The Spielberg Wars
Steven Spielberg recently withdrew from his role as adviser to the Beijing Olympics in order to protest against China's economic support of the genocidal Sudanese regime. This minor story has revived the old "should we boycott the Olympics" discussion, in which I have little desire to participate. For a more thorough analysis, Richard devotes a long post to the subject at The Peking Duck.
A constructive way to view the boycott debate would be to cast morals aside in favor of a simple cost/benefit analysis. What positive outcomes would result from a boycott? Would it persuade the Chinese government to alter its foreign policy in a nod to international opinion? Not likely. Would Beijing liberalize its political system? No. Did the US-led boycott of the Moscow games in 1980 have positive consequences? No. Are there significant risks involved with a boycott? Certainly.
If someone were to write a thoroughly researched, well-reasoned opinion piece arguing that a boycott would serve international interests, then I would not hesitate to read it. Instead I encounter articles like this that do little more than recycle the same old tired complaints about China's domestic and international misdeeds.
February 16th, 2008 - 00:45
Spielberg does not want to offend the American public by tarnishing his name with the association of the PRC. But the thing is, so many people are associated with the PRC today one way or another, what do you want to do? Cut off relations with the PRC? Stop trading with the PRC? Be my guest, the PRC will not budge.
If people question or boycott the Beijing Games because of the alleged role the PRC plays in Sudan, shouldn’t countries like the US and the UK, being much worse offenders of everything, be banned from hosting Olympic Games?
February 19th, 2008 - 00:44
Matt
I don’t think Sudaneses themselves want the democracy “outsiders” are enforcing on them. Last week in Ann Arbor, MI, an independent sudanese traveller held a film screening on the topic of Darfur and basically what he did was travelling all over Darfur and made a film with no his narrative but only words coming out of local Sudaneses. The results was phenomenal and the following discussion was thought-provoking as well. Basically, sudansese just want to get back to their tribal governing and it’s the conflict that was initially between the government and the rebels, which then later was manually uplifted to the conflict between sudanese people. Since I am a Chinese and certainly cares about what they view about Chinese government, I asked the filmmaker “what would happen if Chinese stops selling weapons to the Sudan government and what’s the role of China in this crisis”. His response was absolutely different from what US media or western media has been covering. He said even if China stops selling and weapons and supporting the government, there will be other nations willing to step in to continue this role. among all the nations that are selling weapons to the government, for example, Belgium, they would not stop the sale anyway. The issue is complicated.
They also commented on the response of US media or western media to the greater extent. I really would like to know your thoughts on this if you could write something about it.
I just thought the whole world or the western world is still in the midst of the Cold War. Are they imagining things when they made decision related to other nations?
Very amusing to some extent.
February 19th, 2008 - 08:33
Marco,
I don’t think anyone is suggesting that Sudan “democratize”. What the UN (with Western support) is trying to do is isolate the regime for its genocidal persecution of tribes in the Darfur region. The frustration with China is that it refuses to go along with the isolation because of its lucrative business relationship with Khartoum. Because China is a world power and a permanent member of the UN Security Council, its cooperation is far more vital than that of a small country, hence the attention paid to its behavior there.
Were China to withdraw support, then yes- another regime would step in and do business. But not a regime with the clout and enormous needs as Beijing.
As for the media, I think “still in the cold war” is a bit of an exaggeration but there’s a segment of the media that implies China’s support for brutal regimes are more ideological than economic. We both know this is false, but at the same time Beijing doesn’t deserve a free pass for its foreign policy conduct.
February 19th, 2008 - 09:26
thanks for the response.Yeah , I can see why and how the US sees China run by a brutal regime. As for the Chinese foreign policy, I don’t know if CCP has found an excuse for itself not to interfere other nation’s domestic issues by focusing on economic growth or they just don’t seem to care how others are doing particularly for those that were far away. (I’m kinda refering to the fact of history that China did invade other nations nearby in the past 3-400 years but they didn’t seem to be very interested in lands that were far away even during the peak time of Chinese Empires.) Do you have any thoughts on this? thanks and would like to know what you think.
Marco
February 19th, 2008 - 11:47
Well- part of China’s “no-interference” policy is that it has grown very tired of Western criticism of what Beijing sees as its own internal affairs- such as the 6/4 crackdown. And while China doesn’t play the regime change game, its policy toward Africa really amounts to neo-mercantilism, which can also be quite pernicious. Very few Africans reap the benefits of their governments’ partnership with China.
China likes to claim that as a victim of imperialism itself, it has no desire to subject poorer nations to the same treatment. Yet what people ignore is that China’s historical role in Tibet, Xinjiang, and Mongolia was nothing if not imperialistic. Nowadays, mass Han settlement of these regions has rendered the issue moot, but I still find the Chinese claim that they have never engaged in imperialistic behavior extremely self-serving.
That being said, I do think Westerners exaggerate the threat of China, and as you put it a new “cold war” is not an apt description of what is going on. Unlike the USSR, China does not attempt to export its political ideology to the countries in which it deals, and Beijing does not use its muscle to force favorable political outcomes in other countries. In fact, China’s economic goals are similar to that of most countries: fostering growth, controlling unemployment, and correcting the disparity between wealth and poverty.
Ah- I’m rambling here. Thank you for your thought-provoking comments, Marco.
February 20th, 2008 - 01:06
Matt, first I’d like to ask you how you actually got to know that “Very few Africans reap the benefits of their governments’ partnership with China”. I have never been to Africa. I know though, from numerous articles that I have read (all from western media) that China exports cheap consumer goods to Africa while importing oil, iron ore and other raw materials. How anyone can say that this only benefits a few Africans is beyond me. I understand as the result of cheap Chinese consumer goods coming in, some small businesses and manufacturers might lose out, as in the case of America. But the majority of the consumers win, no? Now African consumers can afford to buy stuff that they need but they could not afford before, this is not beneficial to most Africans?
As to China’s “imperialistic” stunts in Xinjiang, Tibet and Inner Mongolia, you are probably right. However, if the definition of engaging in imperialistic behavior is going beyond the strictly-defined (yet hard to define) ethnic boundaries, then I guess MOST countries in today’s world have done that. Prime examples would be Russia and the US.
February 20th, 2008 - 08:01
Pfeffer, cheap consumer goods don’t really benefit people when one result is that they lose their jobs producing the very same consumer goods because African companies can’t compete with the cheap Chinese imports. Sounds strange, I know, but there’s been more than a few rumblings out of Africa about Chinese imports undercutting African producers and putting them out of business. Also, there’s been more than a few reports of Chinese mining companies treating their African workers at least as badly as they treat Chinese workers in China. Sure, the Africans have jobs, but with crap pay and a damn good chance of being blown up or buried on the job.
And then there are those Chinese companies who import their entire workforce from China…
As for where this information comes from: the media. I presume Matt also regularly reads the news.
February 21st, 2008 - 02:27
Chris, what you have presented here is the same old argument that has been repeated 100 times by the western media. Again, there is no doubt that some African companies and producers have been hurt by the Chinese import (just like what happened in the US), but like what happened in the US, the vast majority of consumers benefit from these imports, would you say no?
I agree the mining companies with dangerous labor practices should be overhauled and scrutinized.
People blast the Chinese for doing business in Africa. OK, what has the west done to Africa? Has the west brought more jobs and wealth to the average Africans?