Xi’s real China dream

11 Nov 22 | Magazine, News and features, Volume 51.03 Autumn 2022, Volume 51.03 Autumn 2022, Volume 51.03 Autumn 2022 Extras

The near coincidence of two events this autumn – the World Cup in Qatar and the 20th National Party Congress in Beijing, where Chinese leader Xi Jinping will likely assume an unprecedented third term in power – represents an appropriate moment to reflect on one of Xi’s signature initiatives. Not the Chinese Dream, the Belt and Road Initiative, poverty alleviation or his anti-corruption campaign, but football.

Legend holds that a soccer-mad young Xi was so aggrieved by the “humiliation” inflicted on the Chinese national team by English club Watford at an exhibition game he attended at the Workers’ Stadium in 1983 that he determined he would redress China’s weakness in football. Decades later he declared, shortly before assuming power, that China would host and ultimately win the World Cup.

As a means to overcoming the country’s historical “national humiliation”, it was probably overly ambitious.

Nonetheless, in his first term Xi put football reform and development squarely on the national political agenda through three major policy documents promulgated between 2014 and 2016. Together they represented an overarching framework for developing a domestic sports economy, facilitating mass participation and creating an effective training ecosystem from youth levels to the national team. The long-term objective was to transform China into a “world class football nation” by 2050, a timeframe and scale of ambition that aligned with broader national objectives such as the “great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation”.

Common to Chinese policymaking, broad top-down objectives were delegated to many different institutional and private actors to design and implement, leading to much experimentation, messy ad hoc adjustment and competing interests.

Compared with many other initiatives associated with Xi’s tenure, football is a benign sector. Many concerns raised at the height of the football craze a few years ago have, as yet, proven unfounded. Chinese companies’ global sponsorship deals and the elevation of Chinese officials within international governance bodies have not made the global game any more corrupt or susceptible to parochial interests.

Chinese investors’ rush to demonstrate fealty to Xi’s football plans (or merely to secrete money offshore) led to a brief, and now largely divested, scattergun acquisition of European football clubs and assets, but the clubs and leagues survived and even though many were in globally strategic locations it did not result in additional “geopolitical influence”. Nor did the funding and construction of stadiums in Africa, though there may have been marginal “soft power” gains in facilitating the hosting of several Africa Cup of Nations tournaments.

Imposing Xi’s favourite sport across Chinese school curricula might appear heavy handed, but encouraging China’s sedentary youth to exercise and head off a public health timebomb is hardly a pernicious objective.

Football is Xi’s pet project, but criticism of the underperforming national team, the hapless Chinese Football Association (CFA) or broader reforms are subject to no more stringent censorship than anything else on the Chinese internet (contained criticism is OK, demands for systemic change or encouraging collective action is not).

It is true that Chinese football reproduces class and place-based disparities, with migrant workers, for example, less able to participate. And, prior to Covid, match-going fans were already facing increasingly strict security at stadiums, fickle owners and idiosyncratic regulatory interventions by the CFA. And yet while we should be mindful of the progressive circumscription of freedoms across Chinese society under Xi, many of the problems faced by Chinese fans are common to supporters everywhere.

That said, we should pause for a moment on the question of ethnicity, given the unprecedented crackdown on Muslims in Xinjiang that has come to define Xi’s 10 years in office. On the surface, football has become a site for advances in representation. China’s best player, Wu Lei, is a member of the Hui (Muslim) ethnic minority group. In March, Chinese-Nigerian Huang Shenghao became the first bi-racial player to represent the country (at under-17 level). Mirahmetjan Muzepper became the first Uyghur to play for the men’s national team in 2018.

The treatment of another Uyghur player, Erfan Hezim, demonstrates the systemic repression of young Uyghur men. Hezim spent almost a year in a detention camp in Xinjiang, apparently for unauthorised travel overseas to participate in football training camps, before being allowed to resume his career in 2019. Uyghurs coming through the ranks can face many forms of discrimination, partly explaining the negligible number of players in the Chinese Super League despite the popularity of football in Xinjiang. The region could be a significant source of playing talent, but the conditions there are so severely circumscribed that it is impossible to realise.

As for those from outside China’s official borders, the expedient decision to bring several naturalised Brazilians into the national team during World Cup qualifying met with only muted criticism from grassroot nationalists, even after the players’ efforts proved futile. The handling of naturalised talent, though, demonstrates an enduringly awkward official embrace of foreignness.

The CFA’s provisional regulations oblige clubs to teach naturalised foreigners Chinese language, culture and history, in addition to the fundamental political positions of the CCP. Party cadres attached to every professional club monitor, supervise and submit regular reports on players’ performance, behaviour and attitudes, reproducing the party’s longstanding “foreign affairs” system for handling foreigners. By all accounts, the naturalised Brazilians have been exemplary. But all this shows that some aspects of football’s development reflect the trajectory emerging across other social sectors during Xi’s tenure – one of a controlled society subject to the regime’s circumscriptions and vision for a desirable China.

In line with the requirements of the reform policies, infrastructure has been built and facilities rolled out on an impressive scale. But football has so far failed to become an elective mass participation sport like basketball or badminton. The popularity of gaming and the exponential growth of professional e-sports in China suggests football has its work cut out appealing to young people.

China has its fair share of dedicated supporters and “transnational fans” who are as knowledgeable and passionate about foreign clubs they will never visit as locals are. Yet the kind of intangible “football culture” that manifests in ubiquitous pick-up games on Brazilian beaches or English playgrounds has not taken root. Football schools and academies have not (yet) produced a “Chinese Messi” or even a supply of more prosaic talent, although it is premature to write off long-term efforts to build up the talent pool.

Youth participation has run afoul of resistant parents who prefer their children to focus on academics, which is intense, uber-competitive and almost certainly a better investment in the future than football. Short fee-paying football camps are the preserve of cosmopolitan middle-class parents, while serious football academies offering talent-based scholarships are mainly an option for poor families whose children are unable to compete for academic advancement. Football as a leisure activity and signifier of middle-class lifestyles embodying China’s desired “mildly prosperous” modernity has so far failed to capture imaginations.

And then came Covid and continuing “dynamic zero” restrictions to burst football’s bubble economy. With the Chinese Super League (CSL) mothballed for a time, expensively-acquired foreign players departed, and China gave up its hosting rights for the 2023 Asian Cup due to the ongoing uncertainties. Owners facing economic headwinds created by the pandemic were unable to service the continual cash injections needed to sustain clubs.

The property sector, which has become intimately entwined with football, was hit by a debt crisis and state interventions associated with Xi’s new preoccupation of ‘Common Prosperity’. Evergrande, the over-leveraged real-estate developer and owner of China’s most successful club, was forced to sell the land for its half-built new mega-stadium back to the local government. Since 2015, more than 20 clubs across the top divisions have folded, often due to insufficient organisational experience and unsustainable business models. Jiangsu FC disbanded soon after winning the CSL in 2020 when its owner, indebted retailer Suning, decided it could no longer afford it.

There is no reason why Chinese football shouldn’t find a sustainable niche as a spectator and participant sport, and a national team that can compete in Asia and qualify for international tournaments. Some of the ambitions set out in Xi’s reforms are not currently realistic, but long-term plans should be given time to unfold. A hypothetical Chinese bid to host a future World Cup, would, given Fifa’s interests and track record, prove irresistible.

The hosting of a World Cup would be a significant boost to football development in the country. But the attendant potential for “sportswashing” and requisite self-censorship have already been demonstrated on a small scale by European clubs and leagues desperate to access the Chinese market. Take the example of midfielder Mesut Özil, who was sidelined by Arsenal, which has a huge following in China, after speaking out against the persecution of Uyghurs.

The Chinese national team will not compete in Qatar later this year, but China will be present through Fifa’s signature sponsorship deal with Wanda, and Chinese fans will watch en masse, attracted by the spectacle, the conversation and the opportunities for offshore sports-betting.

Jonathan Sullivan is a Chinese specialist and an associate professor at the University of Nottingham.

This article appears in the autumn 2022 issue of Index on Censorship. To subscribe click here

Cancelling Russian culture is today’s moral imperative

23 Jun 22 | News and features, Russia, Ukraine, Volume 51.02 Summer 2022, Volume 51.02 Summer 2022 Extras

Artistic director of the Mariinsky Theatre Valery Gergiev at the opening of the Zaryadye Concert Hall. Photo: www.kremlin.ru

Since the war started, Ukraine has become a magnet for the global media. As the war has progressed, its voice has become stronger in cultural matters, too. Ukraine has emerged from the shadows of its murderous “brother” and thrust itself into the western imagination, bleeding, yet stoic, full of raw emotion. It stopped being “the Ukraine”. “Kiev” became “Kyiv.”

Western intellectuals and the public suddenly started browsing Wikipedia pages on Ukraine’s history, trying to dissect reasons for its obstinance in the face of the enemy.

The Russia-Ukraine war has many layers. It’s a war of democracy versus authoritarianism. It is a war of blatant propaganda versus principled journalism. It is also a classical colonial war of a metropolis against one of its former subjects. A liberation struggle, extending into the realm of history and culture.

There’s a growing consensus among Ukraine’s cultural elites that this war should become a point of no-return for Russia trying to impose its imperial blueprint on the perception of history and culture of this region, both domestically and internationally.

In the early days of the war, as the first Russian rockets hit the Ukrainian capital, Ukrainian Institute, a young state institution with a mandate to promote Ukraine’s standing in the world through cultural diplomacy instruments, published a manifesto, calling on international partners to stop cooperation with Russia’s state cultural institutions. Similar to weaning itself off Russian energy, the West needs to stop thoughtlessly consuming Russian cultural products, without contextualising them, the Institute said.

As Russian artillery pound Ukrainian cities, London’s leading museums continue feeding the narrative about great Russian culture and history to their audiences. “Fabergé in London: Romance to Revolution”opened at the V&A shortly before the invasion. It profiles “craftsmanship and luxury” of Carl Fabergé, the jeweller of the Russian imperial family. The backdrop of the story is Russia’s imperial history and close ties between both monarchies.

There has since been a pivot. British museums are suddenly showing more willingness towards giving Ukraine agency. London’s National Gallery reviewed its stance on a Degas canvas in its permanent collection, depicting a swirl of dancers in a distinctly Ukrainian traditional attire. “Russian Dancers” became “Ukrainian Dancers”. Tate Modern is currently working on a new exhibition project with Ukraine as its focus, the first of its kind in its history.

Ukraine’s cultural elites and scholars worldwide are determined to seize this moment and to shift the paradigm where imperial hierarchies persist. As it has stood the histories of big countries, mostly former empires, and their cultural figures and phenomena matter more than those of their colonial subjects. This explains why there are so few centres for Ukrainian Studies in the UK (Cambridge being the notable exception), so few translations of Ukrainian literature. No exhibitions in major museums, up until now.

“We cannot cancel Russian culture.” “Pushkin cannot be held responsible for Putin.” “We cannot exclude Russian artists from being invited to residencies and collaborative projects.” “It’s illiberal.” “It smacks of censorship.” These are the arguments often deployed by many intellectuals and creatives in the West. Let us address these concerns one by one.

Placing Russia at the centre of any cultural conversation should not happen without clear articulation of the fact that Russia has used culture for the purposes of aggressive political propaganda internationally. Culture is a broad reflection of the society it represents, and currently Russian society stands largely united behind an ideology promoting violence and blatant untruths.

The new consensus should go beyond the outcome of the Ukraine-Russia conflict and should be about realisation that cultural discourse is unfairly skewed in favour of big and powerful countries, denying many voice and agency. And Ukraine is not alone here.

Our perception of one’s culture is often shaped by a sheer fact of its presence on the cultural scene: through books, theatre productions, films and exhibitions. We often forget that there’s a powerful state machinery propping up this presence and that rogue states – and Russia has become one – weaponise culture and history to political ends, and even use them as a pretext to start a war. To be remembered, the Russian intent behind the killings in Ukraine is to “de-Nazify” the country.

Artists and academics often lack a toolkit to study and bring to the fore cultures previously absent from the discourse. These cultures are absent or underrepresented not for the reasons of uninteresting or lacking value. They are absent because of entrenched cultural hierarchies, intellectual laziness, lack of courage to work with original sources, as well as a long history of suppression of their culture and language by the metropolis.

It is intellectually dishonest and arrogant to place Ukrainian and “good” Russian artists on the same footing by inviting them to speak at the same panel discussion or to apply for funding, for the sake of “reconciliation” and “dialogue”. There can be no reconciliation while the war is still on. It can only start happening after Russia has admitted its guilt and paid reparations for the damage done. Any other framework would mean perpetuation of the colonial discourse.

This article appears in the forthcoming summer 2022 edition of Index on Censorship. Get ahead of the game and take out a subscription with a 30% discount from Exact Editions using the promo code Battle4Ukraine.

For another view, read Maria Sorenson’s article as she calls for artists to unite in their opposition to authoritarian regimes and an end to the blanket boycott of Russian culture.

Beijing is rewriting Hong Kong’s handover history. We must not allow it

21 Jun 22 | Asia and Pacific, China, Hong Kong, News and features

Hong Kong

Since the handover of Hong Kong to Beijing on 1 July 1997, the annual march to mark the date became a rallying point for Hong Kong’s pro-democracy activitists. Photo: Etan Liam/Flickr

Residents of Hong Kong are going to be given “fortune bags” this month. Millions of people in the city of 7.4 million will receive bags containing a mug, a pen and a fan. The souvenirs will be customised to celebrate 25 years since the handover of Hong Kong from British rule to Beijing rule, which took place on 1 July 1997. This is just one of many planned initiatives to mark the date. Others include the opening of the Hong Kong Palace Museum, modelled on a museum of the same name in Beijing. There’ll be exhibitions, a gala, performances – you name it, they’re doing it. On a less grand scale, an exhibition of photographs from 1997 has been on display at a local Hong Kong art gallery this spring, a collage of smiling faces and waving China flags. A book accompanies the exhibition.

All the initiatives serve to hammer home the message – “this day is a celebration. Do not say otherwise.” The Chinese government is effectively stage managing the 1 July anniversary.

It’s hardly unusual for a state to want to preside over a message of overwhelming positivity. In the UK, we’ve all just emerged from the extravaganza that was the Queen’s Jubilee, a jamboree that sidestepped any of the scandals surrounding the Queen and Royal Family, as well as some people’s misgivings about the concept of monarchy.

But Beijing is going one step further. Not only are they ramping up good stories, they’re papering over the bad. Inconvenient truths are being written out. New Hong Kong textbooks, for example, will say that the city was never a British colony. Instead, the books will teach students the British “only exercised colonial rule” in Hong Kong. Even the police are being made to change their march. According to the South China Morning Post, the Hong Kong Police Force and other disciplined services are being ordered to move in the Chinese “goose-step” fashion at all important events from 1 July, over the current British-style.

Such distinctions might seem curious, even pedantic – “colony” versus “colonial rule”, what difference you might ask?  – but they’re in fact highly political. Beijing is suggesting an unbroken line of sovereignty with Hong Kong. Such a narrative criss-crosses with the one it has used in Xinjiang and Tibet, both of which have been denied past independence in order to justify current Chinese control. As George Orwell famously wrote “who controls the past controls the future”. That is China’s aim.

In Hong Kong, Beijing has been building up to this moment for decades, laying the foundations even before the handover took place. Jonathan Mirsky, East Asia editor of The Times in the 1990s, described the situation in Index six months before the handover: news channels reporting on China were doing so in a “vapid or grovelling” manner; organisations were expected to plan celebrations for the handover. He predicted a dire future, and he was right. Freedom of speech and assembly – the core freedoms that underpin democracies – have been whittled away to the point of non-existence. Index has reported on Hong Kong on and off since our creation in 1972. In recent years this reporting has been more “on”.

The passage of the National Security Law in 2020 entrenched the worst excesses of rule by Beijing. It effectively made criticism of government illegal. Protests surrounding the handover that have taken place annually since 1997 have now become too high-stakes.

But we don’t have to play by Beijing rules over here. We can point out that Hong Kong was, in fact, a British colony. That’s not something to be proud of, but it is well established. The rewriting of history is happening with alarming regularity in China (and elsewhere for that matter) and we should call out this worrying trend.

We should also talk about what has happened to freedoms in Hong Kong since 1997. Events like an anniversary are excellent moments to spotlight a cause and concentrate conversations.

Let’s use the 25th year to really raise our voice. In so doing let’s forge connections with those actively campaigning for Hong Kong freedoms, people like Nathan Law and Benedict Rogers and organisations like Hong Kong Watch and the Committee for Freedom in Hong Kong. We have more power when united. Let’s continue to speak up for those who can’t right now because they’ve been silenced – Jimmy Lai, Joshua Wong, Agnes Chow and the many more currently in prison in Hong Kong simply for demanding basic rights. And let’s pressurise our own governments to do the same.

Ultimately people in Hong Kong should be able to commemorate 1 July however they want, be it with great fanfare and fireworks or holding up a poster and shouting out against Chinese government repression. A pluralistic society is one to celebrate, not one that’s afraid of its own history.

Awards

16 May 22

ABOUT THE AWARDS Index on Censorship’s Freedom of Expression Awards celebrate those who have had significant impact fighting censorship anywhere in the world. There are three categories: Arts, Campaigning and Journalism. Winners are honoured at a gala celebration in...