SSRN Id4320952

The Great Rectification: A New Paradigm for China’s Online Platform Economy
Rogier Creemers
Leiden University
Abstract
This article reviews the regulatory campaign against China’s online platform sector that took place
between 2020 and 2022. It focuses specifically on its substantive policy aspects, arguing that this
“rectification” both intended to remedy existing perceived problems in the online platform
industry and to reshape the sector to better meet the needs of the rapidly altering economic and
development policy environment. The rectification pursued six discrete goals: managing macro-
economic risks, maintaining content control, addressing emerging social concerns, remedying
market imbalances, mitigating foreign risks, and supporting the technology development area. It
led to significant punitive actions, as well as rhetorical and behavioural shifts by companies. As
such, it provides a first test case of the bigger changes occurring under the post-19th Party
Congress “New Era”, but also holds comparative potential for researching platform governance
worldwide.
Introduction
On 24 October 2020, Jack Ma, founder of e-commerce giant Alibaba and its fintech spin-off Ant
Group, took to the stage at a financial conference, the Bund Summit, in Shanghai. In his speech,
Ma sharply criticized financial regulators for failing to understand how technology enabled better
financial risk management, as well as the Chinese banking sector, deriding its “pawn shop
mentality”1. Mere days later, Anti Group’s planned IPO, worth an estimated 37 billion US Dollars,
was suspended. Over the subsequent two years, Chinese “big tech” companies were subject to
a major regulatory campaign. Central authorities issued rules covering competition law and
consumer protection, Internet use by minors and personal information protection, risk
management in fintech services and androgynous pop idols. Regulators also created new
enforcement bodies and review processes, and imposed severe fines and punitive actions against
nearly all major Chinese platform companies.
Many observers have described this regulatory wave as a “tech crackdown”, driven by elite
political concerns and even personal vendettas. Generally, the campaign is described as a bid by
the central government to re-establish control over an economic sector that had hitherto escaped
the strict regulation to which most Chinese businesses are subject2 . Zhang characterizes the
campaign as a knee-jerk response to a regulatory crisis, and a symptom of the volatility inherent
in China’s system of governance3. Journalistic attention has focused on the personalities involved:
the “crackdown” is a Xi Jinping bid to clip the wings of China’s uppity tech billionaires, Jack Ma
most of all4. These elements are not unimportant. For instance, Ma’s cavalier speech was given
right after Vice-President Wang Qishan outlined regulators’ risk perceptions at the same event5,
and may have been the drop that made the cup run over. But the cup was already very full, and
so personal politics are insufficient to fully explain this complex regulatory phenomenon. It is not
1
Unofficial transcript: Xu 2020.
2
Collier 2022.
3
Zhang 2022.
4
See, for instance, Mitchell 2021.
5
Chorzempa 2022.
Electronic copy available at: https://ssrn.com/abstract=4320952

surprising that the Chinese state attempts to expand control of large-scale businesses, the more
salient question is how and for which purposes that control is exercised. Describing the
“crackdown” as a sudden and unexpected turn of events overlooks that, as this article will discuss,
most of its components had already been in preparation since 2018. Focusing on the role of
prominent individuals such as Jack Ma obscures the fact that this wave targeted just about all
major platform companies. Political and institutional interests are undoubtedly important: the
newly established State Administration of Market Regulation, for instance, has gained
prominence and bureaucratic resources as the enforcer of competition law in the tech sector6.
However, no analysis of this impactful phenomenon can be complete without reviewing the
goals it purported to pursue, as well as the policy justifications for those goals.
This article contributes a substantive and contextual interpretation of the regulatory offensive,
which it conceptualizes as a “great rectification”, or the imposition of a comprehensive and
permanent new mode of governance7. Building on Naughton’s notion of “grand steerage”, it
argues that the rectification manifests several high-level policy shifts and socio-economic
changes from the past decade. Perhaps most important is the move away from prioritizing GDP
growth towards a more broadly defined view of development as part of Xi Jinping’s “New Era”,
which fostered policy slogans such as “common prosperity” and “limiting the disorderly
expansion of capital”. The dozens of legislative, regulatory, policy and enforcement measures of
this rectification reveal six major drivers for regulatory intervention: limiting macro-economic
risk; maintaining effective control of online content; remedying market failures and imbalances;
tackling emerging social concerns; contributing to the technological development agenda; and
limiting exposure to foreign adversaries. These drivers form a comprehensive new paradigm for
digital platform governance, in which companies must internalize the perceived social costs and
negative externalities of their business models, and in which they remain loyal corporate citizens
of the Party-state.
The first section of this article describes the policy origins of the rectification in the years
preceding 2020. It pays particular attention to growing state interventionism in technological
innovation and development and the evolving prioritization of platform governance in leadership
circles. The second section successively discusses the six policy drivers listed above, identifying
their policy context, the actors involved, and the specific measures taken. The third section
assesses how the authorities have implemented and enforced the new sets of regulations, and
how platform businesses have responded to it – both substantively and in terms of political
signalling. The conclusion explores the implications for the digital platform industry and China’s
high-tech ambitions in general, as well as how the rectification compares to regulatory trends
elsewhere in the world.
The growing political importance of platform companies
Over the past decade, large platform companies have come to dominate the Chinese digital space.
The two best-known, Alibaba and Tencent, have built ecosystems integrating multiple service
types, including social media, e-commerce, gaming, music, cloud services and ride-hailing. They
have both established digital payment services, and Alibaba’s spin-off Ant Group branched out
6
See, for instance, Reuters 2021.
7
The article thus takes issue with both elements of the term “tech crackdown”. On the one hand, the rectification only covered a
subset of the entire digital industry: sectors such as robotics, hardware manufacture or corporate software were not affected. On the
other, the word crackdown suggests the Chinese government might have wished to substantially eliminate platform companies from
their activities. With the exception of educational technology, this is not the case. Successive policy documents and leaders’
statements underline the importance of the continued development of the platform economy, even as this necessitates stricter
regulation. It also suggests that this is a temporary aberration, after which the status quo ante would resume. This, too, not the case:
the regulatory environment for platform businesses has fundamentally and irreversibly reoriented from a previous model towards a
new one.

into lending and other financial services8. They have been joined by several companies built
around specific core activities, such as Meituan Dianping (voucher selling), Didi Chuxing (ride-
hailing), JD.com (consumer-oriented e-commerce) and Pinduoduo (livestream-based sales), as
well as social media, such as ByteDance’s short video app Douyin, and its competitor Bilibili.
These companies have user numbers in the hundreds of millions and occupy a significant share
of the economy. In 2021, the online sale of physical goods amounted for a quarter of total retail
sales9, and the “core digital economy” sectors occupy nearly 8% of total GDP10. Over 80% of
payments occur through mobile means 11 , and Ant Group occupied a 15% share of China’s
consumer lending market, with 60% of annual top-line growth12. These successes had also made
the companies’ founders billionaires, playing an increasingly prominent role in public life.
Yet as these companies grew, concerns emerged about their business practices and their broader
economic and political impact. In the cut-throat competition between these different platforms,
regulatory or ethical concerns often took a back seat to business survival and the pursuits of user
numbers and profits, and particularly the data on which the new business models were founded13.,
E-commerce and social media platforms were used to trade in stolen data and counterfeit goods14,
imposed onerous and conditions on their users and on-platform merchants, and became
notorious for the exploitation of workers. Tencent was implicated in assisting disgraced Vice
Minister of Public Security, Sun Lijun, with monitoring members of the top leadership15. Online
peer-to-peer lending platforms soared and then crashed, leading some lenders to commit suicide
and inflicting investor losses in the hundreds of billions of Yuan 16 . In a wider sense, these
companies occupied an anomalous political-economic position, Although privately owned, they
straddled an important demarcation drawn before their foundation. With the Socialist market
economy, China effectively developed a tiered economy. The strategic commanding heights
were occupied by State-owned or controlled enterprises, less critical activities were left to the
private sector17. Big tech enterprises, however, emerged after that division was made, were not
of strategic importance at their foundation, and have only become so relatively recently. Apart
from their essential role in the everyday lives of citizens, they play a key role in governmental
operations as suppliers and contractors of digital services.
The leadership has attempted to co-opt platform companies in different ways. By 2012 already,
Party Committees had been established in all major Internet enterprises, and some of the best
known entrepreneurs were given seats in industry associations and state bodies such as the
Internet Society of China and the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference
respectively18. The 2014 4th Plenum called for the creation of “special management shares”, later
called “golden shares”, for online media businesses. These enabled board membership, access
to corporate information and input into corporate decisionmaking19. In 2017, the Cyberspace
Administration of China (CAC) and Ministry of Finance jointly established the 100 billion RMB
China Internet Investment Fund, both to facilitate fundraising and to establish a presence within
corporate reporting and decision-making structures20. In more general terms, from the late 2000s
onwards, the leadership stepped up interventions to shape China’s economy and shepherd it
8
Shen 2019; Tang 2019.
9
Xinhua 2022a.
10
CCCI 2021.
11
Daxue Consulting 2022.
12
Economist 2020.
13
Lee 2018.
14
Bandurski 2017.
15
Chen 2022.
16
Fulco 2020.
17
Yeo 2020.
18
Creemers 2018.
19
Gruin and Knaack 2020.
20
Economist 2021.

towards long-term development vision. This “grand steerage” involved, amongst others, the
mobilization of extensive financial resources and the centralization of information technology in
China’s development strategy21. This concept of steering reflects CCP’s goal-oriented, teleological
worldview22, but while its Utopian visions remain largely the same, significant course changes
have occurred in how the leadership intends to arrive at its destination.
At the 2017 19th Party Congress, Xi Jinping declared that the CCP would move into a “New Era”.
The “dominant contradiction” of the previous period, the focus on economic growth prescribed
by Deng Xiaoping, was replaced by a new primary challenge, navigating “unbalanced and
inadequate development and the people’s ever-growing needs for a better life 23 ”. Instead of
pursuing GDP growth at nearly all costs, more attention would be dedicated to other
considerations, ranging comprehensive national security and environmental destruction to
paternalist worries about China’s youth and economic equality. The 5th Plenum of the 19th Party
Congress, which took place a few days before the cancellation of the Ant IPO, announced the
elimination of extreme poverty, ahead of the set target date of the Party’s 100th Anniversary in
202124. It also approved the 14th Five-Year Plan, which did not contain explicit growth rate targets,
focusing instead on “high-quality development” and increasing productivity25. Subsequently, Xi
dusted off “common prosperity” (gongtong fuyu), a slogan used earlier by both Mao and Deng,
to signal the Party would target inequality 26 . Concurrently, China’s relationship with the US
deteriorated rapidly, triggering greater urgency towards technological self-sufficiency and
reduced exposure to risks from abroad27.
This growing attention for emerging social concerns, as well as pre-existing apprehension about
domestic and foreign sources of destabilization, joined the growing discontent among platform
users and third-party merchants about the state of affairs in the platform economy. A head of
regulatory steam was already building. Efforts to regulate personal information collection and use,
central to online platforms’ business operations, had been ongoing since 2012, and were
accelerated as the drafting of the Personal Information Protection Law (PIPL) started in 201828.
That same year, China’s first e-commerce law was promulgated. This introduced some general
constraints on data-enabled business models. For instance, platform companies had to provide
opt-out options to users when providing personalized or recommended search results29. Gaming
regulators imposed real-name registration requirements for minors in online gaming, as well as
strict daily gaming time limits30. The People’s Bank of China had prohibited banks from handling
cryptocurrency transactions in 201531. It later refused credit scoring licenses to several private
companies involved in a pilot scheme, including Alibaba’s Sesame Credit programme, over
concerns about conflicting interests and problematic business practices32. The CAC subsequently
rapped Ant on the fingers over violations of user privacy33. Financial authorities banned online
P2P lending after the sector’s crash34.
A clear announcement of comprehensive regulation for the platform economy came in 2019, in
a State Council policy outline on its “standardized and healthy” development, the first time a
21
Naughton 2020; Naughton 2022.
22
Creemers 2020.
23
Holbig et al. 2017.
24
Central Committee 2020a.
25
Central Committee 2020b.
26
Hofman 2022.
27
Bateman 2022.
28
Creemers, 2022.
29
NPC 2018
30
NPPA 2019.
31
PBoC et al. 2013.
32
Cadell and Zhang 2017.
33
Reuters 2018.
34
Reuters 2019.

normative document addressed the entire sector 35 . Specifically, this document inventoried a
series of policy and regulatory initiatives intended to create an environment to both stimulate the
sector’s perceived positive role, and respond to the problems it generated. On the one hand, that
entailed streamlining administrative and licensing processes and encouraging the creation of new
business models. On the other, however, it called for regulations on “operator information
verification, product and service quality, platform (including app) complaints, consumer rights
protection, network security, data security, labour rights protection, etc.”, as well as on
competition-between platforms and on-platform operators, and related points such as cross-
platform connectivity and interoperability. The document also indicated that fintech services
should be conducted according to existing regulations, essentially declaring an end to the “Wild
West” era in the sector36. The revision draft of the Anti-Monopoly Law, published in January 2020,
included basic antitrust provisions for the online economy for the first time 37 . Even so, the
leadership’s overall assessment of the platform economy remained largely positive. The 5th
Plenum listed the platform and sharing economies as strategic emerging industries to be granted
policy support38, and the State Council document underlined that new regulations had to “leave
enough space for the development of new business formats”. In other words, rather than a pure
knee-jerk response to specific events, the rectification consisted of measures that had been under
development for some time, reflecting shifting development priorities. It would, however, also be
shaped by specific events that drove it in a more punitive and confrontational direction.
The substance of the Rectification
The rectification unfolded over the period of over a year, in a manner that seemed largely
piecemeal and uncoordinated, as well as event-driven in some cases. In the year and a half after
the cancellation of Ant’s crackdown, authorities issued over a dozen new major policy
documents and over fifty new regulations39 on platform economy-related activities, and stepped
up enforcement resulting in numerous high-profile fines and punishments. These measures
constitute a bundle of six different, albeit sometimes overlapping, objectives.
1. Macro-economic risk management
A first goal of the rectification was responding to the increasing challenges posed by the
burgeoning fintech industry. Its expansion had provided innovative consumer-facing financial
services where the traditional banking sector had not 40 . Nonetheless, as they moved from
payment into wealth management and lending, regulators became increasingly concerned about
their influence on credit allocation and the money supply. In an article published the day before
Ant’s IPO cancellation, Guo Wuping, head of the Consumer Protection Bureau at the China
Banking and Insurance Regulatory commission, warned about improper competition between
underregulated fintech companies and licensed financial institutions. He accused fintech
businesses of charging, excessive fees and inducing risky levels of debt, as well as improper
collection and trading of borrowers’ personal data, causing a build-up of systemic risk and
lowering resilience to crises in the financial system 41 . The response would be, to “fully
incorporate financial activities into supervision in accordance with the law to effectively prevent
risks42” as stated by the Financial Stability and Development Committee, headed by top economic
policymaker Liu He.
35
State Council 2019.
36
Zhu 2021.
37
SAMR 2020.
38
Central Committee 2020b.
39
A full list of these measures is included in Appendix 1.
40
Chorzempa 2022.
41
21 Caijing 2020.
42
Gov.cn 2020

More broadly, the leadership came to demonstrate greater scepticism about financialization, or
the notion that financial services should be a locus of capital accumulation in their own right. In
the context of the new Five-Year Plans, CPPCC Economic Commission deputy chair Liu Shijin,
for instance stated that excessive financialization did not deliver tangible social benefits or an
increase in productivity43. The PBoC’s Financial Stability Report for 2020 drew attention to the
high levels of leverage in online lending44. A Politburo meeting on economic work in December
2020 resolved to tackle the “disorderly expansion of capital45”. Sun Tianqi, head of the PBoC’s,
Financial Stability Bureau, later accused tech platforms of operating unlicensed financial
services 46 . The new regulations brought in as part of the rectification raised minimum
contributions for online loans as well as capital and leverage requirements, and prohibited cross-
provincial online lending47. Furthermore, the proportion of loans that a bank could issue through
online platforms was limited to 50% of its entire portfolio48. In short, the risk management tools
and tactics prevalent in traditional banking were extended to their online counterparts, and even
the online use of the word “bank” was regulated.
The fintech focus also extended to cryptocurrencies and other virtual tokens. Where China had
once been the largest miner of cryptocurrencies worldwide, successive interventions led to a
complete ban on their mining and use49. The stated reason for this lay both with these currencies’
high energy usage and the fact that they were often used for shady and illegal transactions50. Non-
fungible tokens, products relying on similar technologies as cryptocurrencies, remain legal and,
indeed, popular on online trading platforms. Even so, three State-directed industry associations,
the National Internet Finance Association, Banking Association and Securities Association issued
guidelines on preventing NFT-related financial risks, requiring their members to separate NFTs
and financial services, refrain from financing NFT purchases and to verify identities of NFT
buyers51.
2: Online content, ideology, and morality
In the area of content, the rectification largely continues the repertoire of practices and tactics
authorities have developed in the past decade. Specifically, new measures have been introduced
incidentally in response to specific irritants, as well as more structurally to regulate new forms of
content production and dissemination. Moreover, the occurrence of several high-priority political
events in 2021 and 2022 also led to increased attention from the propaganda department.
Since CAC gained responsibility over online content in 2014, it has issued a cavalcade of content-
related regulations52. Its interventions during the rectification constitute a logical continuation of
that process, aimed to ensure novel technologies do not result in regulatory loopholes.
Specifically, in some cases together with other authorities, it has issued regulations for deep
synthesis (deep-fake) content, online livestreaming, algorithm-based recommendation systems,
pop-up windows, app-based information services and online religious information53. By and large,
these were assembled from the same parts bin as the existing regulatory corpus, including
components such as real identity verification requirements for users, registration obligations for
43
Sina 2022.
44
PBoC 2020.
45
Xinhua 2020.
46
Sun 2021.
47
B01
48
B04
49
B09; B21; B11.
50
People’s Daily 2021.
51
B06.
52
Creemers forthcoming 2023.
53
B07; B18; B30; B38; B39; B40; B42; B44; B46; B50; B54.

service providers, outlining requirements for content control, technical response measures and
emergency response procedures, content tagging and the establishment of user complaints and
reporting channels.
The legacy regulator National Radio and Television Administration has no direct regulatory
power for the online world, but is still in charge of audiovisual entertainment – mostly distributed
through the Internet. It did not issue new rules, but took several initiatives against particular
undesired phenomena, with its usual curmudgeonly and paternalistic approach. One of them
was the “fan circle” phenomenon, or online communities of fans of particular idols or franchises.
In the eyes of authorities, these had become rife with misbehaviour, ranging from cyberbullying
and doxing to filing malicious complaints and reports, falsifying online rankings and compelling
fans to purchase merchandise to show their support. More broadly, the NRTA addressed
excessive “entertainmentization” (yulehua) and undesired aesthetics, amongst others deeming
“sissy boys”, or insufficiently masculine male pop stars, to constitute an “abnormal tendency”.
Shows should also not highlight wealth, hedonism, gossip or scandals54 Relatedly, CAC took
action against perceived problems in online fan communities, involving money-raising battles
between celebrities55.
Across the board, content regulators sought to shape a better “online ecology”56, brimming with
positive energy, and contributing to the realization of overall Party goals. Platform companies
obviously had to play a proactive and constructive role in this process, particularly as the
enormity of online content made it impossible for government authorities to provide detailed
rules or instructions to deal with every eventuality. Instead, the rectification saw the consolidation
of the “primary responsibility” (zhuti zeren) concept. This holds that platform companies
themselves have first-line responsibility for content and information management, and will be
held accountable should problems emerge 57 . Consolidating companies’ content review and
information dissemination abilities was especially important as the timeframe of the rectification
also included several high-profile political events, including the Party’s 100th anniversary, the
2022 Beijing Winter Olympics and the 20th Party Congress. Moreover, the Covid-19 pandemic
led to multiple protests where content management mechanisms were put through severe tests.
Even so, measures in the area of content management reflect practices that have gone on for
years, if not decades. “Spiritual pollution” was an area of concern in the 1980s, for instance.
Media authorities regularly crack down on entertainment content they deem morally dubious,
even before the advent of mass mobile connectivity, as in the case of a dating participant who’d
rather “cry in a BMW than smile on the back of a bike” in 201058. This element of the rectification
thus largely constitutes the incremental evolution of existing tactics and practices.
3: Regulating the digital market
The growth of the platform company has, in the eyes of authorities, been accompanied by the
emergence of a series of imbalances, abuses and undesired forms of conduct, which distorted the
functioning of online market mechanisms. A major part of the rectification was to redress these
phenomena through introducing and enforcing data protection, consumer protection and
competition regulation.
The ability to collect, process and trade personal information was critical to platform companies’
business models from the start59. Yet cutthroat competition often drove businesses to fraudulent
54
B20
55
B16; B29.
56
A13.
57
C04.
58
Guo 2017.
59
Lee 2018.

or discriminatory practices involving personal information, as well as insufficient attention to data
security. Authorities particularly decried phenomena such as the collection of data unnecessary
to provide basic services, refusing access to those services if users did not consent to excess data
collection, and a practice called “big data killing” (dashuju shashu) 60 . This referred to price
discrimination by platforms on the basis of users’ information, usually resulting in longer-term
users having to pay more for the same goods and services. The Personal Information Protection
Law61 was published in 2021 to respond to these circumstances. In the works since 2018, its
successive drafts display an evolution from an initial focus on obvious instances of data abuse,
theft and fraud, to an expanded regime that also imposes strict scrutiny and constraints on
platform businesses’ personal information collection and processing practices. Implementing
regulations providing more detail on the scope of permitted data collection and processing in
mobile apps, as well as on the precise processes platform companies needed to follow in
implementing the PIPL.
Regulators also took aim at a range of monopolistic and unfair competition practices tech firms
habitually practiced. Several had, for instance, built “walled gardens”, in which links to or
content from other platforms would not function properly within their own applications, limiting
interoperability. Links to Alibaba’s Taobao marketplace could not be opened from within
competitor Tencent’s WeChat messaging app, while Douyin blocked third-party e-commerce
links in its own livestreams. Main payment competitors Alibaba and Tencent would also not
accept each other’s payment systems. Furthermore, large platform competitions would use their
dominant positions to price out on-platform merchants from their platforms. “Pick one from two”
(er xuan yi) provisions, or obligatory exclusivity clauses, in service agreements meant that on-
platform merchants could not benefit from inter-platform competition.
In more general terms, SAMR also imported the concept of “main responsibility” into market
conduct, publishing guidelines on how Internet platforms could be upstanding economic citizens,
covering over thirty points of attention. These ranged from fair competition, internal governance
and inter-platform openness to the maintenance of platform security, countering the sale of
prohibited items, pricing and advertising, intellectual property protection, worker protection and
assistance to law enforcement bodies62. In SAMR’s view, this serves to ensure that the commercial
activities of platform companies are appropriately balanced against “national and social interests,
the lives and health of the people and the security of their property, the principles of voluntariness,
equality and sincerity, respect for laws, regulations, rules and commercial ethics, public order
and morality”. In other words, markets are not there as a conduit for unlimited pursuit of profits,
but are embedded in a wider list of political concerns and objectives.
4: Addressing emerging social concerns
Chief among non-market considerations were several worries about the impact of platform
businesses on specific social groups. A first prominent strand of such social concern is the
protection of minors. Always having had a paternalist streak, the CCP has devoted increasing
attention to compile a comprehensive legal and policy framework detailing how children should
be brought up63. The new Law on the Protection of Minors, passed in October 2020, contained
a new dedicated section on online rights, covering matters such as online bullying, a prohibition
of smartphones in schools without permission, and the protection of minors’ personal
information64. In spite of the earlier limitations on online gaming time, several high-profile policy
60
C06.
61
B15.
62
B26
63
Daum 2022.
64
NPC 2020

reports raised further concerns about online gaming addiction amongst the young65 . Official
media referred to online games as “spiritual opium”, particularly citing Tencent’s “Honour of
Kings66”. From the summer of 2021 onward, gaming regulator NPPA froze the approval process
for new games67, and in September, limited the provision of online game services to minors to
one hour, from 8PM to 9PM, on weekend nights and legal holidays68. In March 2022, CAC issued
a draft of overarching implementing regulations for the online protection of minors. These
addressed “online literacy”, including responsibilities for childrens’ guardians and schools,
specific online content requirements for information targeting minors, personal information
protection and combating online addiction. The latter section mandates a “youth mode” for
online services, and expands access duration limits from gaming to include online video, live-
streaming and social media69.
A further specific concern around the “healthy upbringing” of children relates to livestreaming as
a career choice. As employment prospects grew slimmer for university graduates, many turned
to influencing, and a 2021 employment market report revealed that nearly two thirds of Chinese
students hoped to become an influencer 70 . However, this does not fit well with economic
development priorities focusing on hard tech and the manufacturing sector. Several measures
have made livestreaming far less financially attractive. In September 2021, the State Council
indicated in a 10-year plan for childrens’ development that anyone younger than 16 would no
longer be permitted to feature in livestreaming content 71 . Subsequent policy instructions
prohibited livestreaming platforms from enabling “tipping” and other money-spending
functionalities, and required the limitation of “player knock-out” real-time competition between
multiple influencers72.
A last child-related intervention was the prohibition of for-profit tutoring services for school-age
children. This measure was introduced as part of a comprehensive effort to reduce burdens on
students in China’s fiercely competitive education system, and restructure that system to meet the
needs of its changing industrial development policies. Moreover, this measure can be interpreted
as a “common prosperity”-related response to class and wealth inequalities affecting social
mobility. Moreover, this policy isn’t just concerned about existing children, but also unborn ones:
as fertility rates have plummeted in recent years, authorities have grappled for ways to encourage
pregnancies, for instance by addressing the high costs of child-related services.
The social policy and common prosperity component of the rectification also involved
exploitative labour practices. Chinese tech companies, under competitive pressure to reduce cost
and increase product development speed, adopted a work schedule that became known as the
“996 system”, referring to work from 9AM until 9PM, 6 days per week. Corporate titans such as
Jack Ma credited this work ethic as essential to the success of their companies, and official media
reported it was adopted by over 40 major tech firms73. Yet the practice also led to deaths through
overwork and suicide. Online protests and publicly accessible working time tracking
spreadsheets were rapidly censored, but the Supreme People’s Court and the Ministry of Human
Resources banned the practice in August 202174. At the lower end of the socio-economic scale,
concern also arose on the fate of the millions of people working in the gig economy, most notably
delivery drivers. Dispatching algorithms used by food delivery platforms such as Meituan and
65
B12.
66
Jingji cankao bao 2021
67
Cao 2022
68
B19
69
B43.
70
Wutongguo 2021
71
C03
72
B46
73
Wen 2019.
74
B17

courier businesses for e-commerce goods impose high pressures to work overtime and speed up
their tasks, resulting in a growing incidence of traffic violations and accidents. Again, protests
and strikes met with a governmental backlash, but the publication of an article describing the
fate of delivery drivers in an official journal triggered public outcry75. In July 2021, SAMR, CAC
and other authorities jointly published new rules setting minimum standards for delivery driver
salaries, performance evaluation systems, workloads, and delivery time limits. Moreover, these
rules explicitly required all drivers should have the option to join a labour union. Subsequent
algorithm regulations also included strict limitations on their use in assigning work to gig
workers76. The Trade Union Law was also revised to facilitate gig worker membership77. On the
ground, pilot projects have emerged in several locations to better protect gig workers against
occupational hazards and injuries78.
5: Countering foreign adversaries
Although the brunt of the rectification dealt with domestic concerns, some of its measures also
reflect growing geopolitical tensions with the United States, most notably in the areas of data
export and the listing of Chinese tech companies on foreign stock exchanges. Some data
localization requirements were already present in the 2016 Cybersecurity Law, and were
expanded in the 2021 Personal Information Protection Law and Data Security Law. Dedicated
rules on data exports came rapidly after, and were finalized in 2022. These imposed security
review requirements for any export of data designated as “important” under the Data Security
Law, data pertaining to over 1 million individuals and sensitive data of 10.000 individuals. Data
exporters were also required to submit the contract with the foreign data recipient to CAC for
scrutiny. While CAC did provide standard contractual clauses for SMEs, these rules constitute
formidable barriers to data trading.
For decades, China has imposed foreign investment and ownership limitations in a whole range
of business activities, including media production and dissemination. To bypass these restrictions
and access foreign capital markets, Chinese companies would set up a “variable interest entity”
(VIE), a legally dubious construction where an offshore holding company essentially controlled
a domestic company through contractual means. Over 200 Chinese companies have listed on
foreign stock exchanges, predominantly in the US, through such a structure. The Chinese
government has maintained a considerable degree of constructive ambiguity on this structure,
recognising the importance of overseas capital for domestic growth79. In recent years, however,
concerns have grown about the possible influence or access to data that foreign owners and
regulators might gain 80 , particularly through new legislation such as the Holding Foreign
Companies Accountable Act (HFCAA)81. The matter came to a head when Didi listed on the New
York Stock Exchange against the instructions of CAC. The latter rapidly revised regulations
concerning cybersecurity review, a mandate it holds under the Cybersecurity Law, in order to
enable it to review foreign IPOs of Chinese companies holding data similar to those covered
under the data export regulations82. This not only turned CAC into a de facto securities regulator,
it also caused concerns about the continued ability of Chinese companies to maintain their VIE
structures. To alleviate those concerns, the China Securities Regulatory Commission issued draft
regulations requiring companies to file with them when planning overseas IPOs. The NDRC’s
2021 revision of “Negative List” foreign investment regulations also explicitly included Chinese
75
Sheehan and Du 2022; Wang 2021
76
B18; B22; B37.
77
B33.
78
Xie 2022.
79
Chen 2021.
80
B10
81
Bu 2021.
82
B11; B35.

jurisdiction over foreign listings by Chinese companies. These regulations mean VIEs are no
longer treated with a blind eye. They impose greater scrutiny on foreign IPOs, particularly in
areas involving cybersecurity and data security, but essentially leave the VIE loophole intact and
provide a degree of regulatory recognition83. This need to balance domestic security objectives
with continued access to international financial markets is further reflected in the agreement
between Chinese securities and financial regulators and the US Public Company Accounting
Oversight Board that provides the latter with far greater access to auditing information, as
required under the HFCAA84.
6: Achieving the Party’s technological development aims
While most of the rectification aimed to remedy perceived discrete problems or risks, it has also
served to embed the platform economy in a new, digitally-centred and future-oriented industrial
policy. In contrast to the previous focus on GDP growth, the “high-quality development”
paradigm differentiates different kinds of economic activities, some of which are deemed far
preferable over others. The core of this paradigm is enhancing the manufacturing sector through
the development and industrialization of “deep technology” and strategic emerging technologies
including artificial intelligence, blockchain, cloud computing, robotics and corporate software.
It not only intends to limit the relative growth of the financial sector, it also assesses the consumer-
facing activities of platforms as of limited utility as they do not contribute necessarily to the
profound levels of innovation the leadership pursues. Liu Shijin, for instance, stated that the
digital transformation of the economy meant shifting from consumption to production, and that
the true value of artificial intelligence lies in providing informative and valuable data to enhance
productivity, not merely to market products to customers85. To this end, the rectification included
several specific measures. The new anti-monopoly regulations, for instance, contained limitations
against “killer acquisitions”, where established incumbents purchase start-up challengers to
forestall competition, negatively impacting technological innovation and wider adoption.
Cybersecurity and data protection auditing and reporting requirements generate income streams
for the cybersecurity industry, allowing the industry to grow and consolidating overall
cybersecurity readiness nationwide86.
This supporting role of the platform sector was made clear in a number of high-level documents
that form part of the 14th Five-Year Plan cycle, addressing informatization generally, the digital
economy as well as the digital transformation of government87. A more detailed plan was issued
for the fintech sector88. A Politburo collective study session was devoted to the digital economy
as these plans were drafted, further underscoring its political priority 89 . Within these plans,
platform companies have important roles to play as contractors for governmental cloud systems
and databases, drivers in the exploitation of data – named a production factor by the State Council
in 2020, the digitization of existing agricultural, manufacturing and transportation services, as
well as the delivery of online social services such as healthcare and education. A new
Interministerial Joint Conference for the Digital Economy was also established under the
leadership of the NDRC, CAC and MIIT, in order to coordinate policy and regulation in the
future 90 . A 2022 CAICT report divides objectives in the digital economy in “digital
industrialization”, the popularization of primarily digital technology goods and services, and
“industrial digitalization”, using digital technologies to enhance the efficiency and productivity
83
B31; B32; B34.
84
Goodman 2022.
85
Sina 2022.
86
C02.
87
C01; C05; C07; C08.
88
C09.
89
A12.
90
A18.

of the “real economy”. This report calculates the value added to China’s economy by the former
at 8,7 trillion RMB, but the latter at over 37 trillion RMB91. Platform companies possess both the
technical capabilities and financial resources to assist in the achievement of these development
goals. An NDRC policy plan, for instance, encourages platform companies to “accelerate the
construction of key projects in the fields of artificial intelligence, cloud computing, blockchain,
operating systems, and processors92.” In short, platform companies are mobilized to serve the
“bigger picture” (daju) of the CCP’s programme. This, too, sometimes reflects elements of the
common prosperity agenda: new policies on the economic exploitation of data call for
redistributive measures, ensuring a more equitable spread of the income from data-enabled
activities93.
Implementation, enforcement and corporate response
The rectification did not merely intend to create new substantive rules for platform business, but
also to remedy the relatively weak deterrent posed by the limited levels of punishment that
previous administrative regulations enabled, as well as the limited resources of enforcement
authorities. The new Personal Information Protection Law and the Anti-Monopoly Law enabled
fines calculated as a proportion of annual revenue, rather than (relatively low) lump sums. SAMR,
the newly-established but underresourced competition regulator, used the priority of the
rectification to establish a new anti-monopoly bureau94 and expand its capabilities both at the
central level and in key cities. Its Beijing branch, for instance, established an expert advisory
committee consisting of over 100 scholars and legal experts, to assist in case work95. SAMR’s first
major victim was Alibaba. In April 2021, it fined the company 18 billion RMB for having imposed
“pick one from two conditions” and other competition violations, equal to about 4% of its 2019
nationwide revenue96. Subsequently, it imposed successive rounds of fines for failing to disclose
acquisitions 97, as well as another multi-billion antitrust fine on Meituan98 . Both Alibaba and
Tencent also came under investigation for possible corruption cases, respectively in relation to
disgraced Hangzhou Party Secretary Zhou Jiangyong and failure to prevent money laundering99.
Other regulators not only looked at corporate conduct, but at core elements of corporate
governance. The PBoC ordered Ant Group to restructure, requiring it to sever the close
connections between its payment services and its credit and lending activities100. Many of its
formal links with Alibaba have been severed, and founder Jack Ma has reportedly moved to
relinquish control over its operations101. Ant has reportedly also been in protracted consultations
with Ant about the imposition of a fine in excess of 8 billion RMB for undisclosed regulatory
violations as part of a broader arrangement that would enable the company to revive its plans for
public listing102. While no major tax-related regulatory changes took place, taxation authorities
have taken part in enforcement-related meetings with companies and initiated campaigns against
tax evasion in online services. Taxation authorities fined celebrity livestreamer Viya 1.3 billion
RMB for tax evasion 103 , followed by smaller punishments for similar offences by other
influencers104. CAC put Didi under a cybersecurity review after the company had listed on the
New York Stock Exchange in defiance of CAC instructions. During this process, Didi was
91
CAICT 2022.
92
C11.
93
C13.
94
A14.
95
C10.
96
D01.
97
D04; D07; D09; D10; D14.
98
D06.
99
Yang 2022.
100
Yang and Potkin 2022; Zhu 2022.
101
Yang and Huang 2022.
102
Zhu 2022.
103
D08.
104
Global Times 2022.

prohibited from adding new users. With its share price plunging, the company decided to delist.
The cybersecurity review resulted in a fine of 8 billion RMB. This episode also highlights some
of the differences between regulators: where SAMR provided a carefully reasoned legal
justification for its massive fines against Alibaba and Meituan, CAC’s decision was far more
politicized and legally dubious. Laws were seemingly applied retroactively, and little detail was
provided on specific applicable law or the calculation of punishment105. The more politicized
nature of CAC is also visible in its “Qinglang” (clean and pure) campaign on online content,
which it has organized annually since 2016. The 2021 and 2022 iterations of this campaign
focused explicitly on problem areas identified in the rectification106.
In wider terms, the rectification created a situation in which both regulators and companies had
to learn to reconstruct relationships and work together again under profoundly changed
conditions. This not only occurred in punitive terms: authorities also organized several meetings
with businesses to communicate what was expected of them 107 and to “have a clearer
understanding of the development situation”108. This close coordination illustrates a noteworthy
characteristic of this rectification. In contrast to other regulatory areas, the number of major
players in the platform economy is quite small: the April 2021 meeting involved only 34
companies. To be sure, enforcement in some areas remains an issue. Most notably, the “996
work culture” has proved to be an intractable problem, as competitive problems and job
insecurity continue to push workers to overwork 109 . Even so, the long-standing problems of
bureaucratic fragmentation and limited local enforcement capability110 matter far less, as central
authorities can interact with this small number of businesses directly and consistently, without
having to navigate complex on-the-ground circumstances across the country, or the limitations
of “campaign-style” enforcement111.
This coordination would be necessary to restabilize the platform economy, as the increased
compliance requirements and costs resulting from the rectification coincided with further
economic headwinds for China’s platform companies. The arrival of the Omicron variant of the
COVID-19 pandemic in China resulted in strict lockdowns in large urban centres such as
Shanghai and Beijing, disrupting economic processes. The United States stepped up pressure on
Chinese digital companies, amongst others through the prospect of delisting them from US stock
exchanges under the HFCAA112. This resulted in severe volatility of digital companies’ stock
values. Alibaba, for instance, went from 304 USD in October 2020 to 81 USD in May 2022,
while Tencent halved in the same period. In total, Chinese tech companies lost over 2 trillion
USD in market capitalization113.
In response, senior authorities have sought to balance signalling that the goals of the rectification
would be fulfilled, and that the platform economy remained an important sector. At a meeting of
the State Council Financial Stability and Development Committee in March 2022, top economics
policymaker Liu He indicated that regulators must “complete the rectification work of large
platform companies through standardized, transparent, and predictable supervision” 114 . A
meeting of the Politburo, the month after, indicated that “rectifications for the platform economy
will be completed, regular supervision will be initiated and specific measures to support its
105
Shi, Horsley and Lu 2022.
106
D02; D03.
107
Wang 2021.
108
A15.
109
Lu 2022.
110
See, for instance, Chen 2016.
111
Van Rooij 2016.
112
Posner 2022.
113
Economist 2022.
114
Xinhua 2022b.

standardized and sound growth will be unveiled.”115 The same month, the National Press and
Publications Administration granted new licenses to online games after a nine-month
moratorium116, although market leaders Tencent and Netease had to wait until September for
new games to be approved117. The Chinese Academy of Social Sciences issued a report on the
assistance tech companies provided to the common prosperity agenda, ranking 41 large
companies by the value they contribute to society. Alibaba and Tencent topped this list, providing
some counterweight to the opprobrium they had received previously118. CAC’s inhouse journal,
China Netcom, published a puff piece by Alibaba CEO Daniel Zhang about his company’s
contributions to China’s development, a sign storm clouds were dissipating 119. Other reports
indicated that regulators mulled delaying the implementation of time limits for young users, while
expanding the “golden share” system120. In October 2022, the NDRC indicated a “green light”
system would be introduced to guide investments in the platform economy, building on an earlier
announcement at the December 2021 Central Economic Work Conference121. The 2022 Central
Economic Work Conference indicated support for platform companies in “leading development,
job creation and international competition”, and did not even mention the rectification and its
components122.
Apart from compliance with the new regulations, platform companies have sought to mollify
authorities through both rhetoric and measures intended to signal their good citizenship. At one
of the consultation meetings organized by the CAC and other regulators, for instance, senior
corporate officers paid homage to the Party-state’s efforts in regulating the online sphere and
committed to closer cooperation. Tencent founder Pony Ma, for instance, stated he felt the
“concern and care” authorities have for the development of the digital economy, and promised
“Tencent will continue to respond to the needs of the country and the times.” Alibaba CEO Zhang
Yong affirmed that “regulation makes for healthier development” and pledged Alibaba would
better serve users and on-platform SMEs 123 . After the April 2021 consultation meeting, the
participating businesses all submitted letters of commitment on rules-compliant conduct to
SAMR124. Businesses also put their money where their mouth was. Alibaba and Tencent both
pledged 100 billion RMB to corporate “common prosperity funds”125, with other companies and
founders announcing further contributions. These initiatives would, amongst others, invest in
connectivity for poorer regions, support SMEs and the agricultural sector, improve the wellbeing
of gig workers, mitigate urban-rural inequality and enhance social services, particularly for
vulnerable groups. Alibaba also supported a local “common prosperity pilot zone” in its home
province of Zhejiang. Didi created a union for its drivers126, while JD.com announced it would
extend social security and health benefits to Deppon, a courier it acquired, establish a “housing
security fund” to help staff purchase homes, and cut top-level salaries by 10 to 20 per cent, all
measures clearly aligning with the “common prosperity” drive127. Businesses in the educational
sector, who saw their entire income stream dry up, had to resort to other ways to remain afloat.
New Oriental, the largest edtech company, pivoted to livestreaming, attracting customers by
making its videos educational128. To forestall stricter regulation, 30 tech companies established a
115
A17.
116
Ye 2022.
117
Huang 2022.
118
Hu et al. 2022.
119
Zhang 2022.
120
Zhai 2022.
121
Caixin 2022.
122
Xinhua 2022c.
123
CAC 2022.
124
A08.
125
Yuan and Jia 2021; TechNode 2021.
126
Bloomberg 2021.
127
Cailianshe 2022.
128
Lee 2022.

self-regulatory alliance for non-fungible tokens, providing a point of consultation between
businesses and regulators129.
Conclusion
The rectification of China’s platform economy is a complex phenomenon that defies explanation
in monocausal or reductionist terms. It finds itself at the junction of a range of interlaced
substantive policy streams, some of which are continuations of longer-lasting practices, some of
which are more novel. Content regulations and the shaming of specific cultural phenomena, for
instance, are the latest iterations of forms of media control developed in the 1990s, but data-
related legislation or rules on foreign listing have no direct precedent. Some are tangentially
related to the functioning of the platform economy, others strike at its heart. The initiatives on
child protection are manifestations of a much more general policy trend, while rules on fintech
and algorithm-driven business models will have a profound impact on tech firms’ operations. It
involves multiple administrative bodies and authorities, each with different priorities and agendas.
Although the six categories of regulatory intervention outlined above each have their own
coherent logic, in combination, they add up to form a comprehensive new framework for the
way in which the Chinese government related to private companies, and in which it intends to
steer economic policy. This framework contains several regulatory-technical components. First,
it seeks to ensure that companies internalise costs and negative externalities that they had
previously palmed off onto other stakeholders, thus giving them greater incentives to reduce those
costs or, at the very least, tying to ensure no-one else is left holding the proverbial bag. Second,
it symbolizes a normalization of the platform sector, where big technology companies no longer
enjoy a halo effect that allows them to avoid the normal laws of regulatory gravity. Whether it is
fintech businesses needing to meet the same capitalization requirements as banks, or exceptional
working conditions in the gig economy no longer being tolerated, platforms will now be subject
to largely similar rules as the traditional companies they compete with or have displaced.
Furthermore, the framework has strong moral overtones. In short, now the platform sector has
matured and these companies hold significant market share as well as great profits, Beijing
expects them to act as good corporate citizens. In this view, reflected most of all in the discourse
surrounding “main responsibility”, companies are not just vehicles to generate profits for
shareholders, but impactful participants embedded in a larger ecosystem. It is incumbent upon
them that they contribute to its sustainability and continued flourishing.
In more general terms, the rectification also attempts to resolve the tensions emanating from the
Leninist imperative to maintain a monopoly of political control and the drive of companies to
maximise individual profit, as well as the emergence of very wealthy, well-known and potentially
influential tech entrepreneurs. Moreover, it does so at the time where the Party has changed its
approach to its relationship with private companies of increasing strategic importance, and
shifted programmatic purposes. With the post-19th Party Congress move away from the centrality
of GDP growth and towards “common prosperity” and “high quality development”, embodied
in the ambitious technological goals of the 14th Five-Year Plan cycle, the leadership has
demonstrated its intention to act in a far more dirigiste manner to steer economic players into its
envisaged direction. The course correction this required of the platform economy, and the
accompanying dislocating interventions, contrast with the supportive environment encountered
by business in other areas of technology: venture capitalist funding for the digital industry reached
historic highs in the year 2021, the high point of the rectification.
With this new approach, China is embarking on an unprecedented experiment. The 14th Five-
Year Plans for the digital sector constitute a form of industrial policy not been elsewhere in the
129
Wen 2022.

world. This opens up promising avenues for research into topics ranging from the specific projects
and case studies that will emerge, to macro-level questions concerning the impact on the
innovative capabilities of Chinese online platforms and its digital economy more generally. At a
more mundane level, research should also be addressed to gauging the extent to which regulatory
interventions in competition, data protection, market management and labour protection have
tangibly changed the situation for affected stakeholders. In these areas, there are also prospects
for comparative research, as China is not the only major digital player to impose stricter
regulations on big tech. The European GDPR, New Deal for Consumers and Digital Markets and
Services Acts, for instance, resemble many elements of the Chinese approach. Even in the
infamously regulation-averse United States, debates on platform regulation are rapidly gaining
speed. In theoretical terms, the rectification takes aim at some of the central facets of “surveillance
capitalism 130 ”. It is sometimes tempting to ascribe occurrences in China purely to Chinese
circumstances, but comparative research may well come to find that partly, the Great
Rectification is a distinctly local manifestation of a global trend131.
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Appendix: Timeline
A: Events and important meetings
# Date Event Reference

2020
A01 3 November Ant Group IPO cancelled https://www.npr.org/2020/11/03/93079
9521/regulators-squash-giant-ant-ipo
A02 9 November CAC, SAMR and State Taxation Administration hold http://www.cac.gov.cn/2020-
administrative guidance meeting on the 5th Plenum of the 11/10/c_1606574423387228.htm
19th Party Congress
A03 16 – 18 Central Economic Work Conference (prioritizes strategic https://www.chinabankingnews.com/20
December technology development, anti-trust and the disorderly 20/12/21/chinas-central-economic-
expansion of capital) work-conference-outlines-8-key-
missions-for-2021/
A04 26 Meeting between PBoC and Ant Group https://www.pekingnology.com/p/detail
December ed-breakdown-of-pboc-deputy
2021
A05 5 March Two Sessions: presentation of draft 14th Five-Year Plan with http://www.xinhuanet.com/politics/202
key role for digital technology 1-03/05/c_1127171050.htm
A06 15 March 9th meeting of the Central Committee for Financial and http://www.xinhuanet.com/politics/202
Economic Affairs, focuses on the platform industry 1-03/15/c_1127214324.htm
A07 12 April Meeting between Ant Group and financial regulators, who https://www.ft.com/content/5c14c1d1-
order restructuring bd9e-4654-9a12-93c4ac46792d
A08 13 April SAMR, CAC and State Taxation Administration hold meeting http://www.cac.gov.cn/2021-
with 34 tech companies, who issue letters of commitment 04/13/c_1619894556494868.htm;
on regulatory compliance https://www.samr.gov.cn/xw/zj/202104/
t20210413_327811.html;
http://www.cac.gov.cn/2021-
04/16/c_1620179180102903.htm;
https://www.samr.gov.cn/xw/zj/202104/
t20210415_327862.htm
A09 17 August 10th Meeting of the Central Committee for Financial and http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/202
Economic Affairs, focuses on common prosperity 1-08/18/c_1310133051.htm
A10 8 September Central Propaganda Department, NPPA, CAC and Ministry http://politics.people.com.cn/n1/2021/0
of Culture and Tourism hold meeting with Major gaming 909/c1001-32221841.html
companies
A11 9 September 9 September: MIIT administrative guidance meeting on http://www.news.cn/2021-
interoperability between platforms 09/14/c_1127858259.htm

A12 20 October Politburo Collective Study Session on the digital economy http://politics.people.com.cn/n1/2021/1
020/c1024-32258357.html
A13 5 November Zhuang Rongwen publishes People’s Daily editorial on http://theory.people.com.cn/n1/2021/11
creating a benign digital ecology 05/c40531-32274181.html
A14 18 SAMR establishes Anti-Monopoly Bureau https://www.samr.gov.cn/xw/zj/202111/
November t20211118_336974.html
2022
A15 28 January Meeting between CAC, MIIT, NDRC and SAMR and major . http://www.cac.gov.cn/2022-
Internet enterprises on “healthy and sustained development” 02/09/c_1646012935608539.htm
of the online industry.
A16 10 March CAC Deputy Director Sheng Ronghua visits Weibo, during http://www.cac.gov.cn/2022-
“Qinglang” campaign. 03/10/c_1648520291123903.htm
A17 29 April Politburo meeting, calls for completing the rectification of http://www.news.cn/2022-
platforms 04/29/c_1128608127.htm
A18 11 July Interministerial Joint Conference for Digital Economy http://www.gov.cn/zhengce/content/20
established 22-07/25/content_5702717.htm
A19 28 July Politburo meeting, approves “green lights” for digital https://english.news.cn/20220728/85db
investment 4bc64d7d4fb9b9c63d08eeeb86ab/c.ht
ml
B: Laws and Regulations
# Date Title Issuing body Reference

2020
B01 2 Wangluo xiao’e daikuan yewu zanxing CBIRC, PBoC http://www.gov.cn/xinwen/2020-
November banfa (zhengqiu yijian gao) 11/03/content_5556884.htm
Provisional Rules for the Management of
Online Microlending Operations (Draft for
Comment)
B02 7 Hulianwang baoxian yewu jianguan banfa CBIRC http://www.gov.cn/zhengce/zheng
December (Internet Insurance Operations Oversight ceku/2020-
Rules) 12/14/content_5569402.htm
2021
B03 7 February Guanyu pingtao jingji lingyu de State Council Anti- https://gkml.samr.gov.cn/nsjg/fldj/2
fanlongduan zhinan (Guidelines Monopoly 02102/t20210207_325967.html
concerning Anti-Monopoly in the Platform Committee
Economy Area)
B04 19 February Guanyu jinyibu guifan shangye yinhang CBIRC https://digichina.stanford.edu/work
hulianwang daikuan yewu de tongshi /chinese-banking-and-insurance-
supervisory-commission-notice-
concerning-further-standardizing-
commercial-banksinternet-
lending-operations/
B05 12 March Changjian leixing yidong hulianwang CAC, MIIT, Ministry http://www.cac.gov.cn/2021-
yingyong chengxu biyao geren xinxi of Public Security, 03/22/c_1617990997054277.htm
fanwei guiding (Provisions on the Scope of SAMR
Necessary Personal Information in
Common Types of Mobile Internet
Applications)
B06 13 April Guanyu fangfan NFT xiangguan jinrong China Internet http://www.zgjjbdw.com/phone.p
fengxian de changyi (Proposal concerning Finance Association, hp?s=/News/show/id/7293/lmid/10
Preventing NFT-Related Financial Risks) China Banking Sector
Association, China
Securities
Association
B07 23 April Wangluo zhibo yingxiao banfa (Online CAC, Ministry of http://www.cac.gov.cn/2021-
Livestreaming Marketing Management Public Security, 04/22/c_1620670982794847.htm
Rules (Trial) Ministry of
Commerce, Ministry
of Culture and
Tourism, State
Taxation
Administration,
SAMR, NRTA
B08 26 April Yidong hulianwang yingyong chengxu MIIT http://www.cac.gov.cn/2021-
geren xinxi baohu guanli zanxing guiding 04/26/c_1621018189707703.htm
(zhengqiu yijian gao) (Provisional
Regulations for Personal Information
Protection in Mobile Internet Applications
(Draft for Comment))

B09 18 May Guanyu fangfan xuni huobi jiaoyi chaozuo China Internet https://www.cs.com.cn/xwzx/hg/2
fengxian de gonggao Finance Association, 02105/t20210518_6168004.html
China Banking
Association, China
Payment Settlement
Association
Announcement
B10 6 July Guanyu yifa congyan daji zhengjuan weifa Central Committee, http://www.gov.cn/zhengce/2021-
huodong de yijian (Opinions on Strictly State Council 07/06/content_5622763.htm
Cracking Down on Illegal Securities
Activities According to the Law)
B11 10 July Wangluo anquan shencha banfa (xiuding CAC http://www.cac.gov.cn/2021-
cao’an zhengqiu yijian gao) (Cybersecurity 07/10/c_1627503724456684.htm
Review Regulations (Revision Draft for
Comment))
B12 24 July Guanyu jinyibu jianqing yiwu jiaoyu Central Committee, http://www.moe.gov.cn/jyb_xxgk/
jieduan xuesheng zuoye fudan he xiaowai State Council moe_1777/moe_1778/202107/t20
peixun fudan de yijian (Opinions 210724_546576.html
concerning Further Lightening Students’
Homework Burdens During the Mandatory
Education Stage and Off-School Training
Burdens)
B13 26 July Guanyu luoshi wangluo canyin pingtai SAMR, CAC, NDRC, https://www.samr.gov.cn/xw/zj/20
Zeren qieshi weihu waimai songcanyuan Ministry of Public 2107/t20210726_333061.html
quanyi de zhidao yijian (Guiding Opinions Security, Ministry of
concerning Implementing Online Food Human Resources
Delivery Platforms’ Responsibilities and and Social Security,
Realistically Safeguarding Food Delivery Ministry of
Personnel’s Rights and Interests) Commerce, All-
China Federation of
Trade Unions
B14 17 August Jinzhi wangluo bu zhengdang jingzheng SAMR https://www.samr.gov.cn/hd/zjdc/2
xingwei guiding (gongkai zhengqiu yijian 02108/t20210817_333683.html
gao) (Provisions on Prohibiting Improper
Competitive Conduct Online (Public Draft
fro Comment))
B15 20 August Zhonghua Renmin Gongheguo geren xinxi National People’s http://www.npc.gov.cn/npc/c3083
baohu fa (Personal Information Protection Congress 4/202108/a8c4e3672c74491a80b
Law of the People’s Republic of China) 53a172bb753fe.shtml
B16 25 August Guanyu jinyibu jiaqiang “fanquan” CAC http://www.cac.gov.cn/2021-
luanxiang zhili de tongzhi (Notice 08/26/c_1631563902354584.htm
Concerning Further Strengthening Control
Over the “Fan Circle” Mess)
B17 26 August Laodong renshi Zhengyi dianxing anli Supreme People’s https://www.court.gov.cn/zixun-
(di’er pi) (Labour Affairs Dispute Model Court xiangqing-319151.html
Cases (Second Batch))
B18 27 August Hulianwang xinxi fuwu suanfa tuicun CAC http://www.cac.gov.cn/2021-
guanli guiding (zhenqiu yijian gao) 08/27/c_1631652502874117.htm?
(Internet Information Service Algorithmic mc_cid=ac393a0c3b&mc_eid=f8a
Recommendation Management Provisions 3931b69&mc_cid=85e6e5aba6&
(Draft for Comment)) mc_eid=fd102d2a70
B19 30 August Guanyu jinyibu yange guanli qieshi fanzhi NPPA http://www.gov.cn/zhengce/zheng
weichengnianren chenmi wangluo youxi ceku/2021-
de tongzhi (Notice concerning Further 09/01/content_5634661.htm
Strictly Managing and Realistically
Preventing Online Gaming Addiction
among Minors)
B20 2 Guanyu jinyibu jiaqiang wenyi jiemu ji qi NRTA http://www.gov.cn/zhengce/zheng
September renyuan guanli de tongzhi (Notice ceku/2021-
Concerning Further Strengthening 09/02/content_5635019.htm
Management over Cultural and Artistic
Programs and Their Personnel)
B21 3 Guanyu zhengzhi xuni huobi “wakuang” NDRC, Central https://www.ndrc.gov.cn/xxgk/zcfb
September huodong de tongzhi Propaganda /tz/202109/t20210924_1297474_e
Department, CAC, xt.html
MIIT, Ministry of
Public Security,
Ministry of Finance,
PBoC, State Taxation
Administration,
SAMR, CBIRC,

National Bureau of
Energy
B22 17 Guanyu jiaqiang hulianwang xinxi fuwu CAC, Central http://www.moe.gov.cn/jyb_xxgk/
September suanfa zonghe zhili de zhidao yijian Propaganda moe_1777/moe_1779/202109/t20
(Guiding Opinions on Strengthening Department, Ministry 210929_568182.html
Overall Governance of Internet of Education,
Information Service Algorithms) Ministry of Science
and Technology,
MIIT, Ministry of
Public Security,
Mnistry of Culture
and Tourism, SAMR,
NRTA
B22 24 Guanyu jinyibu fangfan he chuzhi xuni PBoC, CAC, Supreme http://www.gov.cn/zhengce/zheng
September huobi jiaoyi chaozuo fengxian de tongzhi People’s Court, ceku/2021-
(Notice concerning Further Preventing and Supreme People’s 10/08/content_5641404.htm
Handling Virtual Currency Trading Procuratorate, MIIT,
Speculation Risks) Ministry of Public
Security, SAMR,
CBIRC, CSRC,
Foreign Exchange
Burau
B23 23 October Zhonghua Renmin Gongheguo National People’s http://www.npc.gov.cn/flcaw/flca/f
fanlongduan fa (Xiuzheng cao’an) (Anti- Congress f8081817ca258e9017ca5fa67290
Monopoly Law of the People’s Republic of 806/attachment.pdf
China (Revision Draft))
B24 29 October Shuju chujing anquan pinggu banfa CAC http://www.gov.cn/zhengce/zheng
(zengqiu yijian gao) (Outbound Data ceku/2022-
Transfer Security Assessment Measures 07/08/content_5699851.htm
(Draft for Comment))
B25 29 October Hulianwang pingtai fenlei fenji zhinan SAMR https://www.samr.gov.cn/hd/zjdc/2
(zhenqiu yijian gao) (Internet Platform 02110/t20211027_336137.html
Categorization and Classification
Guidelines (Draft for Comment))
B26 29 October Hulianwang pingtai luoshi zhuti zeren SAMR https://www.samr.gov.cn/hd/zjdc/2
zhinan (zhenqiu yijian gao) (Internet 02110/t20211027_336137.html
Platform Dominant Responsibility
Implementation Guidelines (Draft for
Comment)
B27 29 October Guanyu jinyibu jiaqiang yufang Ministry of http://www.moe.gov.cn/srcsite/A0
zhongxiaoxuesheng chenmi wangluo Education, Central 6/s3321/202110/t20211029_5761
youxi guanly gongzuo de tongzhi (Notice Propaganda 40.html
concerning Management Work to Further Department, CAC,
Prevent Online Gaming Addiction among MIIT, Ministry of
Primary and Secondary School Students) Public Security,
SAMR
B28 14 Wangluo shuju anquan guanli tiaoli CAC http://www.cac.gov.cn/2021-
November (zhengqiu yijian gao) (Online Data Security 11/14/c_1638501991577898.htm
Management Regulations (Draft for
Comment)
B29 23 Guanyu jinyibu jiaqiang yule mingxing CAC http://society.people.com.cn/n1/20
November wangshang xinxi guifan xiangguan 21/1123/c1008-32289458.html
gongzuo de tongzhi (Notice concerning
Further Strengthening Work Related to
Standardizing Entertainment Stars’ Online
Information)
B30 20 Hulianwang zongjiao xinxi fuwu guanli State Administration http://www.gov.cn/gongbao/conte
December banfa (Internet Religious Information of Religious Affairs, nt/2022/content_5678093.htm
Service Management Rules) CAC, MIIT, Ministry
of Public Security,
Ministry of State
Security
B31 24 Guanyu jingnei qiye jingwai faxing CSRC http://www.csrc.gov.cn/csrc/c1019
December zhengjuan he shangshi de guanli guiding 81/c1662244/content.shtml
(zhengqiu yijian gao)
B32 24 Jingnei qiye jingwai faxing zhengjuan he CSRC http://www.csrc.gov.cn/csrc/c1019
December shangshi bei’an guanli banfa (zhenqiu 81/c1662251/content.shtml
yijian gao)
B33 24 Zhonghua Renmin Gongheguo Gonghui Fa NPC http://www.npc.gov.cn/npc/c3083
December (Trade Union Law of the People’s Republic 4/202112/0f425fe175fb410e8b01f
of China) (Revision) 67c8aabba8f.shtml

B34 27 Waishang touzi zhunru tebie guanli cuoshi NDRC, Ministry of http://www.gov.cn/zhengce/zheng
December (fumian qingdan) (2021 nian ban) Special Commerce ceku/2021-
Management Measures for Foreign 12/28/content_5664886.htm
Investment Access (Negative List) (2021
Version)
B35 28 Wangluo anquan shencha banfa CAC, NDRC, MIIT, http://www.mofcom.gov.cn/article/
December (Cybersecurity Review Measures) Ministry of Public zcfb/zczh/202004/202004029594
Security, Ministry of 28.shtml
State Security,
Ministry of Finance,
Ministry of
Commerce, PBoC,
SAMR, NRTA, State
Secrets Bureau, State
Cryptography
Management Bureau
B36 31 Jinrong chanpin wangluo yingxiao guanli PBoC, MIIT, CAC, http://www.cac.gov.cn/2021-
December banfa (zhenqiu yijian gao) (Financial CBIRC, CSRC, 12/31/c_1642548458382007.htm
Product Online Marketing Management Foreign Exchange
Rules (Draft for Comment)) Bureau, National
Intellectual Property
Bureau
B37 31 Hulianwang xinxi fuwu suanfa tuicun CAC, MIIT, Ministry http://www.cac.gov.cn/2022-
December guanli guiding (Internet Information Service of Public Security, 01/04/c_1642894606364259.htm
Algorithmic Recommendation SAMR
Management Provisions)
2022
B38 5 January Yidong hulianwang yingyong chengxu CAC http://www.cac.gov.cn/2022-
xinxi fuwu guanli guiding (zhenqiu yijian 01/05/c_1642983962594050.htm
gao) (Mobile Internet Application
Programme Information Service
Management Regulations) (Opinion-
seeking Draft)
B39 22 January Hulianwang yonghu zhanghao xinxi fuwu CAC http://www.cac.gov.cn/2021-
guanli guiding (Internet User Account 01/22/c_1612887880656609.htm
Information Service Management
Provisions)
B40 28 January Hulianwang xinxi fuwu shendu hecheng CAC http://www.moj.gov.cn/pub/sfbgw/
guanli guiding (zhenqiu yijian gao) lfyjzj/lflfyjzj/202201/t20220128_4
(Internet Information Service Deep 47316.html
Integration Management Provisions)
B41 1 March Guanyu Shenli wangluo xiaofei jiufen Supreme People’s https://www.chinacourt.org/law/de
anjian shiyong falü ruogan wenti de Court tail/2022/03/id/150363.shtml
guiding (Provisions concerning Some
Questions of Applicable Law in Handling
Online Consumer Dispute Cases)
B42 2 March Hulianwang danchuang xinxi tuisong fuwu CAC http://www.cac.gov.cn/2022-
guanli guiding (zhenqiu yijian gao) 03/02/c_1647826956995841.htm
(Internet Pop-up Window Information
Recommendation Service Management
Provisions (Draft for Comment)
B43 14 March Weichengnianren wangluo baohu tiaoli CAC http://www.cac.gov.cn/2022-
(zienqiu yijian gao) (Regulations for the 03/14/c_1648865100662480.htm
Online Protection of Minors (Draft for
Comment))
B44 25 March Guanyu jinyibu guifan wangluo zhibo CAC, State Taxation http://www.gov.cn/zhengce/zheng
yingli xingwei cujin hangye jiankang Administration, ceku/2022-
fazhan de yijian (Opinions concerning SAMR 03/31/content_5682636.htm
Further standardizing Online Live-
Streaming Commercial Activities and
Stimulating the Healthy Development of
the Sector)
B45 12 April Guanyu jiaqiang wangluo shiting jiemu NRTA, Central http://www.nrta.gov.cn/art/2022/4/
pingtai youxi zhibo guanli de tongzhi Propaganda 15/art_113_60105.html
(Notice concerning Strengthening Online Department
Audiovisual Programme Platform Game
Livestreaming Management)
B46 7 May Guanyu guifan wangluo zhibo dashang Central Civilization http://www.nrta.gov.cn/art/2022/5/
jiashang weichengnianren baohu de yijian Office, Ministry of 7/art_113_60309.html
(Opinions concerning Standardizing Culture and Tourism,
NRTA, CAC

Online Livestreaming Compensation and
Strengthening the Protection of Minors)
B47 14 June Yidong hulianwang yingyong chengxu CAC http://www.gov.cn/xinwen/2022-
xinxi fuwu guanli guiding (Mobile Internet 06/14/content_5695690.htm
Application Programme Information
Service Management Regulations)
B48 24 June Zhonghua renmin gongheguo fan NPC https://www.chinalawtranslate.co
longduan fa (Anti-Monopoly Law of the m/anti-monopoly-law-2022/
People’s Republic of China)
B49 25 June Zhonghua Renmin Gongheguo fan dianxin NPC https://www.secrss.com/articles/43
wangluo zhapian fa (Anti- 999?mc_cid=23b9e3a063&mc_ei
Telecommunications and Online Fraud d=ad7c94e0d8
Law of the People’s Republic of China)
B50 27 June Hulianwang yonghu zhanghao xinxi guanli CAC http://www.gov.cn/zhengce/zheng
guiding (Internet User Account Information ceku/2022-
Management Regulations) 06/28/content_5698179.htm
B51 7 July Shuju chujing anquan pinggu banfa CAC http://www.gov.cn/zhengce/zheng
(Outbound Data Transfer Security ceku/2022-
Assessment Measures) 07/08/content_5699851.htm
B52 9 Hulianwang danchuang xinxi tuisong fuwu CAC, MIIT, SAMR http://www.gov.cn/zhengce/zheng
September guanli guiding (Internet Pop-up Window ceku/2022-
Information Recommendation Service 09/09/content_5709179.htm
Management Regulations)
B53 22 Zhonghua Renmin Gongheguo fan bu NPC, SAMR https://www.samr.gov.cn/hd/zjdc/2
November zhengdang jingzheng fa (xiuding cao’an 02211/t20221121_351812.html
zhenqiu yijian gao) (Anti-Unfair
Competition Law of the People’s Republic
of China) (Revision Draft for Public
Comment)
B54 25 Hulianwang xinxi fuwu shendu hecheng CAC, MIIT, Ministry http://www.gov.cn/zhengce/zheng
November guanli guiding (Internet Information Service of Public Security ceku/2022-
Deep Integration Management Provisions) 12/12/content_5731431.htm
B55 3 Guanyu guifan “yinhang” ziyang shiyong CBIRC, CAC, MIIT, https://www.yn.gov.cn/ztgg/lqhm/l
December youguan shixiang de tongzhi (Notice SAMR qzc/gbhqwj/202212/t20221206_2
concerning Issues Related to the 51211.html
Standardized Use of the Word “Bank”)
C: Policy documents:
# Date Title Issuing authority Reference

2021
C01 13 May Zhonghua Renmin Gongheguo guomin NPC http://www.gov.cn/xinwen/2021-
jingji he shehui fazhan di shisi ge wunian 03/13/content_5592681.htm
guihua he 2035 nian yuanjing mubiao
gangyao (Outline of the People’s Republic
of China 14th Five-Year Plan for National
Economic and Social Development and
Long-Range Objectives for 2035)
C02 12 July Wangluo anquan chanye gao zhiliang MIIT https://www.miit.gov.cn/gzcy/yjzj
fazhan sannian xingdong guihua (2021- /
2023 nian) (zhenqiu yijian gao) (Three-Year art/2021/
Action Plan for the High-Quality art_34f89fff961b4862bf0c39353
Development of the Cybersecurity Industry 2e2bf63.html
(2021-2023) (Draft for Solicitation of
Opinions))
C03 8 Zhongguo ertong fazhan gangyao (2010- State Council http://www.gov.cn/zhengce/conte
September 2030 nian) (Development Outline for the nt/
Children of China) (2010-2030) 2021-
09/27/content_5639412.htm
C04 15 Guanyu jinyibu Yashi wangzhan pingtai CAC http://www.gov.cn/zhengce/zhen
September xinxi neirong guanli zhuti zeren de yijian gceku/2021-
(Opinions concerning Further Consolidating 09/16/content_5637727.htm
the Main Responsibility of Website
Platforms for Information Content
Management)
C05 12 “Shisi wu” shuzi jingji fazhan guihua (“14th State Council http://www.gov.cn/zhengce/conte
December Five-Year Plan” for Digital Economic nt/2022-
Development) 01/12/content_5667817.htm
C06 24 Guanyu tuidong pingtai jingji guifan NDRC, SAMR, CAC, https://www.ndrc.gov.cn/xxgk/zcf
December jiankang chixu fazhan de ruogan yijian MIIT, Ministry of b/
(Opinions concerning Promoting the Human Resources

Standardized, Healthy and Sustained and Social Security, tz/202201/t20220119_1312326.
Development of the Platform Economy) Ministry of Rural html
Affairs, Ministry of
Commerce, PBoC,
State Taxation
Administration
C07 24 “Shisi wu” tuijin guojia zhengwu xinxihua NDRC http://www.gov.cn/zhengce/zhen
December guihua (“14th Five-Year Plan” for Advancing gceku/2022-
Informatization of Government Affairs) 01/06/content_5666746.htm
C08 28 “Shisi wu” guojia xinxihua guihua (“14th Central Committee https://www.gov.cn/xinwen/2021
December Five-Year Plan” for National for Cybersecurity and -
Informatization) Informatization 12/28/5664873/files/1760823a10
3e4d75ac681564fe481af4.pdf
2022
C09 5 January Jinrong keji fazhan guihua (2022-2025 PBoC http://www.gov.cn/xinwen/2022-
nian) (Fintech Development Plan (2022- 01/05/content_5666525.htm
2025)
C10 15 June Guanyu fan longduan zhuanjia mingdan de Beijing Municipal https://www.sohu.com/a/559189
gonggao (Announcement concerning the Administration of 250_121106842
Name List of Anti-Monopoly Experts) Market Regulation
C11 28 Guanyu shuzi jingji fazhan qingkuang de NDRC https://www.ndrc.gov.cn/fzggw/w
October baogao ld/hlf/lddt/202211/t20221116_13
41446.html
C12 28 Guanyu jinyibu wanshan zhengce huanjing NDRC http://www.gov.cn/zhengce/zhen
October jiada lidu zhichi minjian touzi fazhan de gceku/2022-
yijian (Opinions concerning Further 11/07/content_5725127.htm
Perfecting the Policy Environment and
Strengthening Support for the Development
of Private Investment
C13 2 Guanyu guijian shuju jichu zhidu geng hao Central Committee, http://politics.people.com.cn/n1/
December fahui shuju yaosu zuoyong de yijian State Council 2022/1220/c1001-
32589920.html
D: Major enforcement actions
# Date Description Authority Reference

D01 10 April 18 billion RMB antitrust fine against SAMR https://www.samr.gov.cn/fldes/tzg
Alibaba g/xzcf/202204/t20220424_34193
0.html
D02 8 May Qinglang campaign. Focus areas: CAC http://m2.people.cn/news/toutiao.
historical nihilism, algorithm abuse, html?s=MV8wXzE0OTgxOTYyXz
online “water armies”, online protection QwODFfMTYyMDUxMzAxNA=
for minors, push notification and pop-up =
windows, online accounts and fan
activities
D03 2-5 July Cybersecurity review against Didi, CAC http://www.cac.gov.cn/2021-
Huochebang, Boss Zhipin and 07/02/c_1626811521011934.ht
Yunmanman; Didi app suspended over m;
data concerns https://www.chinacourt.org/articl
e/detail/2021/07/id/6134032.sht
ml
D04 7 July SAMR fines in 22 cases of engaging in SAMR https://www.samr.gov.cn/xw/zj/2
operator concentration 02107/t20210707_332396.html
D05 26 July MIIT launches campaign on online MIIT http://www.xinhuanet.com/politi
market order cs/2021-
07/26/c_1127695852.htm
D06 8 3,4 billion RMB antitrust fine againt SAMR https://www.samr.gov.cn/xw/zj/2
October Meituan 02110/t20211008_335364.html
D07 20 SAMR fines in 43 cases of engaging in SAMR https://www.samr.gov.cn/xw/zj/2
Novembe operator concentration 02111/t20211119_337049.html
r
D08 20 Livestreamer Viya fined 1,3 billion RMB State Taxation http://www.chinatax.gov.cn/chin
Decembe for tax evasion Administration atax/n810219/c102025/c517150
r 8/content.html
2022
D09 5 January SAMR fines in 13 cases of engaging in SAMR https://www.reuters.com/article/c
operator concentration hina-samr-antitrust-tencent-0105-
idCNKBS2JF0B8
D10 12 March SAMR fines in 10 cases of engaging in SAMR https://www.samr.gov.cn/xw/zj/2
operator concentration 02103/t20210312_326737.html

D11 14 March Tencent under investigation for money PBoC https://www.wsj.com/articles/tenc
laundering violations ent-faces-possible-record-fine-for-
anti-money-laundering-
violations-11647242561
D12 15 March CAC investigation of Douban CAC http://www.cac.gov.cn/2022-
03/15/c_1648951412843416.ht
m
D13 17 March Qinglang campaign. Focus areas: CAC https://www.shdf.gov.cn/shdf/con
livestreaming, multi-channel networks, tents/767/443665.html
online rumours, online environment for
minors, information service apps, online
broadcasting, algorithms, online “water
armies”, online accounts
D14 10 July SAMR fines in 28 cases of engaging in SAMR https://www.samr.gov.cn/fldes/tzg
operator concentration g/xzcf/202207/t20220710_34852
3.html
D15 21 July Didi fined 8 billion RMB after CAC http://www.cac.gov.cn/2022-
cybersecurity review 07/21/c_1660021534306352.ht
m
Acknowledgements
This paper was funded by the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO), project
016.Vidi.185.200

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The Great Rectification: A New Paradigm for China’s Online Platform Economy

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The growing political importance of platform companies

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The substance of the Rectification

1. Macro-economic risk management

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2: Online content, ideology, and morality

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3: Regulating the digital market

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4: Addressing emerging social concerns

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5: Countering foreign adversaries

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6: Achieving the Party’s technological development aims

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Implementation, enforcement and corporate response

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Bandurski, David. 2017. “Cashing In on Dystopia,” 3 January, The China Project,

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# Date Event Reference

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B: Laws and Regulations

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# Date Title Issuing authority Reference

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D: Major enforcement actions

# Date Description Authority Reference

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