Reports From Our Fellows

China Cracks Down for Olympic Unity

China may look like a political monolith, but it often struggles to keep its local governments in line. The central leadership scolds and cajoles them, but they continue to do their own thing – seizing land from peasants and selling it to developers, pumping up their bubble economies with lavish construction projects and fostering rampant corruption in business and government. Just occasionally, however, a directive is issued in Beijing that brings the country to heel. In the last decade such orders can be counted on the fingers of one hand: crack down on Falun Gong (largely successful), eliminate SARS (done) and make sure the Olympics are a success (done, as far as the Communist Party is concerned).

These commands were obeyed because they came with a carrot and a stick. Other work could be put aside for the sake of fulfilling them. And failure to comply would have consequences for careers. Putting on a good Games came with another incentive. Most Chinese (not including Tibetans and Uighurs) wanted them to be a success anyway. The result was an elevation of the Games to the highest levels of political priority for officials at every level. The furious political bickering that normally consumes Olympic host countries over how much money to spend and on what was non-existent in China. The party suppressed it. And the Chinese media – though increasingly feisty as the market economy weakens the party’s grip – fell in line.

Criticism of lavish spending on Olympic projects, or of the huge disruption suffered by the many tens of thousands of Chinese who happened to be in their way, were taboo topics. Occasionally a more daring newspaper might suggest that political reform in China (a stated party goal, though not vigorously pursued) should involve greater public scrutiny of budgets. But no one dared to propose a good look at the Olympic numbers (more than $40 billion, including money spent on cleaning Beijing’s air and revamping its public transport system).

A successful Games, in the leadership’s mind, did not mean putting on 16 days of untrammeled fun. The event had to impress foreign visitors (those allowed in – officials tried their best to screen out undesirables such as human rights activists), the athletes and television viewers. But street parties of the kind seen in other host cities were not on the agenda (spontaneous revelry was deemed a security threat). The success of the games was defined much as North Korea’s leaders define the success of their mass shows. They had to be awesomely spectacular. The director of the Olympic opening and closing ceremonies in Beijing, Zhang Yimou (who himself drew unashamed comparisons with North Korea) achieved this brilliantly. Few inside or even outside China were likely to dwell on the subtleties – the fact that the majority of the performers at the opening ceremony were soldiers, for example, or that their routines played into prevailing Western stereotypes of a well drilled nation locked in a uniform mind set. Most of the time, much of China is chaotic, factious and even at times rebellious. Their Olympic directive fulfilled, provinces will resume their wayward ways. Beijing’s public transport will be much improved, but the air will turn grey again. Problems concealed and grievances crushed by local leaders in their efforts to fulfill the party’s mandate of Olympic harmony will resurface. Post-Olympic China will be back to form.