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China’s new ‘social credit system’

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Re: China’s new ‘social credit system’

#21

Post by maxheadroom »

fuzzbuzz wrote: post #13
bsaul wrote: post #10

The only positive side is that china’s regime is comiting suicide with this system. Seems like nothing was learned from communist russia. Intellectuals will flee, then top scientists, nobody will trade with them anymore, political opponents will be sent to camp, until finally it will all collapse under economical meltdown. My only concern is that civilians don’t pay a too high price in the process.

Norway has just landed some major deals for exporting fish to China. And nor the goverment or the majority of the population seem to bother what China is doing. Money talks, while human rights are censored.

>And nor the goverment or the majority of the population seem to bother what China is doing.

I think this has a lot to do with the, "It doesn't effect me, so its not my problem," mentality that is still pretty prevalent in the globalised world.

As the lyric goes, "Credulous, at best, your desire to believe in angels in the hearts of men."

Re: China’s new ‘social credit system’

#22

Post by brighttank »

lelima wrote: post #2

Does anyone have visit China and presence the social system in first person? I've heard that some people like it (Chinese co-workers), as they feel everyone acting better, but they don't live in China at the moment.

I've been living in Beijing for over ten years. So far I haven't heard anyone complain about it.

I know it's hard for Westerners to understand but most middle class Chinese are likely to see it as a good thing. The whole time I've been here I've read a constant stream of stories about fake food, fake medicine, fake milk-powder (which killed many babies), fake products, all types of fraud, etc. Add that to the general anti-social behaviors (such as spitting in the street) and you can see why many people recognize the need to "improve peoples' behavior" as Orwellian as that might sound to Western ears.

Middle-class urban Chinese also distinguish themselves from rural Chinese which they see as kind-of backwards. That's why there's little appetite for democracy ... nobody thinks those people should be voting.

Re: China’s new ‘social credit system’

#24

Post by raducu »

bsaul wrote: post #10

The only positive side is that china’s regime is comiting suicide with this system. Seems like nothing was learned from communist russia. Intellectuals will flee, then top scientists, nobody will trade with them anymore, political opponents will be sent to camp, until finally it will all collapse under economical meltdown. My only concern is that civilians don’t pay a too high price in the process.

Sorry, but you give people too much credit. The situation is in fact reversed -- people will only flee from an economic meltdown, until that happens people won't flee.

Re: China’s new ‘social credit system’

#25

Post by raxxorrax »

fuzzbuzz wrote: post #13
bsaul wrote: post #10

The only positive side is that china’s regime is comiting suicide with this system. Seems like nothing was learned from communist russia. Intellectuals will flee, then top scientists, nobody will trade with them anymore, political opponents will be sent to camp, until finally it will all collapse under economical meltdown. My only concern is that civilians don’t pay a too high price in the process.

Norway has just landed some major deals for exporting fish to China. And nor the goverment or the majority of the population seem to bother what China is doing. Money talks, while human rights are censored.

Only if your economic outlook is vastly positive people accept this form of control and see it as a necessity. There is indeed a danger that people start passively accepting the surveillance, even if the outlook turns in a worse direction.

edit: It also helps that the majority is still lacking education and surveillance is a very real but abstract danger.

Re: China’s new ‘social credit system’

#26

Post by yorwba »

lelima wrote: post #2

Does anyone have visit China and presence the social system in first person? I've heard that some people like it (Chinese co-workers), as they feel everyone acting better, but they don't live in China at the moment.

Which specific system were your coworkers talking about? One of those run by private financial companies like Alipay or WeChat pay? One of the small-scale experiments run by various municipalities? The country-wide blacklist of people who did not comply with a court order to pay their debts? Something else?

"The" social credit system looks very different from the monolithic apparatus of totalitarian control that people imagine it to be, so many different views can be simultaneously true.

Re: China’s new ‘social credit system’

#27

Post by Consultant32452 »

bsaul wrote: post #14
fuzzbuzz wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Norway has just landed some major deals for exporting fish to China. And nor the goverment or the majority of the population seem to bother what China is doing. Money talks, while human rights are censored.

I don’t think the general public is aware on what’s going on in china in details. They think it’s still pretty ok. But the direction the country is taking is pretty clear, and we soon should hear about nightmarish events more and more. Once one major western country starts taking a public stance and back it up with actions, the others will follow.

The US has just barely started to make some noises with this mini trade war, which I believe will result in some tariffs remaining in place encouraging some of our manufacturing to move from China to central America.

Re: China’s new ‘social credit system’

#28

Post by raxxorrax »

bsaul wrote: post #14
fuzzbuzz wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Norway has just landed some major deals for exporting fish to China. And nor the goverment or the majority of the population seem to bother what China is doing. Money talks, while human rights are censored.

I don’t think the general public is aware on what’s going on in china in details. They think it’s still pretty ok. But the direction the country is taking is pretty clear, and we soon should hear about nightmarish events more and more. Once one major western country starts taking a public stance and back it up with actions, the others will follow.

> the others will follow

Sadly, that is only true for countries that have a president like Trump. A populist, strong-arm type of politician wouldn't be my first choice but my government in Germany would have folded already. They proposed that people need to use their real names on the internet just a few days ago. Yes, it is that bad and yes, they are old and frightened.

Re: China’s new ‘social credit system’

#29

Post by adinobro »

China currently doesn't have a "credit score" like most of the rest of the world. They also don't have a national police database so this is their attempt to do both at once. If you look at the information these two things seem to make roughly 90% off your score.

Everything else is basically an experiment. Each district is doing it differently to find out what works the best and that will then be merged into what the country does. (The scientific process ... using data to inform policy)

I visited Guangzhou in 2018 and was expecting it to be crazy since it has "the worst levels of noise pollution in the world" https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/mar/08/where-world-n... but it was almost crazy how quiet the city was. After the report come out they went around the whole city putting in traffic lights and fixing up all the intersections. There is still traffic but it is now more organised than any Chinese city I have been to. I ask the locals about it and they love the cameras, the order and the reduction in noise pollution. They freely admit that without the cameras most of the other Chinese people would just not obey the road rules so they are glad that the cameras are there.

I image "social credit" will be similar. Lots of people here just don't pay bills because there is no credit history and there are no debt collectors (well not like in the west anyway). If you owe money to the wrong people then it is better to just disappear but for most companies, they have no power and they cannot do anything.

Re: China’s new ‘social credit system’

#30

Post by gerbilly »

johnchristopher wrote: post #8
Gys wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess they do not realise what is coming? > '...one of the ways that people can improve their own social credit score is to report on the supposed misdeeds of others.'

Now, that's Orwellian. As described in the book. It's not the cameras, the government agents in the shadows or the spying technology... It's the end result of everyone spying on each other that made the world of 1984 so inescapable to Winston.

You don't have to go to a book of fiction to get an example.

Some Chinese are still old enough to remember the Cultural revolution.

During this time people were interrogated for days by their peers in so called 'struggle meetings' in an attempt to change their supposed incorrect behaviour.

Reporting someone as a bourgeois person could cause them to disappear.

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