Paul S

Mike

Process Manager

How can you operate in a country if you don't agree to its laws? If an overseas company entering the UK market broke UK laws on , say, child abuse, we would try and take action.

Different countries have different systems, standards and regulations.

The ethical question therefore is not whether to comply with the laws of a country, but whether you should operate in that country at all. Is the regime and its laws so hideous or repugnant to your own standards that any activity is wrong? Can you do more good than harm by operating there?

Selling arms to a dictator is wrong. Providing humanitarian relief may be for the best even if the regime has created much of the suffering (e.g. Zimbabwe).

So consider China and Google in this context. Is the world going to boycott China? Maybe it should, but isn't going to happen. Is providing access to a host of information bolstering the regime or helping the society open up?
Isn't indicating all blocked information a good thing, as it may increase pressures for information to be opened up? If the search engine market was left to indigenous companies, would that be better or worse for the Chinese people?

Google has weighed all this up, and have reached one conclusion which I think is broadly correct.

Other conclusions are possible. But Google has been very honest and open in its approach and should not be castigated in a simplistic way.