While the Winter Games do not have quite the prestige of the Summer competition, a successful Olympics next year could be as valuable a soft power win for China as 2008 – especially if they are the first unconstrained Games to be held since the coronavirus pandemic, with the delayed Tokyo 2020 Summer Olympics looking ever more beleaguered.Ĭhinese President Xi Jinping – who last month visited several key Olympic venues – has been keenly aware of how the coronavirus, which was first detected in Wuhan, has affected China’s standing around the world, with Beijing facing criticism for failing to contain it.

Some 14 years after hosting its inaugural Olympics, Beijing will become the first city to stage both the Summer and Winter editions of the Games, in February 2022. As economy after economy in the West was devastated, China escaped largely unscathed – and able to spend a record $43 billion on hosting a sporting event. That feeling of China becoming a leader on the world stage was reinforced by another major development of 2008: the global financial crisis. Protesters clash with police and Olympic security as the Torch Relay passes through London on April 6, 2008. “Through the extravagant opening ceremony, the Chinese government showcased China’s historical glory and new achievements … unassailable evidence that China had finally ‘made it’.” “Hosting the 2008 Summer Olympics was a symbol of China’s rejuvenation,” writes historian Zheng Wang. Remembered today as an event in which record-breaking sporting achievements were matched only by the spectacular pageantry and organization of the Games, the success of the Beijing Olympics was no sure thing.Ĭhina had never hosted the Olympics before, and in the run-up to the 2008 Games – held under the slogan “One World, One Dream” – there were calls for a boycott over the country’s human rights records, concerns for how Beijing’s notorious smog might affect the health of athletes, and angry pro-Tibet protests along much of the Olympic Torch relay.Īt home, Chinese organizers and athletes faced immense pressure to pull off not just sporting success, but to produce a monument to national pride, a soft-power showcase that would cement China’s place as an emerging global superpower. As the sound of fireworks rang out over Beijing to mark the close of the 2008 Summer Olympics, China’s leaders could have been forgiven for breathing a sigh of relief.

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