Over at Bloody Scott, my blog colleague Furriskey has a post up about the Chinese government and the upcoming 2008 Olympics. We like to bash the Beeb for being dolts, but the author makes salient observations regarding the Communist Party and its use of power. But it brings up some interesting avenues for speculation. Were you a betting man, would you say that anti-government groups will be able to organize successfully to wring concessions in exchange for not disrupting the festivities, or will there be demonstrations, or will the Communists have managed to crack down hard enough in advance that it will pass without incident? Look into your crystals and predict. Summon up your inner Nostradamus.
Just by talking about it, we focus attention on the situation. Let’s see whether we can’t get PW banned in China.
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They club people and haul them away for adhering to a regimen of meditation and exercise/stretching. If anyone as much as hinted they would disrupt the Olympics, it would be the 9mm to the back of the head…
I’m with Major John.
No protests, not even one.
And most of the MSM will focus on the new construction, what a great job they did, and there will be a few puff pieces of the forced relocations, taking of land, or other BS.
That’s my inner Nostrodamus.
in my view it’s a tossup.
The chinese government rarely deals with ‘enemies of the people’. With the eyes of the world on them, and what will surely be an unprecidented invasion of foriegn journalists during the games, I don’t think they want to be seen violently suppressing demonstrators, but then they’ve never cared what the world thought of them in the past, why start now?
one thing I think is certain – they have a plan. whatever it is, it will have been decided upon long before the games begin, and probably was discussed at length at the highest levels long before they decided to pursue the games.
and what will surely be an unprecidented invasion of foriegn journalists during the games
They’ll watch the journalists, at least the ones they let in.
They are probably busy watching anyone they think will try to access journalists even now. And by watching I mean getting them out into the countryside.
When I was in Beijing, they arrested (I saw this with my own eyes) one woman for dressing as a man in some sort of protest, and one man for jumping in the little river around the Forbidden City. Apparently that was another protest.
Beijing has a huge number of people in the crowd, if you will. Taking pictures and watching.
It’s possible that some of the smarter groups will get some concessions, depending on what you mean by that. Regardless, nobody is going to be holding demonstrations in Beijing.
You can complain in China, you just can’t insist, and demonstrating during the big coming out party would count as insisting. There’s a lot of change happening in China, and things are getting better, but a good way to find out how much hasn’t changed is to bitch too much.
The Chinese people are also behind the Olympics; they’re proud of their national performance in Athens (the China-Russia women’s volleyball final is a big fave), and proud to be hosting in 2008. They want to show the world that China is a great nation, and for the most part I don’t think they’d welcome protests any more than the government.