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Vietnam is a complex country. Wikipedia gives more background: > Vietnam is a unitary Marxist-Leninist one-party socialist republic, one of the two communist s

Vietnam is a complex country. Wikipedia gives more background: > Vietnam is a unitary Marxist-Leninist one-party socialist republic, one of the two communist states (the other being Laos) in Southeast Asia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vietnam#Government_and_politics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vietnam#Government_and_politic... Politically, it's still an autocratic state, but economically the country has opened up to the global market since the 1980's, not unlike China. > Human rights have long been a matter of much controversy between the Government of Vietnam and some international human rights organizations and Western governments, particularly that of the United States. Under the current constitution, the Communist Party of Vietnam is the only one allowed to rule, the operation of all other political parties being outlawed. Other human rights issues concern freedom of association, freedom of speech, and freedom of the press. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_in_Vietnam https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_in_Vietnam Vietnam is home to several ethnic minorities and a range of religions and beliefs. There haven been frequent regional tensions and uprisings over the past decades and Vietnam itself has also had disputes over borders with Cambodia and China right after the end of the Vietnam War. Vietnam and Facebook have a rocky past, but Facebook is well embedded in Vietnamese society by now. For instance, it is a bedrock for small business owners as it allows them to escape restrictions which are enforced on street shops. So, it's a source of wealth, but at the same time, it irks authorities enough to create tensions. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-11-07/vietnam-relies-on-once-banned-facebook-to-kick-start-businesses https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-11-07/vietnam-r...

zentiggr 7y ago
So if Facebook pulls out of Vietnam, their economy is likely to suffer because of their own internal politics. Sounds like another excellent reason to leave the country and refuse to support the regime until actual democracy is in place. (Of course, you could say that argues that companies should leave the US now as well, but that's another can of worms.) Facebook doesn't have any requirement to be embedded in society, anywhere. And regardless of its spot benefits anywhere, it is still an overall negative influence.
- CaptArmchair 7y ago
  Good points! If Facebook pulls out, the general population - not the economic or political elites - will suffer for it. A political regime based on a framework of democratic values, beliefs and morals can only emerge if there's infrastructure to spread the idea: press, education, common causes and interests and so on are needed before change happens. Facebook is just one element in that change. There's the narrative that Facebook enabled the Arab Spring uprisings. It did so because it filled the vacuum where free and independent press would exist. You're right, Facebook doesn't have any requirement to be embedded in society. It's a private company. And one that claims to be anything but a content publisher (to avoid all kinds of pesky litigation). However, everyone has embraced and incorporated Facebook into the fabric of society due to it's ease of use. And so Facebook very much has a moral responsibility similar to that of any newspaper company. After all, newspapers ranging from NYT to WaPo to the Globe aren't inherently required to publish (inter)nationally. They were originally local newspapers. The big issue with Facebook is that it has acknowledged that it is as an advertising business, while people clearly want to use it as a publishing platform to spread ideas. There's a massive amount of dissonance to the detriment of everyone, including Facebook which gets a bad rep for it's actions.

zentiggr 7y ago

So if Facebook pulls out of Vietnam, their economy is likely to suffer because of their own internal politics. Sounds like another excellent reason to leave the country and refuse to support the regime until actual democracy is in place. (Of course, you could say that argues that companies should leave the US now as well, but that's another can of worms.) Facebook doesn't have any requirement to be embedded in society, anywhere. And regardless of its spot benefits anywhere, it is still an overall negative influence.

CaptArmchair 7y ago
Good points! If Facebook pulls out, the general population - not the economic or political elites - will suffer for it. A political regime based on a framework of democratic values, beliefs and morals can only emerge if there's infrastructure to spread the idea: press, education, common causes and interests and so on are needed before change happens. Facebook is just one element in that change. There's the narrative that Facebook enabled the Arab Spring uprisings. It did so because it filled the vacuum where free and independent press would exist. You're right, Facebook doesn't have any requirement to be embedded in society. It's a private company. And one that claims to be anything but a content publisher (to avoid all kinds of pesky litigation). However, everyone has embraced and incorporated Facebook into the fabric of society due to it's ease of use. And so Facebook very much has a moral responsibility similar to that of any newspaper company. After all, newspapers ranging from NYT to WaPo to the Globe aren't inherently required to publish (inter)nationally. They were originally local newspapers. The big issue with Facebook is that it has acknowledged that it is as an advertising business, while people clearly want to use it as a publishing platform to spread ideas. There's a massive amount of dissonance to the detriment of everyone, including Facebook which gets a bad rep for it's actions.