Why 1984 Medalist Li Ning Lit the Flame at the Beijing 2008 Olympics: The Contribution of the Los Angeles Olympics to China's Market Reforms

After the Communist victory in 1949, the People's Republic of China was excluded from most world organisations. China withdrew from the International Olympic Committee in 1958 in protest over its continued recognition of Taiwan, and since it supported the US boycott of the Moscow 1980 Olympics, it did not return to the summer games until the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics. While the diplomatic importance of those games is well known, their importance for China's economic reforms has not been discussed. The Los Angeles Games not only played an important role in the revitalisation of Chinese national identity, but also provided an eye-popping example of marketised sport and mega-events just as the economic reforms were launched. The Los Angeles Games were the first televised broadcast of the popular culture of the West to a wide Chinese audience. The deep impression they left on their Chinese viewers helped to launch China towards becoming the economic power that it became a quarter of a century later. This was symbolically represented at China's first Olympic Games in 2008, when the Olympic flame was lit by Li Ning, the gold medalist in Los Angeles who founded a sporting goods company that is considered as one of the hallmark cases of the reforms.     

试论奥林匹克运动对构建社会主义和谐社会的影响

2008年奥运会在北京举办,奥林匹克运动在中国的实践和普及,将推动社会经济、政治、文化、科技和外交全面发展,对于推动中国走向世界,提升国际地位,培养全民的公平竞争意识,促进人的身心和谐发展,实现人与自然和谐相处等方面有着积极的推动作用.     

The Transformation of China's National Fitness Policy: From a Major Sports Country to a World Sports Power

For most countries with developed economies, the increasing prevalence of a sedentary lifestyle has led to a decline in adolescents' physical fitness and increased risk of chronic disease and obesity. A common solution to this problem has been to encourage greater youth participation in sports and physical activities. However, there is little evidence to suggest that this approach has been successful. Since the 1984 Los Angeles Olympic Games, the development of elite sports in China has received increasing attention, reaching its climax during the Beijing Olympic Games, where China won the most gold medals. According to a study undertaken by Dong Xinguang, who designed the ‘Outline of the National Fitness Program,’ China's success in elite sports has, to some degree, been built at the expense of the country's national fitness. This study focuses on the sport-for-all policy change, especially the changes to the Peoples Republic of China's (PRC) national fitness policy after an official speech delivered after the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games by the president of the PRC, Hu Jintao, who, for the first time, mentioned the idea of ‘changing from a major sports country to a world sports power.’ In an attempt to help assess the extent of change in China's national fitness policy, this study adopts the five policy change indicators (comprising organization, statutes, budget, personnel, and the media) developed by Hogwood and Peters and Juang. Furthermore, elite theory is adopted as our analytical framework to explain how the political elites have tackled the difficulties in promoting sports in China. Finally, our findings are presented in three parts: the driving forces behind the policy change, policy change reflected in the five dimensions, and the conclusion.     

Guangzhou: The Asian Games and the Chinese ‘Gold-Fest’ – Geopolitical Issues for Australia

At the Guangzhou Asian Games, the performances of China's athletes, the officials and the host city of Guangzhou were outstanding. China's journey to the Asian Games in Guangzhou and the accompanying political and sporting machinations throughout are considered in the initial discussion of this essay. The analysis subsequently focuses on Australia's metamorphosis as an ‘Asian’ nation and the sporting, cultural and diplomatic implications this could have for Australia and China. Would this signal Australia's egress from the Commonwealth Games and the Commonwealth per se, thus cutting the British Imperial umbilicus? The presence of Australia at the Asian Games may also enhance the soft power ambitions China has for its engagement in the Asian Games; succeeding in competitions that include a global sports ‘heavyweight’ like Australia would add kudos to the performances of Chinese athletes. How would Australia benefit from this shift? Considering Australia's geopolitical and economic ties with East Asia would an increased level of sporting engagement with China concomitantly produce cultural, economic and political successes? In the long term, Australia may inevitably become part of the post-colonial East Asian world: the future world of power, wealth and geopolitical influence.     

板球运动的变革与入奥成功的挑战

板球这项古老的运动一个世纪后重新进入奥运会。为什么能快速成长,并成为一项全球化的运动？本文着眼于板球运动的历史渊源和全球化发展,分析板球运动的传统文化传播和演变历程,从板球竞赛的变革解读测试赛、世界杯、亚运会和奥运会,从国际板球组织的全世界发展分析世界板球运动快速成长及中国板球运动的举步维艰,探讨板球运动的变革成长道路及入奥后板球传统国家和新兴国家所面临的机遇与挑战。     

Syria and the Olympics: National Identity on an International Stage

Since its independence in 1946, Syria has fielded a team for every summer Olympic competition except 1956, yet has won only three Olympic medals. In contrast with its smaller, higher-powered neighbour Lebanon, its participation at the Olympics has been consistent but limited, with the country making little impact internationally. Yet the history of Syria's involvement with the Olympics reflects key elements of its political and social history: its ambitious but short-lived partnership with Egypt, the Baathist-supported promotion of women as athletes and head of the National Olympic Committee and its commitment to participation in the vexed but ideologically important Pan-Arab Games. This article uses official International Olympic Committee publications and related press coverage to examine the history of Syria's involvement with the Olympic Games, the Mediterranean Games and the Pan-Arab Games. It argues that Syria's participation was initially important not for its medal count but for the ‘sign of statehood' that membership in the Olympic community conferred, and that its participation in regional games supported Syria's political positions as a Baathist, Arab republic. It concludes by contending that these political commitments have renewed salience as the conflict in Syria that began in March 2011 continues, and the country's participation in Olympic and regional games becomes increasingly politicised.     

People's Daily: An Evolutionary Narrative on Asia in Its Coverage of the Asian Games

Amid the complex international situation and entangled interests, news narration is usually conducted by the government, media and the public together by copying mainstream ideas and concepts. In covering the Asian Games, People's Daily takes on a periodical change in its narration about Asia during the history of China's participation in the Games: in the stage of ‘alienation and struggle’, the narration is focused on politics; in the stage of ‘participation and competition’, the narration becomes two dimensional, touching on both politics and sport; in the stage of ‘hosting the Games and taking the lead’, the narration is further diversified and incorporates politics, sport and culture. Such an evolution takes place in a profound international and historical context, reflecting the changes not only in China's sporting events coverage but also in the ‘mindset and insight’ of Chinese media in covering sporting events and Asia.     

2022年北京冬奥会环保体系的构建与实施研究

我国成功取得2022年冬奥会的举办权,这必将引起对环境保护问题的关注。本文分析了冬奥会与环境之间的密切关系,提出冬奥会中注重环保将促进举办城市地理环境的改善,基础设施的合理规划建设以及社会、经济、环境价值的平衡。与此同时,结合2022年北京冬奥会的环保形势进行研究,由环保教育、环保发展、环保监测、环保评估、环保防治、环保保障六大方面构建北京冬奥会环境保护体系,得出了北京冬奥会环境保护的实施路径：把握环保原则,创新体制机制;落实政策措施,建立长效机制;利用环境管理工具,做好环境评估监测;注重公众环境教育制度,创造良好环保氛围。     

从2008到2022:“北京双奥会”我国体育政策的演变历程及其时代特征

奥运会为中国体育政策的发展留下了宝贵遗产，特别是北京冬奥会的申办和筹备不仅加快了大众参与冰雪运动的相关政策制定及议程落实，也进一步丰富了奥运遗产的积淀。我国体育政策正在构建“多元的”“现实主义的”奥运话语体系，相比北京夏奥会，冬奥会的政策遗产更清晰，也更具可持续性。采用内容分析法和扎根理论，选取与2008年北京夏奥会和2022年北京冬奥会相关的国家层面体育政策（2001—2021年）进行分析，阐述北京夏冬奥运会影响我国国家体育政策的演进历程及时代特征的逻辑关系。研究认为，以北京夏冬奥运会为导向的国家体育政策演进呈现出3个特色鲜明的时代特征：北京夏奥会促进体育功能价值逐渐扩大（2001—2008年）；北京夏奥会助力体育强国战略的开启（2009—2014年）；北京冬奥会推动体育在国家经济社会发展的多元价值升级（2015—2021年）。     

Reconnecting Colonial Imagination?: Hong Kong People's Attitude Towards the London 2012 Olympics

A number of Olympic studies focus on the relations of the Olympics with nationalism, globalism, cosmopolitism and Olympism. However, the majority of these ‘-ism’ studies focus on the impact of the Games on national integration in the host countries or cities; its transnational connections contribute to the creation of a transnational society and its global consciousness cultivates cosmopolitism. Most studies do not investigate the ‘colonial (re-)connectivity’ of the Olympic Games, which has the potential to affect people's attitude towards the Olympic Games and the host countries or cities. This study attempts to analyse the concept of ‘imagined community’ by measuring how people in Hong Kong (the colonised) display their awareness, motivation and expectation towards the British community (the coloniser) in hosting the London 2012 Olympic Games at the pre-game level. The results, based on a sample of 312 people in Hong Kong, highlight the multidimensionality of identity among different age groups. The London 2012 Olympics was not capable of creating the ‘imagined community’ to foster a coloniser–colonised reunion, but it somehow provided an identity-neutral platform for Hong Kong people to display situational, conditional or even pseudo-nostalgia for the colonial era.     

Olympics,Media and Politics: The First Olympic Ideas in Brazilian Society During the Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries

Abstract

The Olympic Games of the modern era are powerful global mediated events. Olympic cities receive an overwhelming examination by world media. As the 2016 Olympic host, Rio de Janeiro has been given an enormous amount of attention, both by the international media and researchers who looked at the urban spaces of Rio, the struggles over the hegemony of the city and the social meanings the Olympics bring to the host city’s citizens. However, studies over the historical relationship between Rio, sport and media are rare. This paper addresses the historical uses of the term Olympic by Brazilian media during the late nineteenth and the early twentieth centuries. By looking at the main articles in the newspapers of these periods, we examine the extent to which ideologies over sports have changed the way the Olympics were represented in Brazil’s national imaginary. We demonstrate how the use of expressions associated with the Olympics historically generated a closer appreciation of these events by the public. We also show how political authorities appropriated the Olympics for their own benefit. The paper concludes by asking whether or not the historical lessons from the early Olympic ideas in Brazil have been learned by the 2016 Rio Games organizers.     

Economic Changes Resulting from Seoul 1988: Implications for London 2012 and Future Games

South Korea has often been considered a successful host nation after the 1988 Seoul Olympic Games and their apparent positive economic, cultural, social and environmental legacies. The purpose of this essay is to offer an analysis of economic growth as a consequence of earlier Olympic Games and to extrapolate to the 2012 London Olympic Games and beyond to the forthcoming 2018 Pyeongchang Winter Olympics. It is the intention of this essay to examine previous studies, economic indices of world banks and reports of each Organising Committee of the Olympic Games (OCOG). The hypothesis is that the Olympic Games have not positively influenced the economic growth of the host nations. The essay explores this conclusion with reference to London 2012. The essay will reveal past negative influences of the Olympic Games and ask the International Olympic Committee (IOC): ‘What is the IOC's responsibility to the host city after the Games?’ Finally, the essay will propose and recommend an economic tool to the IOC to ensure sustainable outcomes after the Games.     

2016年里约奥运会我国田径运动员竞技实力分析

采用文献资料、数理统计等方法对中国运动员在第23-30届共8届奥运会以及2006年以来参加历届世锦赛以及亚运会的成绩进行统计分析。通过对中国田径竞技实力项目的分析,预测在2016年里约热内卢奥运会上中国运动员的竞技实力与成绩。分析表明:当前,中国田径运动项目中男、女中长距离竞走,女子投掷、马拉松跑等为优势项目;男子110m栏竞技实力下降,待新人崛起;女子标枪和男子跳高项目竞技实力逐步显现,为潜优势项目;中国运动员在所有的47个田径比赛项目中,还有男女100m、200m、400m、800m、3 000m障碍跑、4×400m接力跑;男子400m栏、1 500m、5 000m、10 000m、马拉松;女子100m栏,女子跳远,男子投掷类项目没有运动员进入过前8名。2015年北京世锦赛中国男子跳远、标枪、撑杆跳高、100m跑,女子100m栏,男子4×100m等项目实现了历史性突破。探讨田径项目状况可以促进人们对田径竞技运动整体发展状况的了解、清晰田径运动不同分项间存在的异同性,可以为田径运动的综合管理提供思路、为田径运动提供制胜策略及训练理念。     

论“人文奥运”理念的和谐内涵

"人文奥运"是北京奥运会的核心理念,和谐是北京奥运会的灵魂."人文奥运"包含了身与心、人与人、国与国等丰富的和谐内容;主张中国文化与世界文化的和谐交融,认为人的身体与精神应该和谐发展;坚持弘扬"相互理解、友谊、团结和公平比赛"的奥林匹克精神,认同"为建立一个和平而更美好的世界做出贡献"的奥林匹克宗旨;贯彻"和谐奥运"的理念有助于建设"和谐北京",推进社会主义和谐社会的进程.     

Chinese Desires? Olympism and Dominance,Guangzhou and Missed Opportunity,Major Leagues and Isolation on the Pacific Rim

Understanding the situation of China's self-promotion via Olympism requires us to connect two patterns. China is successful at Guangzhou and in Beijing Games at sponsoring and competing in Olympic-style sports festivals, but also surrounded by highly popular professional team sport leagues in baseball, rugby and cricket from Japan to India. China is successful in the promotion of its new capitalist economy but is critically short of energy sources and its aggressive diplomacy in pursuit of energy by land and sea has led to confrontations from Japan to Burma and even to the US ‘pivot’ to Asia. Review of theories of situation demonstrates that while a Debord-style spectacle theory might seem to explain the sporting spectacles and a realism in the tradition of Clausewitz might seem suited to the military situation, in fact approaches to situation combining realist and constructivist elements are stronger; a Deleuzian emphasis on will to power needs to be supplemented by Weberian attention to ends and ideas. Neither pattern explains the other; they connect. China makes history and its internal debates over state and middle class values can be tracked observing promotion of professional team sport in urban China and the scale of state sponsorship of Olympic-style games.     

雅典奥林匹克精神的思考及其对北京"人文奥运"的启示

雅典奥运会向世界展示了奥林匹克精神,但也不时流露出奥林匹克的不和谐音：拿不到金牌就是失败,裁判玷污奥林匹克精神的表演,锦标主义和狭隘的民族主义,重结果轻过程。我们应该吸取雅典奥运的人文经验与教训,加强“人文奥运”理念的建设,把2006年北京奥运会办成展示“人文奥运”理念的盛会。     

我们离人文奥运有多远

“人文奥运”是北京申请举办2008年奥运会的理念之一。人文奥运的理念是要在奥运的各项活动中体现‘以人为本’的思想,要使奥运各项活动为人类的健康与和谐发展服务。随着2008年北京奥运会的逼近,我们有很多行为值得反思。     

A Game for the Global North: The 2018 Winter Olympic Games in Pyeongchang and South Korean Cultural Politics

Abstract

The South Korean region of Pyeongchang will host the 2018 Winter Olympic Games. Using Wallerstein’s world system theory and Collins’s notions of zones of prestige and emulation as a conceptual framework, this paper examines the South Korean Government’s intention to stage the winter sporting spectacle. As the Winter Olympics is arguably considered a game for the relatively affluent global north, South Korea, as a semi-core state, attempts to elevate its position to a global economic and cultural powerhouse through being a host of this winter sports mega-event. However, it should be noted that the Winter Olympic Games is an event through which white supremacy and Western cultural hegemony are continuously reinforced. Therefore, the South Korean ambition to enhance its international standing by staging the Winter Olympic Games paradoxically reflects Western cultural imperialism and Orientalism embedded in South Korean cultural politics associated with the winter sporting contest.     

China’s Decisiveness in Olympic Bids: Leveraging International Sporting Mega-Events to Improve Beijing’s Odds of Success

Abstract

Through reviewing the 1993 Shanghai East Asian Games, the 2001 Beijing Summer Universiade and the 2014 Nanjing Summer Youth Olympics, this paper provides an in-depth account of how the organization and celebration of China’s international sporting events were decisively leveraged to improve Beijing’s chance of success in the three Olympic bids, respectively for the 2000 Summer Games, the 2008 Summer Games, and the 2022 Winter Games. The findings show China’s nationwide determination to entitle the capital city to hold the Summer and Winter Olympics as well as the synergy of its central and local authorities in handling international sporting affairs. They also reveal the keys that enable China to have become one of the most reliable spots on the planet for staging sporting mega-events and to gain long-lasing prestige in the global sports community.     

A Theory of Sport and Politics

The study of international relations purports to explain how nation-states and individuals interact around the globe. Yet one major area of such interaction – international sport – remains exceedingly understudied. This in spite of the fact that countries have gone to war over sport, fought for sovereign recognition through sport, and that citizens around the world have it as a daily part of their lives. Indeed it is astounding that a phenomenon that matters so much has been so little studied by a field that purports to explain relations between states and humans around the world. These deficiencies became more apparent in 2008 when we witnessed the world's biggest country hosting the world's biggest sporting event. The Beijing Olympics, though entertaining and exciting, showed how little we have thought about the link between sport and international politics. This article introduces a framework for understanding the link between sport and politics. Its point of entry is to argue that many of the questions about how China portrayed itself during the Olympics and whether the Games marked China's rise as a responsible power cannot be answered without first understanding how sport in general is related to a country's political development, and its sense of nationhood. My arguments do not represent new breakthroughs in political science, rather I attempt merely to offer a systematic way of thinking about how sports and the Olympics matter in world politics through three inter-related causal pathways relating to a country's sense of self, its diplomacy, and its capacity for change.