Exploring China’s cyber sovereignty concept and artificial intelligence governance model: a machine learning approach

The current global cyber governance model is dominated by Western liberal norms and multi-stakeholder values. Dissatisfied with the status quo, some developing countries like China embrace another governance concept called cyber sovereignty, which advocates more state control. Meanwhile, AI development further enlarges cyberspace’s national security threats, but an international governance framework is absent in the AI realm and China is eager to take the lead in building one. This gives rise to the question: what explains China’s approach to cyber and AI governance? Current studies on cyber sovereignty and China’s AI governance model are mostly qualitative and/or have a small sampling frame, while the meaning of cyber sovereignty is debatable. Therefore, this article applies topic modelling to official/semi-official texts about cyber and AI governance to understand the cyber sovereignty concept and how it shapes China’s approach to AI governance. This article finds that cyber sovereignty is an extension of China’s state-centric view of international order. Not being a passive recipient of norms, China hopes to shape alternative cyber norms to defend national security. Now, since the global community has not reached a consensus over global AI governance, China is exploiting this gap to promote its own set of cyber visions.