Assess how access to technologies have impacted the rate and direction of change in

China

Access to technology in China has impacted the rate and direction of change in a biased way
as those in power, such as the CCP, control the population’s access to technologies to allow
for the faster adoption of changes that benefit them whilst also restricting civilian access to
technologies in some situations to slow down or prevent changes that harm them and their
authority.

China underwent a massive transformation in the 20th century as it made a rapid shift from the
traditionally agrarian Qing dynasty that fell in 1912, to the communist People’s Republic of
China (PRC), with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) as its single leading party. Following
this major societal and political change, China underwent modernisation as increased
globalisation meant more knowledge and technologies were adopted from the rest of the
world, however, these were still adapted to align with traditional Confucian values of Chinese
society, like collectivism and filial piety. This led to the development of starkly different
technological standards and requirements, as the traditional “seven necessities” that consisted
of firewood, rice, oil, soy sauce, salt, vinegar and tea were replaced with more
technologically advanced requirements. Chinese households aspired to purchase more
domestic technologies like washing machines, refrigerators and televisions, whilst Chinese
businesses began replacing human labour with mechanical labour to increase efficiency,
production and therefore profits, hence positively growing China’s economy and helping its
move from agrarian to industrialised. With the Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping’s stimulation of
economic optimism in the 1900s, the role and importance of technology became more
prominent in Chinese society, and hence access to technology increased. However, despite
this increased access to technology, restriction to these technologies also took place in the
early 2000s, as the Chinese government banned some communication technologies, and at
times even used their technologies to further their political agenda and brainwash their
citizens with propaganda. This tightly controlled access to technology, allowing for a faster
rate of change, but its impact on the direction of change has been both in the positive and
negative direction depending on the group it affected.

During the 20th century as access to technology and technological development increased, the
rate of change in China was observed to have increased drastically, however, these changes
often benefitted groups in power such as the wealthy and the CCP government. An example
of this is Mao Zedong’s “Great Leap Forward” program that aimed to industrialise China, and
was achieved through the process of modernisation and globalisation, as many technological
ideas were adopted from the west and other parts of the world to allow China to economically
catch up to the rest of the globe. This change benefitted the government as it modernised
China’s economy and increased its economic power on the international and macro level. On
the other hand, an example of the government’s restriction on civilian access to technologies
to slow down or prevent a change from occurring is the Government’s restriction of
communication technologies like social apps, as the government banned most western social
media apps like Twitter, Facebook and Youtube in the early 2000s to slow down
westernisation as well as prevent the organisation of demonstrations, protests and strikes
against the government through these apps. In turn, China replaced many of these western
social medias with Chinese alternatives, such as ChinaNet instead of the Internet, Weibo
instead of Twitter, Renren instead of Facebook and Youku instead of Youtube. Leaders used
China’s Internet to warn people of the dangers of becoming too westernized, and the CCP
issued a directive to government officials to combat ‘dangerous’ Western values and other
perceived ideological threats. Hence, those that hold power in China controlled the access of
the masses to technology, as they use it to speed up the development of changes that benefit
them but also restrict the peoples access to technologies to slow down the rate of changes
harmful to their power from occurring.

Similarly to the way the access to technology impacted the rate of change, the access to
technology impacted the direction of change in a biased way too as the direction of most
changes pursued with the help of access to technology was often aimed at benefitting the
groups that held power in China. The introduction of the social credit system is an example of
a change that was achieved through the greater access the government had to technology, as
recording and tracking an individual’s social points was made easier with technologies like
scanning machines that identified the amount of points each individual had as well as
complex computer databases that kept track of all this information for the government to
easily access. The social credit system is a system of reward and punishment that depends on
the amount of points the individual has; the more good deeds they perform the more points
they have and the more privileges they receive, however, the more bad deeds performed
meant less points and therefore less rights held in their community. This change pursues a
beneficial direction for the government as it allows them to effectively control their populace
through this system, hence maintaining their power and control over the people. However, to
many civilians this change pursues a harmful direction as they are unable to express their
own opinions or criticise the government without fear of losing points, and losing points
often robs them of simple rights like being able to ride the plane or get a home loan from the
Bank.

In conclusion, the rate and direction of change in China has been heavily influenced by
society’s access to technology, however, this rate and direction is often beneficial to the
groups in power who control and restrict the population’s access to technology to protect their
authority and maintain their control over the nation. These changes therefore mostly benefit
those in power, whilst sometimes disadvantaging those without power or wealth.