Global Media Events

China on the Global Stage: Beijing 2008 Olympics

Next summer China will host the 2008 Olympic Games – a high risk / high reward global image strategy that relies heavily on favorable coverage by international media to succeed. We offer some excerpts from our writing on this topic this quarter.

 

Free Press for the 2008 Olympics?

By Nicole Karmil

…China has recently announced that during the Beijing Olympics in 2008, foreign journalists will be allowed to travel freely within China. They will also be allowed to come in and out of the country without visas. Even better, journalists may conduct interviews with Chinese athletes … but only after a 3-week application process...

 

Olympic Sex Sensations

By Galina Mulloy

…Today the critical eyes of the foreign media are turned toward Beijing seeking any ‘tittle-tattle’ about China’s organization of the Olympic Games. Not to disappoint, China's sex-toy industry recently launched a series of products on the market carrying Olympic symbols. One of them is called Fuwa condoms, carrying an image of the Fuwa Olympic mascots. Chances are these are not on the Olympic organizing committee's list of official merchandise...

 

International Journalists: Can they change the world in Beijing?

by Julie Shelton

…During the Beijing Olympics, thousands of international journalists will have 90 days to report the stories that Chinese media is prohibited to publish. Stories on China’s support of North Korea, its oppression of Tibet, human rights violations in prisons, factories and other areas, government cover-ups, military build-up and even the Chinese government’s plans to take Taiwan back.

However “wrong” it may seem to support these Games, though, it would be wrong not to when we know what international journalists embedded in the country – under the guise of reporting on the Games themselves – can do for the billions of oppressed in China, North Korea and even Taiwan….International journalists need to band together next summer in the spirit of being the voice for those who cannot speak.