scholarly journals The Beijing 2008 Olympics: Examining the Interrelations of China, Globalization, and Soft Power

2015 ◽  
Vol 23 (2) ◽  
pp. 286-296 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Giulianotti
Keyword(s):  
Soft Power ◽  
Olympic Games ◽  
Beijing Olympics ◽  
Mega Events ◽  
Key Issues ◽  
Global Television ◽  
Negative Impacts ◽  
2008 Beijing Olympics

This article explores the national and global significance and impact of Beijing’s hosting of the 2008 summer Olympic Games. The discussion is organized into four main parts. First, I locate the 2008 Beijing Olympics in the context of wider processes of globalization; in particular, I explore how China ‘glocalized’ the Olympics, by giving the event distinctive meanings that were then experienced by global television audiences. Second, I employ the concept of ‘soft power’ to explore how, in hosting the event, China sought to advance its international influence and appeal; I introduce the concept of ‘soft disempowerment’ to examine how there may have been some negative impacts for China in staging the Olympics. Third, I discuss issues of security surrounding the Beijing Olympics, given the growing focus on such questions for sport mega-events in general following the 9/11 attacks in 2001. Fourth, I outline some of the key issues regarding sporting legacies for China, following the 2008 Olympics, with particular reference to Chinese football.

China’s Global Cultural Interactions

2020 ◽  
pp. 137-155
Author(s):  
Shaun Breslin
Keyword(s):  
Communist Party ◽  
Soft Power ◽  
Chinese Communist Party ◽  
Chinese Culture ◽  
Olympic Games ◽  
Chinese Media ◽  
Mega Events ◽  
International Image ◽  
Confucius Institutes ◽  
Belt And Road

As China continues to “rise” in world affairs, its international image is becoming more and more important. The Chinese Communist Party and government has become interested in—some would say obsessed with—its international image. In recent years it has sponsored mega events such as the Shanghai Expo and Olympic Games, G-20 Summit, and Belt and Road Forums. Beijing has also established Confucius Institutes (CIs) and classrooms worldwide, and has internationalized the Chinese media. This chapter examines China’s “soft power” and traces the historical precedents behind the contemporary promotion of Chinese culture abroad. It finds that, despite enormous investment, China’s internatonal image continues to be mixed and challenged by a number of domestic impediments.

The 2008 Beijing Olympics opening ceremony: visual insights into China's soft power

2012 ◽  
Vol 27 (2) ◽  
pp. 188-195 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chwen Chwen Chen ◽  
Cinzia Colapinto ◽  
Qing Luo
Keyword(s):  
Soft Power ◽  
Beijing Olympics ◽  
Opening Ceremony ◽  
2008 Beijing Olympics

scholarly journals Comparing the Urban Impacts of the FIFA World Cup and Olympic Games From 2010 to 2016

2018 ◽  
Vol 42 (4) ◽  
pp. 247-269 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martin Müller ◽  
Christopher Gaffney
Keyword(s):  
Olympic Games ◽  
Survey Method ◽  
World Cup ◽  
Fifa World Cup ◽  
Mega Events ◽  
Urban Impacts ◽  
Adverse Impacts ◽  
Urban Project ◽  
Negative Impacts ◽  
The Olympic Games

At a cost of often more than US$10 billion, mega-events such as the Olympic Games and the FIFA Men’s World Cup are the single most transformative urban project in many host cities for decades. This article develops an analytical matrix for comparing the impacts of these events on cities and proposes a case survey method to apply this matrix to six recent sports mega-events: the Olympic Games in Vancouver, London, Sochi, and Rio de Janeiro and the FIFA Men’s World Cups in South Africa and Brazil. We find that for the events in our sample, it is not so much the event itself, but the political and economic contexts that most influence impacts. Cities in democracies with more market-led economies experienced fewer adverse impacts and were better able to use the event for urban development than those in less democratic countries with more state-led economies. None of the cities, however, was able to avoid negative impacts.

Global Sport

2018 ◽  
pp. 596-612
Author(s):  
Richard Giulianotti
Keyword(s):  
Critical Analysis ◽  
Olympic Games ◽  
Future Research ◽  
World Cup ◽  
Economic Issues ◽  
Mega Events ◽  
Sport For Development ◽  
Political Economic ◽  
Sociocultural Issues ◽  
The Olympic Games

World sport often appears as one of the most powerful illustrations of globalization in action. This chapter provides a critical analysis of global sport. Four major areas of research and debate on global sport are examined: political–economic issues, centering particularly on the commercial growth of sport and inequalities between different regions; global sport mega-events such as the Olympic Games or World Cup finals in football; the emergence and institutionalization of the global sport for development and peace; and sociocultural issues, notably the importance of global sport to diverse and shifting forms of identity and belonging. Concluding recommendations are provided on areas for future research into global sport.

scholarly journals Emancipating the Image: The Beijing Olympics, Regeneration, and the Power of Performance

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carol Mei Barker
Keyword(s):  
Olympic Games ◽  
Public Image ◽  
Beijing Olympics ◽  
The Public ◽  
Susan Sontag ◽  
Counter Narrative ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
The World ◽  
The Government ◽  
Rapid Transformation

“In China, what makes an image true is that it is good for people to see it.” - Susan Sontag, On Photography, 1971 The Olympic Games gave the world an opportunity to read Beijing’s powerful image-text following thirty years of rapid transformation. David Harvey argues that this transformation has turned Beijing from “a closed backwater, to an open centre of capitalist dynamism.” However, in the creation of this image-text, another subtler and altogether very different image-text has been deliberately erased from the public gaze. This more concealed image-text offers a significant counter narrative on the city’s public image and criticises the simulacrum constructed for the 2008 Olympics, both implicitly and explicitly. It is the ‘everyday’ image-text of a disappearing city still in the process of being bulldozed to make way for the neoliberal world’s next megalopolis. It exists most prominently as a filmic image text; in film documentaries about a ‘real’ hidden Beijing just below the surface of the government sponsored ‘optical artefact.’ Film has thus become a key medium through which to understand and preserve a physical city on the verge of erasure.

scholarly journals Impacts of the Olympic Games as mega-events

2004 ◽  
Vol 157 (3) ◽  
pp. 209-220 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Malfas ◽  
E. Theodoraki ◽  
B. Houlihan
Keyword(s):  
Olympic Games ◽  
Mega Events ◽  
The Olympic Games

scholarly journals Satellite-based estimates of reduced CO and CO2emissions due to traffic restrictions during the 2008 Beijing Olympics

2012 ◽  
Vol 39 (14) ◽  
pp. n/a-n/a ◽  
Author(s):  
Helen M. Worden ◽  
Yafang Cheng ◽  
Gabriele Pfister ◽  
Gregory R. Carmichael ◽  
Qiang Zhang ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Beijing Olympics ◽  
2008 Beijing Olympics
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