The Regulation of Generative AI in China

Abstract The rapid development of AI applications, and in particular the emergence of ChatGPT, triggered a rapid response by Chinese regulators, who have started to lay the groundwork for the comprehensive regulation of AI-generated content. This approach seeks to balance political considerations, and in particular concerns surrounding politically undesirable and destabilizing content, on the one hand, and China’s bid to attain global AI leadership on the other. This chapter reviews how Chinese policymakers’ perceptions and interventions have evolved on the basis of technological developments and their own learning processes, and how this will shape the development of generative AI technologies in China.