pyraz wrote: post #28

I think I saw this Black Mirror episode.

I think I experienced it on HN and Reddit ;)

I would add that the difference is that in Black Mirror, it was other people that are giving you up/down-votes. Here, it's the government.

I'm not sure if that makes it better or worse.

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