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Greatest leap forward?

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LowThiaKhiang

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Greatest leap forward?
Mary-Anne Toy | August 2, 2008

The view from the 10th floor of the Pangu Plaza building to China's breathtaking Olympic Green is stunning. This shot — of the "Bird's Nest" national stadium and the Water Cube aquatic centre with Beijing's high-rises behind it — is what most Australians will see on their televisions during the Beijing Olympics that start next Friday .

The enormous, dragon-shaped Pangu Plaza building, where channels Seven, Nine and the ABC will broadcast from, is yet another new landmark in a city that has undergone an extraordinary $US43 billion ($46 billion) Olympic makeover.

As the world looks in awe at Beijing's transformation and wonders whether it is ready to hold the most spectacular Olympic Games ever, the story behind Pangu Plaza shows how far China has come — and how far it has to go.

Liu Zhihua, a Beijing vice-mayor responsible for Olympic construction and land deals, was one of the most powerful men in Beijing until he was abruptly sacked two years ago for corruption and a "degenerate" lifestyle after an estranged mistress ratted him out for accepting bribes from developers.

One of the deals that led to Liu's downfall was his requisitioning of this prime site — opposite the Olympic Green and less than 200 metres to the Bird's Nest. Work on the project stopped in late 2003 when the original developer ran into problems. Liu and the city government put the site up for auction, against the developer's objections, and a government-controlled construction company outbid five others by a suspiciously large amount.

With less than a week to go until the Games, Pangu Plaza — an office, luxury housing and Beijing's first "seven-star" hotel — is still an active building site, impervious to the apparent ban on construction imposed to arrest the city's notorious pollution.

But like most of the negative aspects of Beijing's Olympic transformation and China's incredible rise to become once again a force to be reckoned with after its "century of humiliation" by Western powers and Japan, none of that will matter on Friday. On August 8, at the auspicious time of 8.08pm (10.08pm AEST), the world will gasp in awe at China's dazzling opening ceremony.

The screening this week of secret footage of the opening ceremony by Korean broadcaster SBS — an offence punishable by up to seven years' jail for Chinese citizens — has enraged and distressed Beijing and international Olympic officials.

Along with the furore over Beijing's announcement this week that it is breaking a pledge to allow foreign reporters unrestricted internet access, it shows how wide the gap of understanding still is between China and the West.

Political commentator Hu Xingdou, a frequent critic of the Government, says that despite this, there is no doubt China is ready to host the Games.

"China is very strong at mobilising social resources, even compared to those 'purely democratic' countries," Professor Hu of the Beijing Institute of Technology, says. He believes China will struggle with "software" issues such as media freedom but its ability to turn on a massive spectacle can't be denied. "I think China is ready."

China has built the world's biggest airport and the most amazing Olympic stadiums and facilities, and has spent tens of billions of dollars greening the city, cutting pollution and mobilising millions of people in its efforts to prove to the world that it is an emerging great power.

More than 4.3 million local families have been issued "etiquette manuals", 870,000 taxi drivers, government workers, waiters and bus conductors have attended manners courses, and the city claims 5 million of its close to 18 million residents have managed to learn at least one foreign language.

There are surface-to-air missile launchers in place south of the Olympic Green, and there are a reported 40 new helicopters plus unmanned surveillance drones to keep the skies safe. There are officially 110,000 armed police and other security officers plus a "people's army" of up to a million local residents or "city volunteers" to monitor the streets, help visitors and spot potential troublemakers. Another 100,000 Olympic volunteers will be inside the venues. The People's Liberation Army is on standby to prevent a terrorist attack.

The city has been scrubbed clean and repainted, and anything remaining deemed unsightly has had a traditional Chinese wall built to hide it. Giant billboards spruiking the Olympic slogan "One World, One Dream" adorn the now mostly quiet building sites. Beijing looks green and clean, with another 40 million flowering pot plants, on top of 100 million plants already used to landscape the city in the past year and the 22 million trees planted over the past seven years. Beijing and China are as ready as they can be.

A survey by Ogilvy Public Relations China, which is advising several Olympic sponsors, found that, nationally, Olympics excitement remains high, up from 74% "extremely excited" to 77%, although enthusiasm levels among Beijingers have dropped 10 percentage points to 69% from the start of the year.

Ogilvy China president Scott Kronick says this drop probably reflects pre-Olympic restrictions and changes, but he expects the figure will quickly rise again.

Kronick, who has lived in Beijing for 13 years, says China is "overwhelmingly ready" to host the Games. He says Government clashes with foreign media, especially since last year's food safety scandals, have taught the Chinese that it is not necessarily weak to share factual information to solve a problem, a change he says reflects increasing national confidence.

"First and foremost they care about social stability, and nothing is going to rock social stability … they've become more comfortable with saying these (internet) sites will be censored — and that's more honest than they have been."

Daniel Bell, the first Westerner on staff at prestigious Tsinghua University's political philosophy faculty, says he was pessimistic about whether the Western media and world would acknowledge the positive strides China has made. In his new book, China's New Confucianism, Bell argues that as the nation retreats from communism, ancient Confucian values should be reinvented to provide a new moral compass for today's China.

Bell says he initially thought the state's "single-minded pursuit of Olympic gold medals" as opposed to the Confucian view that everyone wins when competition is fair and civil, in line with Olympic values, would encourage a negative kind of nationalism.

But he says he failed to foresee that Olympic success could in fact help China overcome its sense of victimhood over the previous century's humiliations at the hands of Western powers and Japan.

"If China wins gold medals and re-establishes its 'deserved' place in the sun, the traditional Confucian ways may assert themselves against — or at least mitigate — negative emotions such as resentment and aggressive nationalism."

He points to the Government's enormous efforts to encourage "Olympic civility", teaching Chinese spectators to applaud losing teams and acknowledge good performances by opposing athletes — even from traditional foes such as Japan — and athletes to be gracious in winning or in defeat.

As part of the Olympic tradition, a primary school in north-east Beijing has been assigned to cheer and support Japanese athletes.

Chen Yali, director of Chen Shi China research group, writing in the current edition of the journal China Security, is concerned that Beijing's Olympic organisers should understand that if they insist on a protest-free Olympics "it will win the battle but lose the war if peaceful protests are suppressed with unnecessary force".

"The Olympic Games will be the first time China displays to the world how it deals with mass protests. Whatever China does, it will have to prepare for criticism and negative reporting. However, the Games will be a good opportunity for China to not only show the prosperity and prestige of a rising power, but to demonstrate to the world that, though it cannot transform overnight, it is trying hard to change for the better."

Chinese writer Zhao Lingmin, discussing nationalism in the popular news weekly Nan Feng Chuang's current Olympic edition, says that when it comes to international disputes, a lingering inferiority complex from the "hundred years of humiliation" under the Western powers and Japan turns normally analytical and critical Chinese into wild nationalists and "blind conformists".

A translation of Zhao's article by the Washington-based non-profit World Security Institute, says: "There are a lot of people who are worried: when the French and the Japanese teams take part in events, will the Chinese audience hiss and boo? When CNN conducts interviews in Beijing, will people on the street use uncivilised language and behaviour?"

Zhao says China has materially already reached world power status but questions whether it is spiritually prepared. "If we are only ready to enjoy the advantages of being a great power and are unwilling to accept the misunderstandings and censure that inevitably accompany this esteemed status, then we don't have what it takes to be one," she concludes.

Voices opposing the Olympics, even among traditional foes of the Government, are muted, not just because the consequences of dissent remain extreme, but because of national pride and a collective reluctance to air the country's dirty laundry to the world.
 
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