China, the Olympics, and Global Leadership
China's leaders view the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing as a national coming-out party. But, if China is to emerge as a global power, it must abandon its nineteenth-century conception of national sovereignty, as well as reform its system of governance sufficiently to modernize and develop successfully.
The whole world, it seems, views China as the next great global power. A trip to Beijing does little to dispel that impression. Out of the welter of dust, noise, welders’ sparks, flotillas of cement mixers and construction cranes, the setting for the 2008 Summer Olympic Games is taking shape. A visitor feels inconsequential in the chaotic vastness of this epic undertaking.
The whole world, it seems, views China as the next great global power. A trip to Beijing does little to dispel that impression. Out of the welter of dust, noise, welders’ sparks, flotillas of cement mixers and construction cranes, the setting for the 2008 Summer Olympic Games is taking shape. A visitor feels inconsequential in the chaotic vastness of this epic undertaking.