Olympia 2022 in Beijing: How to put pressure on China too

The women's tennis organization WTA has shown how the communist leadership of China can be put under pressure: with clear demands, with the threat of clear consequences and with the willingness to put aside your own financial interests.

The organization has achieved so much credibility internationally that Beijing must fear that the alleged abuse scandal involving tennis player Peng Shuai will become a catalyst for a diplomatic boycott of the Winter Olympics in February.

However, the WTA did not achieve its actual goals: an exit permit for Peng Shuai and a public investigation into the allegations it made against a former top official.

Anyone who knows the Chinese regime knows that it cannot be expected anytime soon.

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) is meanwhile in the pillory because it tried to resolve the affair as quietly as possible so as not to endanger the Olympic Games.

It may be premature to condemn this “quiet diplomacy” as opportunistic unless you know what was going on behind the scenes.

Experience shows that you need both: sustained pressure that drives up the cost of human rights violations in China, and political negotiations to achieve improvements for individuals.

As for the question of a diplomatic boycott of the Olympic Games, this means that there is not just one right answer.

You don't have to be a prophet to predict that neither the future Chancellor Olaf Scholz nor the future Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock will travel to the Winter Games in Beijing.

Propaganda spectacle in Beijing

The only question is how they will explain their absence.

As early as 2008, the Chancellor, the Foreign Minister and the Interior Minister responsible for sport stayed away from the summer games in Beijing.

However, the federal government did not want this to be understood as a boycott or protest against the crackdown on the protests in Tibet.

It was said in Berlin that one had never considered participating, so one could not speak of a rejection.

It is one thing not to add high-ranking delegations to the propaganda spectacle that is to be expected in Beijing.

Another, demonstratively refusing the invitation with reference to an alleged genocide in Xinjiang.

One thing is clear: all heads of state and all high-ranking politicians who take part in the opening ceremony in February will be absorbed by the Chinese propaganda.

In view of the alleged crimes against humanity committed by the Chinese state in Xinjiang, every foreigner in the guest gallery is accused of assisting Beijing with whitewashing these crimes.

The pandemic is an opportunity for everyone to get out of the affair without risking retaliation from Beijing.

The United States, Great Britain and Australia, however, have decided to increase the pressure on Beijing by threatening a diplomatic boycott.

A boycott of athletes is nowhere seriously considered, because no country wants to deny its athletes participation in the competitions.

With their move, the three countries are underscoring their new unity in dealing with China.

But it also shows the dissent with the EU, which is unlikely to find a common line on this issue.

Winter sports countries such as Italy or Austria, which China offered themselves as expert partners in organizing the Winter Games and who made good money from them, are unlikely to want to deny the country the ability to host the Games.

The Chinese leadership is already working hard to limit the damage to the image of a possible boycott. Because of the pandemic, people are not interested in many state guests anyway, it is now said in Beijing. At the 2008 Games, China was still looking for international recognition. In the meantime, the leadership is giving it off as a sign of strength that such advertising is no longer necessary. The domestic audience is more important for Beijing.

It is not difficult for the state media to squeeze the boycott threats into the popular narrative that the West does not allow China to rise.

If that led to the West losing sympathy among those Chinese who are still oriented towards free societies, that would be in Beijing's interest and damage to America and Europe.

For the general public outside of China, with or without a boycott, the Games will draw more attention to human rights abuses in China.

And that's good.