May 2012

Former Beijing mayor Chen Xitong—blamed for years as one of the main culprits of the military crackdown on the 1989 pro-democracy movement in Tiananmen Square—has called it “a regrettable tragedy that could have been avoided” and aimed to play down his role in surrounding events.

Co-workers, neighbors, government office workers, unemployed young toughs and gang members are being used to monitor perceived troublemakers, according to rights groups and people under surveillance.

China's biggest microblogging service has introduced a code of conduct explicitly restricting the type of messages that can be posted. Weibo—which resembles Twitter—took the action after local authorities criticised "unfounded" rumours posted by some users.

State censorship is no longer just a question of dissidents testing the boundaries of what is permissible and regularly running afoul of the authorities—the old, familiar model. It has become a matter of authoritarian innovation as well, with the one-party state experimenting in with ways to constrain and control its explosive new media environment.