Cyberbullying and Public Policy in China: A Case Study of Liu Xuezhou’s Family Search

Abstract

While informational technologies are advancing rapidly, cyberbullying in China has posed many challenges as public policy issues. Recently, Liu Xuezhou suffered from cyberbullying on one of the largest Chinese social networks-Weibo, and committed suicide while searching for his birth parents. This incident has aroused widespread concern in society and triggered many Internet constituents to take subsequent actions. Taking the case of this family search incident as an example, this paper analyzes the underlying causes and implications of policy-wise deficiency under the public policy domain and finds that the media authorities, netizens, the government, and social media platforms all played major parts in this incident. Analyzing the case through multiple perspectives, the study offers public policy evaluations in terms of cyberbullying and social network governance. While the government has put great regulatory efforts into cleansing the Internet this year, the study presents more policy-wise suggestions through ethical, educational, and legislative lenses.