How Social Media Facilitate the Governance of the Underground Economy: The Case of Petty Smuggling in Macao SAR, China.

This paper examines how social media platforms are utilized to solve the problem of goods-related scams by smugglers in Macao's petty smuggling industry. By collecting primary data through 61 interviews, fieldwork in a petty smuggling hotspot between Macao and mainland China, and cyber-ethnography i...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Publicado en:British Journal of Criminology Vol. 66; no. 5; pp. 940 - 959
Autores principales: Yang, Haiyan, Xu, Jianhua
Formato: Artículo
Publicado: Oxford University Press / USA Sep2026
Materias:
Acceso en línea:Ver este registro en EBSCOhost
fields @attributes:
  recordID: 1
pdfLink:
plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=ssf&AN=196418909&site=ehost-live
header:
  @attributes:
    shortDbName: ssf
    uiTerm: 196418909
    longDbName: Social Sciences Full Text (H.W. Wilson)
    uiTag: AN
  controlInfo:
    bkinfo:
    jinfo:
      jid:
        00070955
        BJC
      jtl: British Journal of Criminology
      issn: 00070955
      maglogo: N
    pubinfo:
      dt: Sep2026
      vid: 66
      iid: 5
      pid: 622
      pub: Oxford University Press / USA
    artinfo:
      ui:
        196418909
        10.1093/bjc/azaf066
      ppf: 940
      ppct: 19
      formats:
      tig:
        atl: How Social Media Facilitate the Governance of the Underground Economy: The Case of Petty Smuggling in Macao SAR, China.
      aug:
        au:
          Yang, Haiyan
          Xu, Jianhua
        affil: Department of Sociology, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Macau, Rm. 3001, E21B, Humanity and Social Sciences Building, Av. da Universidade, Taipa, Macao SAR, China
      su:
        China
        Macau (China : Special Administrative Region)
        Social media
        Online identities
        Informal sector
        Ethnology research
        Smuggling
        Organizational governance
        Real-time control
      sug:
        subj:
          Social media
          Online identities
          Informal sector
          Ethnology research
          China
          Macau (China : Special Administrative Region)
          Smuggling
          Organizational governance
          Real-time control
      keyword:
        copyrightHolder:Centre for Crime and Justice Studies (formerly ISTD)
        copyrightYear:2026
        inLanguage:en
        Macao
        publisher:Oxford University Press
        sameAs:https://dx.doi.org/10.1093/bjc/azaf066
        smuggling
        social media
        copyrightHolder:Centre for Crime and Justice Studies (formerly ISTD)
        copyrightYear:2026
        inLanguage:en
        Macao
        publisher:Oxford University Press
        sameAs:https://dx.doi.org/10.1093/bjc/azaf066
        smuggling
        social media
      ab: This paper examines how social media platforms are utilized to solve the problem of goods-related scams by smugglers in Macao's petty smuggling industry. By collecting primary data through 61 interviews, fieldwork in a petty smuggling hotspot between Macao and mainland China, and cyber-ethnography in two popular Chinese social media platforms Xiaohongshu and WeChat, this paper discovers that some traditional underground economy governance mechanisms such as reputation, hostage-taking, violence and third-party protection have been largely revamped into online background checking, digital ID information sharing, cyber violence and platform penalties. In addition, social media provide a new form of governance: real-time process monitoring. This study not only provides up-to-date empirical data on how petty smuggling takes place between Macao and mainland China but also enriches our understanding of how social media platforms could reshape the governance mechanisms in the underground economy in the digital era.
      pubtype: Academic Journal
      doctype: Article
      src: R
    language: English
    refInfo:
    copyright:
      @attributes:
        flag: N
    holdings:
      @attributes:
        islocal: N