From the issue July 27, 2001

May Your Dreams Come True The Chinese government invested millions of dollars and lots of political capital to win the 2008 Olympic Games for Beijing. Now it must deliver on its promises to the world at large and its own people By CRYSTYL MO in Beijing

Policemen laughed as illegal fireworks lit up the Beijing sky. Thousands of strangers shook hands, crying tears of joy. Motorists abandoned their gridlocked cars on the city's main boulevard to taste the euphoria. One man proudly brandished a sign of the times - a laptop computer instead of a cloth banner, its screen showing the Olympic symbol. Even the Communist Party joined the party, as President Jiang Zemin waded informally into the Tiananmen Square throng. New Beijing, Great Olympics. Finally. Says Hong Kong-based Morgan Stanley Dean Witter chief economist Andy Xie: "Chinese just ticked off a huge box on what a 'normal' country should have."

Be careful what you wish for, goes the ancient Chinese proverb: You just might get it. Beijing's outpouring of pride on July 13 - when International Olympic Committee delegates voted overwhelmingly for Beijing to host the Games of the XXIX Olympiad - was the fun part. The real games are yet to begin. From human rights watchers to environmentalists, from press freedom advocates to Falungong adherents, China can expect unprecedented international scrutiny over the next seven years. On that note, the Olympics movement was careful to warn that the Games can be reassigned as late as 2004. "The site of the 2008 Games will be discussed every day until the opening ceremony," says U.S. Olympic delegate Anita Defrantz.

But foreign pressures are the least of the Chinese leadership's problems. A developing country in the throes of enormous political, social and economic change, China's biggest Olympics challenge is internal. Its extraordinary Great Leap into modernity over the past 20 years has created a halfway-house economy where old certainties have dissolved into insecurities, where previously nonexistent social divisions are hardening. World Trade Organization accession, expected next year, will further rock the socio-economic boat. A raft of new leaders, including a new president in 2002, must try to move with the uncertain times to contain and cajole. "The Beijing Olympics will be much more than sports," says Hong Kong activist Christine Loh, a former politician. "It will impact domestic policies to a much wider extent than for most host cities."

All this must happen as the Olympics begin to look less like a party and more like a marathon. Along with most Olympic hosts, China will discover that costs can rarely be contained to everyone's satisfaction. Inevitable snafus will test everybody's patience. Jobs will disappear when polluting factories are closed or relocated as part of the $12 billion environmental cleanup of Beijing. Houses will be bulldozed to make way for Olympic stadiums and transport improvements - expected to cost another $22 billion. The fight against corruption is ongoing, and the underlying social tensions, so vividly illustrated in the wild, post-vote celebrations, will only mount. "Life in Beijing has improved, but many people still struggle to make ends meet and don't feel they have a lot of freedom," says Feng Xiaogang, a leading film and television director. "This victory provided a positive way for people to finally let out that energy."

Yet China's handling of human rights is a major sticking point. "Strong scrutiny from international public opinion is absolutely necessary," says Xiao Qiang, a New York-based spokesman for Human Rights In China. Sidney Jones, Asia director of Human Rights Watch, regrets that the Olympic committee didn't even try to get guarantees on human rights. He Depu, a spokesman for the illegal but tolerated China Democracy Party in Beijing, is bluntly pessimistic. "This victory will only serve to strengthen the Chinese Communist Party and it will use it for propaganda purposes," He says. "I don't expect to see a quick change in human rights in China because the Party is still very insecure. I tell those who are so optimistic to be more sober."

Press freedom is another area that desperately needs improvement. Bid members promised Olympic delegates that foreign journalists would not be restricted - though they didn't mention their domestic counterparts. But just one day after making that pledge, authorities in Beijing pulled the plug on a U.S. television network when it tried to report suicides by Falungong followers. And several weeks ago a wire-service photographer was beaten by Beijing police during a Falungong demonstration. "When the first journalist gets stopped, who's going to remind China of the pledge and insist that they honor it?" queries Jones. Others see a more positive outcome. "I think the leading officials are very much aware of the basic institutional changes that need to be made to help the media do its work," says Ying Chan, a media studies professor at Hong Kong University. "It's in their own enlightened self-interest to keep their promise."

Of course in the end, the Olympics are big business. And that's a game everyone knows how to play. "The WTO entrance combined with the Olympics sends an overall signal of confidence to foreign companies that they haven't received in more than 10 years," says Laurence Brahm, a Beijing-based lawyer and author. "And regardless of how you cut it, the average guy on the street will benefit. A lot of the people who have been laid off in the course of the state-owned enterprise reforms will be given opportunities by various services and business in connection with WTO and Olympic preparations. This will create a trickle-down effect far beyond anything the World Bank or the International Monetary Fund could have ever done."

As Beijing awoke to an emotional hangover July 14, the Olympic bid office was flooded by offers to donate cash. Many residents also said they were happy to move far from the city center if that would help China stage a successful Games. "The demolition [of houses] is actually a good thing," says Bai Feng, a bar owner in a district due to be leveled. "These buildings are old and really miserable to live in. I'm happy to move to a more modern place." In some minds the Olympic committee has overlooked the present to invest in the future. That's a mighty unpredictable wager, yet the payoff may well be the transformation of a nation.

With reporting by ALLEN T. CHENG/BEIJING