Human rights and the Beijing Olympics

Imagined Global Community and the Transnational Public Sphere1

Dados Bibliográficos

ID5609599
AutoresSusan Brownell (0000-0002-6568-7128, University of Missouri–St. Louis, autor correspondente)
Ano2012
Volume63
Fascículo2
Páginas306-327
Data de publicação2012-06-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoBritish Journal of Sociology (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 0007-1315 • E-ISSN: 1468-4446
EditoraWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1111/j.1468-4446.2012.01411.x
PMID22670649
OpenAlexW1938152630
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas17
Referências citadas12

The Olympic Games are increasingly used by non-governmental organizations to demand transnational forms of accountability from public authorities. This article assesses the effectiveness of transnational public opinion surrounding the Beijing 2008 Olympics, when the pressure of Western public opinion was exerted upon the government of the world's most populous non-Western nation to improve its human rights record. Utilizing the concepts of 'imagined global community' and 'transnational public sphere', it finds that the Olympic Games had helped to call into existence a transnational public that ran up against the obstacle posed by the incomplete formation of supra-national forms of governance. The International Olympic Committee, a non-governmental organization, was a weak substitute. Because of the strong desire of Chinese people to take part in transnational deliberations, the article concludes with optimism about the potential of transnational public spheres that include Chinese people to develop toward more effective forms of transnational governance. But the IOC must strengthen the voice of its non-Western members, and Western interlocutors, including the media, must accept their share of the responsibility for creating the conditions for egalitarian dialogue

Accountability · Beijing · China · Corporate governance · Economics · Government (linguistics · Human rights · Management · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Public opinion · Public relations · Public sphere · Sociology · Doping in Sports · Law · Public Administration · Sport and Mega-Event Impacts · Sports, Gender, and Society