Atlantic Community:Open Think Tank Article "China's Olympic Trap"

China's Olympic Trap

Florian Kuhne: China is caught in the question how to behave in preparation of the Olympic Games in summer.

When it became clear that China would carry out the Olympics in 2008, for certain there have been people who thought this as a great chance for the Chinese government to show how advanced, progressive and despite of all critics "democratic-modern" they are. But now the situation turns the other way: China is carefully observed not only by civil-rights-activists but also the whole world community in the forerun of the Olympic Games in summer. And this turns out to be problematically for the Communist Party. Activists and dissidents in China take advantage of the high interest in Chinese politics these days. They know about the assessments of the world community concerning Chinese domestic politics and they try to use this enhanced interest to speak up aganist the government. Rumours in rural regions and now the conflict in Tibet are signs for the dissatisfaction of the Chinese civilists.

Maybe China has fallen in its own trap: by agreeing to host the Olympic Games in Beijing this year, China succeeded in drawing the attention of the international community to itself and to its wrongs.

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March 27, 2008

Donald Stadler, Self-employed, Platinum Contributor (590)

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I think not only China is in a trap of it's own making - the IOC is joined at the hip with China. The IOC has allowed itself to become European centric as symbolised by ithe makeup of it's executive council. There has been a degree of hostility expressed within the IOC to the US and Canada, and it's search for alternate allies has led them to choose Beijing as the site for the 2008 Olympics. This now appears soemthing of a devil's bargain.

Not only because the protests in Tibet and elsewhere show China in a despotic light, but also because of the heavily polluted atmosphere of the Olympic venues. Holding the games in Beijing may not be healthy for the world's athletes. One can only hope that any such consequences of these games may not prove fatal or lasting to any competitor.

Perhaps the IOC should change policy and simply schedule the Olympics in a nice, safe, clean European city every four years with perhaps an occasional digression to Japan or Australia. I think the US can be ruled out for the forseeable future because Atlanta was such a overwhelming debacle (at least in certain pairs of eyes) and becuse the yank's simply aren't civilized enough and despots as well.

April 1, 2008

Donald Stadler, Self-employed, Platinum Contributor (590)

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I think this problem was fairly predictable. One only need look to the Tiananmen Square Massacre to guess that the many Chinese dissidents would make use of the Olympics to - dissent. Not that the Chinese government intends to respond to the protests by steamrolling 5000 dissidents - in public anyway - many more than 5000 may 'disappear', perhaps permanently. But quietly and discreetly.

But once the Olympics opens there is only one way to ensure that unseemly protests don't erupt and embaress the Chinese government during it's 'coming-out' party. They must ruthlessly cordon off the Olympics from their own public! Ordinary Chinese won't be allowed within sniffing distance of the Olympic venues or the places where tourists gather unless they happen to work there. This will be a festival for the international elite, tourists, and the Chinese elite.

Can one say this about other Olympic Games? Perhaps to a degree. High ticket prices can tend to exclude the less-interested members or the poorest of the public from the games, but one suspects that many Australiand got to see the Sydney games without political vetting, and similarly for Seoul, Athens, Barcelona, and even Atlanta. I rather doubt the Brits will close off a part of London to the citizenry in 2012 as I predict the Chinese will do. Thus it appears that the 2008 Games will come to resemble only two previous sets of games - those held in 1936 and in 1980. Hopefully closer to the latter than the former, but I doubt the IOC had replicating even the Moscow Games in mind when they granted the 2008 Games to Bejing.

Or am I being naive?