The 2022 Winter Games in Beijing provide many benefits for China, and really don't have any downsides for the country.
For China's leader, Xi Jinping, the most important result of the Games will likely be their impact on his domestic audience, as Chinese media coverage of the Games will be highly nationalistic and laudatory, aimed at impressing the Chinese people. To this home audience, the spectacle of the Games reinforces government propaganda about China's success and progress toward achieving the “Chinese Dream of the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation.”
But I don't predict the 2022 Games will have the same effect, either domestically or internationally, that the Beijing 2008 Summer Olympics had, partially because the Winter Olympics are smaller and the weather is harsher, and partially because 2008 was the first time China hosted the Olympics.
In 2008, stunning opening ceremonies including 5,000 syncopated dancers telling a stylised story of 5,000 years of Chinese history astonished the international audience. The power of that first time cannot be repeated.
Nonetheless, China has spared no expense to prepare, with a report from Insider pegging the total cost “in excess of US$38.5 billion, 24 times the country's initial budget of $1.6 billion.” As with everything China does, when it wants to occupy the center stage internationally, it will put on a big show.
The domestic payoff of the Olympics matters because China will face a trying year in 2022. Xi is seeking an unprecedented third term as general-secretary of the Communist Party. The nation's economy is slowing. International opposition to China's human rights abuses in Xinjiang and Hong Kong and to its aggressive foreign policy is growing. Xi is hoping that the “bread and circuses” diversionary aspect of the Games will help him overcome the stresses of this year and advance his political standing.
Chinese leaders care about improving the nation's international status, but they're already working from a position of relative strength.
China's rise internationally, especially since 2008, is undeniable.
Its status as the number two power in the world is almost universally acknowledged.
As a scholar of Chinese politics and foreign policy, I believe that Xi wants the Games to impress the world.
But that is less important to him than the domestic effect of the Games.
China is not traditionally strong in winter sports. But the country has invested heavily in preparing increasingly competitive teams for these Games. The success of Chinese athletes at the Games will enhance China's reputation and thus Chinese citizens' sense of pride.
In turn, this will mute competition from Xi's opposition within the Chinese Communist Party.
FreeSki world champion Eileen Gu chose to compete for China – her mother is Chinese – and not the U.S., where she was born and is a citizen. Her choice may yield golds in areas where China is not a strong competitor.
Her decision also reverberates with Xi's call on all ethnic Chinese worldwide to aid China's development. Chinese domestic propaganda will highlight how she chose China over the U.S., and implicitly urge others to do the same.