Business and Government Relations (Google

Business and Government Relations (Google in China Case) Future Recommendations for Google's Strategy in China A core part of Google's culture is the concept of being able to be a profitable business without doing evil, as they have mentioned several times throughout the corporate information part of their site.

Ironically the largest opportunity for growth in the next ten years requires partnering with a nation that practices evil in human rights, lacks many of the freedoms Americans and members of westernized nations take for granted, and will not tolerate even a text message of dissent (Gwynne, 2).

With 420 million Internet users or nearly 30% of the total population being online and the growth rate this nation's online population expected to be among the fastest globally according to McKinsey & Company, the market is too attractive to ignore for Google (Daga, Manuel, Narasimhan, 16). Presented below are recommendations for Google in managing and navigating the extremely difficult cultural, ethical and political landscape of China (Hanson, Rothlin, 70, 71).

Recommendations for Google in China First, Google needs to realize that capitulating on their ethical values is potentially disastrous in the long-term of their business model and ability to withstand other nations' demands for control. Google should not back down from China's demands for filtering of citizen's identities as they are a private business and ethically they have the right to protect their customers.

As part of this first recommendation of not capitulating on their ethical foundation and not divulging user identities, Google must state they are willing to align their search strategies to match the culture of China, which is a strategy other businesses attempting to enter the Chinese market rely on (Gwynne, 2). This cultural alignment would respect variations in political requirements in the country yet never violate the trust of the user.

For example, the interior regions of China are extremely conservative politically and will not divulge information about the local government offices online, and Google needs to define this as a strategy in China (Hanson, Rothlin, 79, 80). Google needs to respect this and not index these pages and provide the Chinese government with a technology to provide updates on this auditing process. Second, Google needs to define its operating strategy including its ethical principles as they relate to the Chinese government.

The statement of these ethical principles needs to be developed in conjunction the Chinese government and key Chinese partners to ensure ownership of them. Further, these principles need to set the foundation for arbitrating government concerns and complaints about Google's operations (Hamilton, Knouse, Hill, 145, 146). Third, Google needs to lead the development of a more effective framework for keeping China in compliance to the UN Int'l Covenant on Civil.