Political Culture of Cyberspace discussion!!!

Is the political culture of cyberspace inherently democratic and transnational in character, or is Beir correct when stating that "meaningful participation in transnational civil society-based networks and practices are not at all equally apportioned across geopolitical space" (806)? If Beir is correct, what does this mean for the role of the "political culture of cyberspace" in the Kyrgyz Republic and Central Asia more generally?

I would say that it is more transitional than democratic, because the political culture of cyberspace, as I think, depends on the regime of every state as our presenters had their case study on Iran and China. Thus, talking about the political culture of Kyrgyzstan and the rest of the Central Asian Republics, I would say each has its own ways of controlling the incoming and outgoing of information through internet in the country. Some have similar restrictions and some have relatively different cyberspace political culture.

I partially agree with what Bier talks about the cyber-culture and partially not. First, there should exist a freely functioning civil society in state where people can express their thoughts and feelings and can openly participant in the cyber-space without any restrictions. Second, in non-democratic states, there is almost no place for such a freely functioning civil society, which basically means that people’s rights on cyber-space are restricted as are discussed in the following paragraphs.

I would say that even in better democratic states, Internet information is being checked mainly due to the national security issues, but in non-democratic states, such as authoritarian and totalitarian; Internet users are being checked not only for security reason, but also for spreading propaganda against regime ideologies that will eventually lead to toppling of the regime.

Coming back to the Central Asia, we can say that the more the society gets democratic, and more restrictions on Internet users decline. For example, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan are considered as authoritarian countries, which mean that in terms of cyber-politics, they have a great sense of Internet censorship in their countries. Basically, they limited those internal and external Internet websites that are threat to the break down of the regime and vis a versa.

On the other hand, if we look at the Kyrgyz Republic as well as Kazakhstan, they are to some extent democratic states, because they allow oppositions to speak and mobilize supporters. Thus, the tendency toward Internet restrictions is less, but they are, I assume, more politicized both by the government and opposition parties. Thus, it could the same for any other non-democratic society.