Corruption finds foe in microblogs

Microblogs and other social media have turned out to be effective and efficient tools for exposing official corruption in China, according to a report released Monday by academics from Shanghai Jiao Tong University.

The report not only showed an increase in the number of corruption and official misconduct cases that caught widespread public attention on Chinese social media from 2010 to 2012, but a decrease in the time it took for authorities to launch an investigation after the cases were first publicized.

Researchers at the university's Public Opinion Research Laboratory analyzed 260 hot-button issues from 2010 to 2012, according to the report. The number of corruption and official misconduct cases that got traction on microblogs or other social media rose to 105 in 2012 from 78 in 2010.

Authorities have also been acting faster to deal with more cases that blow up on the Internet. In 36 percent of the cases in 2012, government agencies declared that they had opened an investigation or had taken other action within 24 hours of the case spreading online, up from 29 percent in 2011 and 15 percent in 2010, the report said.

"Information spreads rapidly online," said Xie Yungeng, the report's chief compiler. "Under pressure from the public, the government has to move fast before the situation becomes more difficult to handle."

In one of the more salacious cases, Lei Zhengfu, a district Party chief in Chongqing Municipality, found himself the target of an investigation within 63 hours of a microblogger leaking a video of him having sex. In June, Lei was sentenced to 13 years in prison for bribery. Before social media and the Internet, whistle-blowers in China usually resorted to calling or writing to local prosecutor's offices and disciplinary authorities. Answers could be a longtime coming, if they came at all.

A whistle-blower surnamed Chen waited for two years for a response to his letters and petitions about a senior judge on the Shanghai Higher People's Court whom he accused of mishandling a case he was involved in.

He did not receive replies from officials in Shanghai, according to an interview with Chen on Zhejiang Satellite TV. He then anonymously posted a video showing four court officials in a nightclub with prostitutes, which sparked an investigation.

The report also found that 55 percent of hot-button issues lasted less than a week. About 18 percent lasted from seven to 14 days. Issues that lasted from two weeks to a month aroused the most attention from the media and the public.

"Our findings showed that hot-button issues have their own life cycle. Some cases quiet down and disappear from public view as other issues replace them. The cases vary a lot depending on whether intervention, such as crisis communication, was needed," Xie told the Global Times.

Traditional media still played an essential role as it remained an important venue for the government to make statements about investigations into exposed corruption cases, the report said. More than 60 percent of such information was revealed in media interviews.