Spineless Yahoo, Google, Cisco and Microsoft
My guest blogger, Confidential Reporter got me to thinking when he wrote his Blogger’s Editorial Wish-list. And I still don’t know the answer…so forgive me for thinking out loud.
I read a report by Jim Hoagland of the Washington Post which brings up the point of how corporate America argues that a free market will lead to freedom in China.
Yahoo, Google, Cisco, and Microsoft provided a link to this argument hoping it would appear in higher in the rankings of public opinion and otherwise meaningless searches after they agreed to help Beijing censor or spy on dissidents.
Hoagland goes on to say that America tried this in South Africa by doing business-as-usual with the racist apartheid regime. It didn’t work. Nothing changed until US companies began to demand equal opportunities for blacks.
Is something like this called for in China? Do US businesses need to get involved in politics to make a difference for the average Chinese – and not at the department store?
I can’t imagine the spineless businesses here in the valley doing so – what they want is to make more money – regardless of how.
I am not a political activist. And I don’t know the answer to these questions.
Can anybody help me?
It’s more about culture than politics.
Labling everything politics does not help solve probelms. American standards work in america, may work in the UK, but may not necessarily work in every other country. What’s the fuss all about then? After all, companies are profit driven, and bound to head anywhere there is money to be made. And these companies have done the right thing by following local custom.
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