Perspective: Debating high tech's China challenge

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Cisco Systems and Yahoo should be called out. They should take a PR and profit hit when they do this.

Thierer: As you know, Reporters Without Borders has gone further and proposed regulation to address "the ethical lapses displayed by certain Internet sector companies when operating in repressive countries." They have been applying pressure but say nothing has changed.

Now they propose that Congress and the Department of State push a code of conduct. If that doesn't work, they think legislation should disallow U.S. companies from providing services in those countries and forbidding selling them surveillance or other software.

What are your thoughts on this proposal?

Harper: Everyone supports Reporters' Without Borders' goal, of course, which is freedom. But their goal isn't total freedom: It's just press freedom. They would reduce the freedom of Internet businesses in the United States to advance a press freedom strategy in certain other countries (one which I think doesn't work).

I don't think freedom should be a zero-sum game like that. I want more freedom for everybody, which is part of why I come down on the side of the engagement strategy.

People have plenty of power to persuade others and to persuade companies. The test of their commitment is whether they will do the work that brings others to adopt their view and share their mission.

--Jim Harper

You mentioned that engagement with China is an arguable ethical lapse. Do you agree? This is about as appealing a case for corporate social responsibility as there can be. But Milton Friedman said in 1970 that the social responsibility of the firm is to increase profits. Should technology companies rein in the profits they return to shareholders and the employment they give workers to be socially responsible?

Thierer: A corporation's first duty is to maximize its value for shareholders. But certain issues rise to a different level. In World War II, companies sold various chemicals and munitions to the Nazis. I wouldn't equate the sale of computer software and hardware with the sale of deadly weapons and chemicals. But where would you draw the line?

I assume you would agree that the sale of deadly items would qualify for special regulation. But I take it you would never support anything beyond that? What if the company has a long track record of marketing speech-restricting tools to repressive regimes across the globe?

Harper: A country can regulate or ban domestic companies' trade in munitions because the geopolitical interests of nation-states trump the economic interests of companies and people.

American technology companies should play a little hardball with repressive regimes.

--Adam Thierer

Dual-use technologies are a closer call--products with both peaceful and military uses. Here we're talking about technology and services that have both beneficial-communicative and harmful-censorial uses, but they have no particular military uses. The interests of the U.S. are not at stake, just the interest of a faction in directing the U.S. government to advance its aims.

Capturing and using government power is far too easy and far too appealing to too many. It's better for people who object to corporate practices to use their own influence to affect it. No company lives in a bubble. They buy inputs of all kinds: transportation, power, paper, advertising, courier services, hardware, software. If a company can't be persuaded directly to stop an objectionable practice, its suppliers can be pressured to stop providing the inputs.

I fully respect anyone who disagrees with me on the substance of my argument--that trade in technology has net benefits for the Chinese people, even if some traders collaborate in censorship--that is, if they advance their argument through persuasion. People have plenty of power to persuade others and to persuade companies. The test of their commitment is whether they will do the work that brings others to adopt their view and share their mission.

Thierer: I guess I would still classify myself as being in the "engagement is good" camp, but I'm uneasy about it. You argue that the "interests of the U.S. are not at stake, just the interest of a faction in directing the U.S. government to advance its aims." Isn't spreading democracy and freedom of expression a U.S. interest? If some of our most respected technology companies are facilitating the repression of dissent and speech, doesn't that counter our national interest?

American technology companies should play a little hardball with these repressive regimes. I will continue to oppose efforts to legally force them to do this--but I hope that they will consider taking a different approach to engagement with China and other repressive regimes.

Biography
Adam Thierer directs The Progress & Freedom Foundation's Center for Digital Media Freedom. Jim Harper directs the Cato Institute's information policy studies.

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[freq]

employ with them or compete with them

pretty simple.. if only our corporate leaders were as smart and couragous as they are privleged.....

geeze, then we would be living like the Jetsons!!

[freq]

I forgot to mention.....

scared.... scared as to losing their wad....