"A major contribution to the study of global events in times of global media. Owning the Olympics tests the possibilities and limits of the concept of 'media events' by analyzing the mega-event of the information age: the Beijing Olympics. . . . A good read from cover to cover." —Guobin Yang, Associate Professor, Asian/Middle Eastern Cultures & Sociology, Barnard College, Columbia University From the moment they were announced, the Beijing Games were a major media event and the focus of intense scrutiny and speculation. In contrast to earlier such events, however, the Beijing Games are also unfolding in a newly volatile global media environment that is no longer monopolized by broadcast media. The dramatic expansion of media outlets and the growth of mobile communications technology have changed the nature of media events, making it significantly more difficult to regulate them or control their meaning. This volatility is reflected in the multiple, well-publicized controversies characterizing the run-up to Beijing 2008. According to many Western commentators, the People's Republic of China seized the Olympics as an opportunity to reinvent itself as the "New China"---a global leader in economics, technology, and environmental issues, with an improving human-rights record. But China's maneuverings have also been hotly contested by diverse global voices, including prominent human-rights advocates, all seeking to displace the official story of the Games. Bringing together a distinguished group of scholars from Chinese studies, human rights, media studies, law, and other fields, Owning the Olympics reveals how multiple entities---including the Chinese Communist Party itself---seek to influence and control the narratives through which the Beijing Games will be understood. digitalculturebooks is an imprint of the University of Michigan Press and the Scholarly Publishing Office of the University of Michigan Library dedicated to publishing innovative and accessible work exploring new media and their impact on society, culture, and scholarly communication. Visit the website at www.digitalculture.org.

Already the world has seen the political, economic, and cultural significance of hosting the 2008 Olympics in Beijing—in policies instituted and altered, positions softened, projects undertaken. But will the Olympics make a lasting difference? This book approaches questions about the nature and future of China through the lens of sports—particularly as sports finds its utmost international expression in the Olympics.

The Beijing 2008 Olympic ceremonies were spectacular performances and technological accomplishments by the People’s Republic of China. However, the audience in Beijing was only the most overt element of a global audience receiving the message of the Games. For this global audience, the Beijing performances were a harbinger of wider regional and international ambitions; a message of intent that pointed to a larger Chinese plan to a degree not seen since the Ming dynasty. New Chinese ambitions embrace both soft power and hard power. The actor in this political drama of international scope is the Chinese state and its political ambitions on the world stage. The Beijing Olympics can be seen as its opening act, and the audience as global. Rather than the kind of "morality" play that is typically used in China to educate the people in politics, this new production – a production on many levels – was one aimed at audiences all around the world, and one that was a calculated expression of realpolitik. This book was previously published as a special issue of the International Journal of the History of Sport.

As the only American in the senior management team of the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympic Games, Jeff Ruffolo takes you behind the scenes and into a world no one has ever before witnessed. This remarkable, first-person account of the Beijing Summer Olympic Games is a riveting narrative taking you inside the greatest Olympics ever! This true story recounts the author's effort to perfect the broadcasting of NCAA Volleyball on the fledgling Internet and commercial radio stations throughout the Western USA and how he parlayed that experience into becoming America's voice of Olympic Volleyball at the 1996 Atlanta, 2000 Sydney and 2004 Athens Summer Olympics and then finally securing a position with the Beijing Olympic Organizing Committee. Follow the author as he maneuvers alone through unchartered and perilous waters in The People's Republic of China to become the Senior Expert of the Beijing Olympic Organizing Committee and the personal challenges he faced as the 2008 Beijing Olympic Media Center managed one global media crisis after another. Be captivated by this fascinating tale of political intrigue, mystery and magic as you too will be transported ... Inside the Beijing Olympics.

In China's Public Diplomacy, author Ingrid d'Hooghe contributes to our understanding of what constitutes and shapes a country's public diplomacy, and what factors undermine or contribute to its success. China invests heavily in policies aimed at improving its image, guarding itself against international criticism and advancing its domestic and international agenda. This volume explores how the Chinese government seeks to develop a distinct Chinese approach to public diplomacy, one that suits the country's culture and authoritarian system. Based on in-depth case studies, it provides a thorough analysis of this approach, which is characterized by a long-term vision, a dominant role for the government, an inseparable and complementary domestic dimension, and a high level of interconnectedness with China's overall foreign policy and diplomacy.

While Americans are generally aware of China's ambitions as a global economic and military superpower, few understand just how deeply and assertively that country has already sought to influence American society. As the authors of this volume write, it is time for a wake-up call. In documenting the extent of Beijing's expanding influence operations inside the United States, they aim to raise awareness of China's efforts to penetrate and sway a range of American institutions: state and local governments, academic institutions, think tanks, media, and businesses. And they highlight other aspects of the propagandistic “discourse war” waged by the Chinese government and Communist Party leaders that are less expected and more alarming, such as their view of Chinese Americans as members of a worldwide Chinese diaspora that owes undefined allegiance to the so-called Motherland.Featuring ideas and policy proposals from leading China specialists, China's Influence and American Interests argues that a successful future relationship requires a rebalancing toward greater transparency, reciprocity, and fairness. Throughout, the authors also strongly state the importance of avoiding casting aspersions on Chinese and on Chinese Americans, who constitute a vital portion of American society. But if the United States is to fare well in this increasingly adversarial relationship with China, Americans must have a far better sense of that country's ambitions and methods than they do now.

The Beijing Olympics in 2008 marks the beginning of an era of new business opportunities in China for 1.3 billion Chinese and the rest of the world. For investors, marketers, and businesspeople who want to understand the new drivers and business chances of the Chinese economy, Supertrends of Future China is the definitive guidebook. The authors ? two experts with decades of experience in Asia and both corporate and entrepreneurial track records ? introduce readers to China's ten supertrends: Value-adding and Innovating, Urbanizing and Servicing, Consuming and Aspiring, Inter-networking and e-Commercializing, Affluencing and Greening. These supertrends form the foundations of the best opportunities in the manufacturing, service, lifestyle, e-Commerce, telecommunications, finance, and environment industries during China's Olympic Decade.This complete book of new China opportunities presents the latest information and analysis from a positive and objective angle, focusing on the potential for business success rather than finger-pointing and fear-mongering. Written by businesspeople for businesspeople, it is an essential book for anybody doing business, investing, or working in China. It will also appeal to general readers interested in China's social, economic, and environmental development.

This report aims to analyse the projects implemented by the city of Beijing to incorporate environmental sustainability into the 2008 Olympic Games and fulfil the environmental commitments made during the candidature phase. Beijing set ambitious environmental goals to show the world its commitment to sustainable development. The project areas range from addressing air and water quality and waste management to including environmental considerations in new infrastructure development.

Competing in the 1986 National College Games of the People's Republic of China, Susan Brownell earned both a gold medal in the heptathlon and fame throughout China as "the American girl who won glory for Beijing University." Now an anthropologist, Brownell draws on her direct experience of Chinese athletics in this fascinating look at the culture of sports and the body in China. Training the Body for China is the first book on Chinese sports based on extended fieldwork by a Westerner. Brownell introduces the notion of "body culture" to analyze Olympic sports as one element in a whole set of Chinese body practices: the "old people's disco dancing" craze, the new popularity of bodybuilding (following reluctant official acceptance of the bikini), mass calisthenics, martial arts, military discipline, and more. Translating official and dissident materials into English for the first time and drawing on performance theory and histories of the body, Brownell uses the culture of the body as a focal point to explore the tensions between local and global organizations, the traditional and the modern, men and women. Her intimate knowledge of Chinese social and cultural life and her wide range of historic examples make Training the Body for China a unique illustration of how gender, the body, and the nation are interlinked in Chinese culture.

An insider's account of Romania's emergence from communism control In the 1970s American attorney Alfred H. Moses was approached on the streets of Bucharest by young Jews seeking help to emigrate to Israel. This became the author's mission until the communist regime fell in 1989. Before that Moses had met periodically with Romania's communist dictator, Nicolae Ceausescu, to persuade him to allow increased Jewish emigration. This experience deepened Moses's interest in Romania—an interest that culminated in his serving as U.S. ambassador to the country from 1994 to 1997 during the Clinton administration. The ambassador's time of service in Romania came just a few years after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the subsequent collapse of communism in Eastern Europe. During this period Romania faced economic paralysis and was still buried in the rubble of communism. Over the next three years Moses helped nurture Romania's nascent democratic institutions, promoted privatization of Romania's economy, and shepherded Romania on the path toward full integration with Western institutions. Through frequent press conferences, speeches, and writings in the Romanian and Western press and in his meetings with Romanian officials at the highest level, he stated in plain language the steps Romania needed to take before it could be accepted in the West as a free and democratic country. Bucharest Diary: An American Ambassador's Journey is filled with firsthand stories, including colorful anecdotes, of the diplomacy, both public and private, that helped Romania recover from four decades of communist rule and, eventually, become a member of both NATO and the European Union. Romania still struggles today with the consequences of its history, but it has reached many of its post-communist goals, which Ambassador Moses championed at a crucial time. This book will be of special interest to readers of history and public affairs—in particular those interested in Jewish life under communist rule in Eastern Europe and how the United States and its Western partners helped rebuild an important country devastated by communism.