China's great leap : the Beijing games and Olympian human rights challenges Cover Image

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China's great leap : the Beijing games and Olympian human rights challenges

Summary: An essential book for understanding China on the cusp of the Olympics, China's Great Leap draws on the expertise of many of the world's leading China experts. These writers examine the People's Republic of China today as its government and 1.3 billion people prepare for the 2008 Olympic Games. When Beijing first sought the Games, China was still recovering from the upheavals of Maoist rule and adapting to a market revolution. Today China wants to engage with the outside world-while fully controlling the engagement. How will the new leaders in Beijing manage the Olympic process and the internal and external pressures for reform it creates? China's Great Leap will illuminate China's recent history and outline how domestic and international pressures in the context of the Olympics could achieve human rights change. Learn about key areas for human rights reform and how the Olympics could represent a possible great leap forward for the people of China and for the world. With contributions from Joseph Amon, Bao Tong, Frank Ching, Jerome A. Cohen, Arvind Ganesan, R. Scott Greathead, Han Dongfang and Geoffrey Crothall, Sharon Hom, John Kamm, Phelim Kine, Jimmy Lai, Liu Xiaobo, Martin Lee, Christine Loh, Emily Parker, Kenneth Roth, Sophie Richardson, Mickey Spiegel, Wang Dan, and Dave Zirin. As Media Director of Human Rights Watch, Minky Worden monitors crises, wars, human rights abuses, and political developments in more than seventy countries worldwide. From 199298, Worden lived and worked in Hong Kong as an adviser to Democratic Party chairman Martin Lee. Worden is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, speaks Cantonese and German, and is an elected member of the Overseas Press Club's Board of Governors. She is the co-editor of Torture: Does It Make Us Safer? Is It Ever Ok? A Human Rights Perspective.

Item details

ISBN: 9781583228432
ISBN: 1583228438
Physical Description: print
303 pages, 16 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations, map ; 21 cm
Edition: Seven Stories Press 1st ed.
Publisher: New York : Seven Stories Press, ©2008.

Contents / Notes

Bibliography, etc. Note:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 303-317) and index.

Formatted Contents Note:

A lever for change in China / Nicholas Krostof -- Overview: China's race for reform / Miky Worden -- From Mao to now: three tumultuous decades / Frank Ching -- The promise of a people's Olympics / Sharon K. Hom -- The ghosts of Olympics past / Dave Zirin -- Olympian changes: Seoul and Beijing / Richard Pound -- Five Olympic rings, thousands of handcuffs / Wang Dan -- Physical strength, moral poverty / Jimmy Lai -- A gold medal in media censorship / Phelim Kine -- High hurdles to health in China / Joseph Amon -- Worship beyond the gods of victory / Mickey Spiegel -- A slow march to legal reform / Jerome Cohen -- Building the new Beijing: so much work, so little time / Mei Fong -- China's Olympic dream, no workers' paradise / Han Dongfang and Geoffrey Crothall -- The race for profits / Arvind Ganesan -- China and the Spielberg effect / R. Scott Greathead -- A marathon challenge to improve China's image / John Kamm -- Clearing the air / Christine Loh -- Modern games, old Chinese Communist Party / Bao Tong --Democracy with Chinese characteristics / Martin Lee -- Authoritarianism in the light of the Olympic flame / Liu Xiaobo --Dragons win: the Beijing games and Chinese nationalism / Emily Parker -- Challenges for a responsible power / Sophie Richardson -- A dual approach to rights reform / Kenneth Roth.