Tagprotest

🔖 Understanding implications of Hong Kong’s tech ecosystem changes for India (archive) by Rohan Seth & Manoj Kewalramani

The new National Security Law was added to Annex III of the Basic Law, the de facto constitution of Honk Kong. It grants law enforcement agencies the power to censor speech, and track citizens online for a broad set of reasons. It has been used as a justification to arrest protestors.

After the new law was put in place companies like Facebook, Twitter, Google and Microsoft have paused data requests coming from Hong Kong authorities. China has been an ethical gray-area and different tech companies have reacted to it differently — Google Search has exited, while Apple continues to comply to app removal requests.

The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology is in the process of updating the Intermediary Guidelines. If these guidelines don’t include sufficient procedural safeguards and oversight, it too will become a draconian law, a tool for the State to regulate and track speech.

🔖 The ‘3.5% rule’: How a small minority can change the world (archive)

Research by Erica Chenoweth, political scientist at Harvard shows that non-violent protests that are able to actively engage 3.5% of the population always succeed. These protests can take the form of general strikes, consumer boycotts etc. Since they’re non-violent they are able to engage a broader demographic.

The researchers reviewed social movements from 1900 to 2006. The movements were considered a success if they were able to achieve their goals within a year of their peak engagement. They also applied a strict non-violence test (India’s independence movement, for example couldn’t be considered). Some examples were: