Why the everyday is essential: Navigating censorship and surveillance on WeChat in China

This article examines everyday, non-activist forms of political communication on WeChat in the Beijing region. How is the communication of sensitive issues entwined with other daily communicative practices? And how do users negotiate the Chinese system of online surveillance and censorship? Examining how WeChat users communicate sensitive issues, knowing that every word and image they share can be tracked, analyzed, and acted upon, we, bringing the work of James Scott in dialogue with Chinese internet studies, demonstrate how online contention is openly articulated, but simultaneously obfuscated and disguised. We focus on the sticky super app WeChat, being the central node of the Chinese internet, deeply integrated into everyday life. We argue that, especially in China and other authoritarian contexts, it is vital to situate, study, and analyze online contention within the flows of everyday communication. Confronted by ubiquitous surveillance and censorship, Chinese citizens constantly and consciously calibrate the way they voice or do not voice opinions on sensitive societal issues. By weaving sensitive messages through mundane exchanges on social media, they can hide in plain sight. Yet, we also show that these small forms of resistance are vulnerable, and certainly not bulletproof to state repression and online harassment.