Olympian politics – the continuation of war by other means

The lighting of the Olympic flame is a religious affair. The reenactment of the ancient ceremony is meant to symbolize both the eternal spirit of humanity and our collective belief in peace, shared values, and fair competition. Presumably it is the belief in the sanctity of the games that has led western leaders to call on keeping politics out of the 29th Olympiad, fending off calls for a boycott by democracies of China’s crowning moment. Unfortunately, if the dictators in Beijing remain steadfast in their refusal to recognize that things are changing – including inside the borders of China – it will become increasingly difficult for western leaders to ignore the calls for greater freedom for oppressed minorities there.

The argument that politics and sport do not mix is flawed at its root. The ancient games were all about politics and city-state pride. Recognizing them as a celebration for all Greeks, the city-states would call off war for their duration and would laud their victors as symbols of the superiority of their city. Sometimes, as legend has it, the city state would raze some of its fortifications as a symbol of its invincibility. When Theodosius I banned the Olympic games in 394 AD, he did so for politics – deeming the games pagan in what was by now a Christian Roman Empire.

Since the modern games were inaugurated in 1896, politics intervened on a number of occasions. Most famously the games became political at the Berlin games in 1936, briefly in Mexico City in 1968, at the Munich Olympics in 1972, in Moscow and Los Angeles, in 1980 and 1984 respectively. As the 2008 summer games approach we will witness an increasingly intensifying campaign by activists, which will not leave governments in the west unaffected, and will likely transform the Beijing Olympiad into a highly political affair.

There is nothing wrong with mixing politics and sport. The United States is an oddity in this respect, because its professional sports franchises are apolitical. Republicans and Democrats alike, Americans of all races, religions and creeds, support the same sports team. European soccer was never apolitical – even though there is growing tendency to distort the lines between political identity and commercial interests with the emergence and success of the Champions League. But for most of the past century, clubs in many countries in the world have been identified with the right or the left sides of the political spectrum, with the haves or the have-nots, with the fascists or the communists.

The modern Olympics too have always been political – both in the way the nation-state adopts them as symbols of its achievement and national pride, but also in the way they are awarded. Recently there was also a question raised about the way Kosovo would be represented in the Olympics, since it is a state that the United Nations does not yet recognize. For that there may be solutions – including letting Kosovar athletes march behind the rest of the national flags parading during the opening ceremony. But what does need to be resolved is the question of awarding the games to totalitarian regimes – especially in the post-Cold War era. Should China have been awarded the games in the first place, in view of its dismal human rights record?

Despotic regimes recognize full well the public relations value of displaying their might, be it in military parades or in the number of gold medals accumulated by its robotic athletes. Even the most liberal among us note the medal count, and for smaller states any medal is a source of national pride - of collective achievement. For regimes like the one in Beijing, Mussolini’s Italy during the soccer World Cup in 1934, Hitler’s Germany in 1936, or the Soviets in 1980, the international focus on them and their regime is part of an orchestrated show of their system’s superiority. The international community should cease collaborating with such regimes.

The arguments made that, for example, the thousands of reporters who will flood Beijing will also expose the shortcomings of the Chinese state are insufficient. Western governments should pressure Beijing to speed up reforms in matters that are not solely economic – including matters pertaining to the rights of workers and improved living standards for the millions of Chinese citizens who are not benefiting from the capitalist windfall. And, the western leadership should not shy from spoiling Beijing’s party: athletes should wear armbands expressing their opposition to the oppression of minorities and dissidents in China, and heads of state should not participate in the opening or closing ceremonies. Maybe then Beijing will begin to appreciate the true Olympic spirit.
Michalis Firillas
25 March, 2008

U.S. crashes - China breaks

This article originally appeared in Haaretz on 21 March, 2008.

News from America is bleak. Earlier this week the Federal Reserve came to the rescue and backed a deal for the sale of a paragon of Wall Street culture, Bear Stearns, to JP Morgan Chase, for a mere $2 per share. Lehman Brothers, another major investment bank, was also felt to be tottering. Responding to the crisis of liquidity - the availability of money for banks to loan, primarily to other smaller banks and then on to Joe in the street - the Fed dropped the rate by a further 0.75 percent. After weeks of dire financial instability, and months of efforts by Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke to stem the downward spiral sparked by the subprime collapse, mostly by repeated cuts in the interest rate, the question on everyone's lips is one of anticipation: How long will this go on? Perhaps they should also be asking, "How much worse can this get?"

Even the most optimistic forecasts do not exclude the possibility that a recession, or worse, stagflation (high prices on top of no jobs), will go on for many months. Realists will also tell you that unless the legacy of former Fed chief Alan Greenspan, primarily of averting recession by adding cash to the economy through interest-rate manipulation and lax lending regulation, is adjusted to the current international conditions, we are all in for lean times. The condition of the number one economy in the world will obviously affect the rest of the world. But as you watch America tumble into what may be the biggest economic crisis since World War II, from an international perspective, China is the one to keep an eye on.

Let's state the obvious: China is the world's most populous country; on average its economy is the fastest-growing one in Asia; its economy is a mixed bag of reforms and strict state controls; and it is not a democracy. Managing this problematic combination of factors is a complex task to say the least, but more important, it is not something that can go on indefinitely. Moreover, these factors have also contributed to three parallel processes that have matured and are now converging in China at this critical juncture, when the American economy is in a downward spin. The impact of this convergence may mean that the biggest domino in the world economy will also fall over, and this is a crash that will not only be heard around the world, but may also turn bloody.

The first process is the enrichment of China. The opening of the Chinese economy to foreign investment made it part of the global capitalist economy, bringing in billions of dollars from exports of consumer goods and contributing to the emergence of a middle class. The insatiable hunger of the developed world, particularly the United States, for inexpensive Made in China products transformed the country into what is essentially a lender of money. China has the largest foreign reserves in the world, estimated at a staggering $1.4 trillion dollars, nearly 70 percent of which is held in U.S. dollars. Even with the gradual, yet significant, adjustments of the yuan's value during the past two years, the dollar's dive means that Chinese laborers are working harder to sustain the Americans' high standard of living, which for years has relied on borrowed money - not on American production. A financial meltdown in the U.S. will affect China and its accumulated wealth badly.

Secondly, China is constantly in search of resources. The explosive growth of the Chinese economy has made the need for fuel and raw materials a priority, sending the price of commodities internationally sky high. Coupled with the declining value of the dollar, the main currency of international trade, not only are essential commodities, like oil and grain, enormously expensive, but this past year the situation has been exacerbated by growing concerns that climatic changes may result in serious global shortages in basic foodstuffs. This past month alone, the cost of foodstuffs in China rose by approximately 24 percent. Inflation and scarcity, particularly of basic necessities, including heating fuel, is the stuff public unrest is made of.

The third process is socio-political. The decision of the Chinese leadership, since 1989, to increasingly open up their society economically, and allowing it to grow into a significant component of the global economy, created openness on various levels, notwithstanding the efforts of Chinese officials to keep the clamps of centralized control in place. Such controls are impossible to apply perfectly. As such, Chinese society is becoming increasingly unequal, with a growing disparity between classes, and also growing unease, as the public has greater access to information and means with which to express dissatisfaction. Adding to this complex situation are minorities, comprising nearly 9 percent of China's 1.3 billion citizens, whose ethnic and cultural identities have for decades been oppressed in a process the Dalai Lama recently described as "cultural genocide."

Even though China is most often described in the U.S. as a "rival," in great part due to the lack of transparency endemic to its one-party system, in reality it is at this time much more of a partner. Indeed, over the past five years, the two states have been locked in a bear hug: each is too deeply reliant on the other for maintaining its economic ethos that a separation would be detrimental to both. The logic has so far been that the infusion of American dollars into China, and their return to the U.S. for investment (mostly in Treasury bills), is what is keeping the economies of the two countries afloat. What happens if that balance fails? How much devaluation of the dollar can China accept? How will Beijing weather a sustained depression in the U.S., with fewer buyers for its consumer products?

This is a precarious time for a Chinese political system that abhors instability. Will it make an audacious turn and break free of the American financial embrace, risking its economic growth and potential domestic upheaval? Will this not exacerbate the already dour economic conditions in the U.S., forecast to spread elsewhere? We will have to watch and see.
Michalis Firillas
21 March, 2008

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/966762.html