China avoids Olympic protests by banning foreign spectators

By Gady Epstein: China affairs editor, The Economist

FOR A TIME it was not clear who would attend the Winter Olympics that will be held in and around Beijing in February 2022. Reports of crimes against humanity being committed against Uyghurs—including mass internment, forced labour, separation of families and forced sterilisation—had prompted calls to cancel or move the games. Activists lobbied corporate sponsors to withdraw their support. Human-rights groups branded it the “genocide Olympics”. Activists and elected officials around the world talked about boycotting the games.

But it is difficult to boycott something you are not allowed to attend. In September 2021 organisers said they would not be permitting any spectators from outside China, as the games would operate in a covid-19 “bubble” stricter than the one imposed in Tokyo for the Summer Olympics. The ban does not apply to world leaders, who are invited by the host country, nor to accredited foreign media, of whom there will be plenty. But in effect the Beijing games will be a domestic—and domesticated—affair.

The “closed-loop management system” for the Olympics may help authorities in Beijing avert the sort of propaganda nightmare that activists had hoped to create. Under the contract the host country agrees with the International Olympics Committee IOC, the environment of the games is meant to be free and open. Journalists can operate freely with unfettered access to the internet; there can be no discrimination; and there is a right to assemble freely and protest. But those promises mean little.

It is difficult to boycott something you are not allowed to attend

The IOC cannot stop China from preventing Uyghurs getting to the games where they would magically experience official non-discrimination. Foreign media will focus some attention on human rights, but China is unlikely to give visas to Western reporters, other than those in the bubble covering the sports.

There is no serious talk of countries not competing, as when America boycotted the 1980 Olympics in Moscow, after the Soviet Union’s invasion of Afghanistan (prompting the Soviet bloc countries to boycott the 1984 games in Los Angeles in retaliation). And the IOC’s corporate sponsors generally avoid direct answers to questions about China’s treatment of Uyghurs, and claim they are supporting the Olympics more broadly.

Some world leaders, including President Joe Biden, are expected to send a message by not attending. But China’s strict pandemic rules will remove some of the sting. That leaves the most important participants, the athletes themselves, with the best chance of making an impression. Do not be surprised when some brave gold-medal winner risks the Communist Party’s wrath by making a symbolic gesture of protest from the podium.

Gady Epstein: China affairs editor, The Economist■

This article appeared in the China section of the print edition of The World Ahead 2022 under the headline “Frozen”