The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) has accused its opponents of hiring an “Internet army,” citing this army’s supposed activities as an explanation for why it lost last year’s nine-in-one elections so comprehensively. As a result, it has put a great deal of effort into post-election efforts to improve its communications with the nation’s netizens — yet such efforts might be in vain, as the workings of the virtual world do not coincide with the KMT’s projections.
The KMT and its candidates were stung by harshly critical and satirical remarks from netizens during last year’s election campaign, while Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) candidates and independent Taipei mayoral candidate Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) generally received favorable online treatment, leading the pan-blue camp to repeatedly accuse its opponents of paying netizens to spread negative remarks about the party and its nominees.
Following the elections, a major topic of discussion in the KMT was how to defend against the “Internet army,” or how to win over netizens before the next election.
To that purpose, Premier Mao Chi-kuo (毛治國) yesterday invited online marketing experts to present a lecture to members of the Cabinet on how to communicate with Internet users.
However, such efforts to better communicate with netizens are misguided, as the key to turning online public opinion around lies in good governance, not in presentation skills.
For those KMT heavyweights who are unfamiliar with the virtual world, the Internet might seem a mysterious or magical place — a platform that could be easily manipulated — but that is just not how it works.
The Internet might be compared to places — such as the forums of the Roman Empire, salons in France during the Age of Enlightenment, or the temples and marketplaces of Taiwan in a previous era — where people gathered to talk about politics, and thus public opinion was formed.
People would comment according to their feelings or perceptions; when the government performed well, they would praise it; otherwise, they would criticize it, make fun of politicians and pin their hopes on the opposition parties.
That is how the Internet works as well: The medium might be different, but the way it works is more or less the same.
The KMT accuses the opposition of paying netizens to criticize the party, but DPP Taichung City Councilor Chiang Chao-kuo (江肇國) also came under fire online recently after he reportedly “humiliated” a police officer when he failed to pursuade the officer to cancel some tickets, and do not forget that when former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) was in power, and during the initial years of President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) first term, online public opinion was very critical to the former president, and very favorable to Ma.
In fact, Ma is not the first government leader to try to improve the government’s online image. Both the DPP administration and the KMT administration have made numerous efforts to channel the criticisms of netizens, yet none of these efforts have been successful.
As the Internet becomes an increasingly important channel by which people express political views, government officials should stop treating the medium as a separate and somewhat magical entity that requires special attention.
The government only needs to focus on good governance — when the majority of the people approve of what the government does, it will naturally receive positive online feedback.
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