COULD THE VISE TIGHTEN ON XIAOHONGSHU?
Provided that one in every of President Donald Trump’s first acts upon returning to the Oval Workplace was to delay the TikTok ban, whether or not Xiaohongshu’s new Western viewers will keep energetic (or be allowed to) on the platform stays to be seen.
As a Chinese language-developed and -owned app, Xiaohongshu is topic to the legal guidelines and laws of the Chinese language authorities, which can pose difficulties for American customers who’re accustomed to freedom of speech on social media platforms. Some US customers have already discovered that lesson the laborious approach.
Ought to intercultural dialogue on Xiaohongshu show an excessive amount of of a threat to Chinese language censorship, Beijing might tighten its vise on the app.
In keeping with a leaked inside doc in 2022, the platform already actively censors discussions that could possibly be deemed controversial or destabilising. If the continued interplay between US and Chinese language customers begins to jeopardise the pre-existing tradition of self-censorship that exists on Chinese language social media, Beijing might start in search of much less refined strategies to implement compliance with its strict regulatory framework.
Moreover, although TikTok might have earned a short lived reprieve, there isn’t any assure that Xiaohongshu won’t be topic to an identical investigation and ban by the US authorities down the road.
Whereas it stays to be seen whether or not “TikTok refugees” will assimilate and study to stick, or if the Chinese language authorities will discover a steadiness between encouraging intercultural exchanges and sustaining the integrity of the Nice Firewall, Xiaohongshu’s dramatic rise within the West has supplied a uncommon and engaging look into what occurs when Chinese language and American netizens collide.
Konrad Lee is a Program Assistant on the Asia Society Coverage Institute in New York, who focuses on overseas coverage and US-China relations.
