In China where the term “human flesh search” first appeared and became a controversial issue, the internet populism(網路民粹主義) also plays an important role in it. It is hard to make a specific definition of populism. An English political theorist Margaret Canovan stated that populism puts emphasis on the masses’ thoughts and that the society can be reformed by the group power. The Chinese government is on the top of the social status and controls all the distribution of profit which also increases the poverty gap (貧富差距) after Chinese economic reforms. For the masses, the common people, who have complaints about the upper reaches of society, the Internet provides a good way to speak for themselves. They can use the group power like human flesh search to find out something illegal such as the Chinese venal officials’infamous behaviors. It is too late for the judiciary to represent the masses to crack down the crime.
Furthermore, the Chinese Netinens have the following characteristics(侯政男、蔡宗哲,2013):
(1) They are younger and low-edcationed, which cause them to have more immature and irrational comments.
(2) They are potential proponents of populism.
(3) They usually have the psychological expectations that the law does not punish a group of people(法不責眾). Each of them only takes a little part of the collaboration in human flesh search. They can hide behind the big group of netizens and say anything without being afraid of the law.
(4) They have strong moral senses.

Reference

侯政男、蔡宗哲（2013）。《嚴格管制下的中國網路民粹主義狂歡現象分析：理論建構初探》，中華傳播學會 2013 年會論文 http://ccs.nccu.edu.tw/history_paper_content.php?P_ID=1487&P_YEAR=2013。