Ask the Experts

As Olympic athletes return home this week following the close of the Beijing games on Sunday, The Daily Orange asked three professors – each with their own expertise – their thoughts about the 2008 Summer Games.

Our Experts

-Norman Kutcher: History professor with emphasis in cultural, social and intellectual history of China. He spent this past May and June, as he does almost every year, researching and living in the Hebei Province, which serves as the gateway to Beijing.

-Hongying Wang: Political science professor and director of East Asia Program at the Moynihan Institute of the Maxwell School, with an emphasis in politics of East Asia, Comparative Politics and Politics of Globalization. In addition, she teaches a graduate seminar on Chinese politics.

-Dennis Deninger: Adjunct professor, teaching sports on television class for television, radio and film program in the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications. He spent 25 years at ESPN and has worked with NBC’s Mary Carrillo.

How do you feel China represented itself during the Beijing Olympics?

Kutcher: I think that they were intent on showing themselves to the world in a way that demonstrated their true identity. It’s very important to people in China to introduce themselves to the world, and they think that westerners don’t understand them and are very suspicious of them. I think they were very successful.

Wang: I think China represented itself very well. The opening ceremony was spectacular – though it was very costly – presenting China’s historical glory and recent achievement in a memorable performance. Chinese athletes, winning by far the biggest number of gold medals of all the participating countries, made a strong statement of China’s new strength.

How do you feel the world responded to China during the Olympics?

Kutcher: I think in a way that China and the world are really in a better place after the Olympics. There will be better understanding; and the West will be more understanding that China is going to chart a different course. It won’t modernize in a way that the rest modernized.

Wang: My impression is that the world has been very impressed with China’s achievement not only in hosting this event, but more broadly as well. I think the Chinese have done a very good job in improving the image of China. This could translate into a political and diplomatic asset. But it could also be negated by the next political crisis mishandled by the Chinese government.

Deninger: The Olympics provides an incredible amount of exposure. A lot of us had never seen the roads and skyscrapers … for most people it’s pictures of The Forbidden City, and when you see the cosmopolitan city it’s become, you see connections to here – when we’re sitting in traffic and there’s noise from construction next door. They’re living with the same things on the other side of the world in China.

How do you feel the media represented China during the games?

Kutcher: The media is finally starting to get beyond stereotypes. One stereotype that people have always had about China related to idea that China is a monolithic place where individualism is really downplayed and unimportant. What we saw during the broadcasts was that all Chinese people aren’t the same.

Wang: I think the media in the U.S. have made a dramatic departure from the normally negative tone of their coverage of China. The vast majority of the media reports about China in the past two decades have been the human rights abuses in that country, China’s hunger for energy and natural resources, bad environment, spying, prison labor, etc. During the Olympic Games, the stories I have seen are much more on the positive side.

Deninger: Very generously. China was portrayed slightly through rose-colored glasses. There was certainly more praise than criticism. It is a beautiful country and (the media) are not there to cover people being pushed out of their homes. There are a lot of ‘unpleasantries’ there, so it was slightly glossed over.

Where do you foresee China in four years during the 2012 London Olympics?

Kutcher: For one thing, there is a much higher level of public awareness and public pressure than in the past. And people with economic security are demanding more from life – like better water, safer food, etc. They are also demanding, and by and large receiving, more civil liberties. The legal system is thriving, and many more Chinese people are using it to assert their rights … As Chinese learns more about what goes on elsewhere, they will push for more reforms at home.

Wang: I think Chinese athletes will continue to do well in these games. Where China will be more broadly is hard to say, depending on how it deals with a host of economic and social problems that could become worse, e.g. inequality, environmental degradation, relations with Taiwan, etc.

Compiled by Amanda Allison, news editor

 

Published on August 27, 2008 at 12:00 pm