Channels, Fall 2018

Channels • 2018 • Volume 3 • Number 1 Page 129 further denotes that liberalism relies on three “core assumptions,” namely the “Primacy of Societal Actors,” “Representation and State Preferences,” and “Interdependence and the International System” (“The configuration of interdependent state preferences determines state behavior”). This approach emphasizes the accession of power by means of a healthy sphere of cooperation, which applies directly to world powers that achieved their position through capitalist networking and international diplomatic goodwill. In contrast, Mearsheimer (2001) describes realism as the belief that “power is the currency of international politics” (pg. 72) and thus “Great powers, the main actors in the realists’ account, pay careful attention to how much economic and military power they have relative to each other.” This approach greatly emphasizes the competitive nature of international relations, and thereby points to the overarching goal of international cooperation, that being the betterment of one’s own nation. In this context, liberalist international policies of the USA and the PRC exist because cooperation is necessary for improving the national economic situation, an ultimately realist goal. While liberalist policies may be the norm among modern developed nations, the USA and the PRC ultimately use such policies for realist means. Having addressed what scholars delineate as prevailing international relations theories, the discussion naturally turns toward how government surveillance links to these ideologies to practice. Surveillance policy scholars Ball and Wood’s (2013) Surveillance and Society article “Political Economies of Surveillance” kicks off this discussion with the important observation that government surveillance practices cannot be considered in and of themselves and must be contextualized in terms of related politics and economics, the ideology and goals of the government, and the implementation therewith. The authors explain that “we seek to secure our homeland precisely so that we can enjoy the full benefits- economic and otherwise” (pg. 2). Ball and Wood point to the proliferation of public CCTV surveillance systems in the USA as demonstrative of a desire for greater protection against terrorist activity in the post 9/11 world but highlight the importance of considering “the way in which surveillance works in and for government,” especially in regard to the national economy. This also applies to the PRC, as is seen in government surveillance scholar David Wood’s (2017) “The Global Turn to Authoritarianism and After.” The PRC has not suffered a terrorist attack of the same magnitude as September 11th, 2001, but as Wood explains, it demonstrates authoritarian behavior in that its surveillance policy is geared towards gathering data from the connotation of “what is necessary or potentially useful to ensure the persistence of the state and its control” (pg. 362). Having achieved continued economic success, the government of the PRC seeks also to achieve greater protection and by definition control over its society in order to preserve that success. CCTV Implementation and Application Having examined the idea that government surveillance results from a primary wish to protect economic interests, the next portion of the discussion addresses the more practical question of how CCTV surveillance networks actually serve means of protecting urban centers, those being crucial factors in national economic success. McCahill, Norris, and Wood (2002), in their published work for Surveillance and Society on the growth of CCTV surveillance from a global perspective, outline the four stages of development in the proliferation of CCTV networks. They define those stages as “Private Diffusion” (pg. 119) wherein CCTV first becomes popular in the private business sector, “Institutional Diffusion” into the public sector that involves the installation of CCTV networks in areas of “public infrastructure” (schools, transportation hubs, etc.), “Limited Diffusion” into public zones in general, including urban centers and city streets (often justified on a basis of crime prevention), and “Towards Ubiquity” of surveillance involving more comprehensive and extensive systems that cover an entire city. They posit in their research that the most significant factor that drives this process in the USA is the “heightened security concern following the September 11, 2001