Source:FC:Urs Schöttli May 06 2010
A few days ago the world exposition in Shanghai opened its doors to thepublic. After the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing this is the second major world event, with which China makes global headlines. In the run-up to the two events we noted that while in Beijing the attention focused on the Olympics, in Shanghai the main interest was for Expo 2010. Observers who had been at the opening ceremony in Beijing’s bird’s nest noted that the fireworks that launched the Shanghai Expo were far grander. Proud Shanghai officials mention with glee that the Olympics had been a short event, while the Shanghai Expo will last a full six months.
Obviously, this is a new round in the eternal rivalry between the two great cities. World expositions come and go and most of them get quickly forgotten. However, a few of these events have gained a particularly emblematic significance.
We think of the Great Exhibition in London’s Crystal Palace in 1851 or of the World’s Fair in Paris in 1889, which gave the French capital a new monument of global fame, the Eiffel Tower. The London exhibition was also the celebration of the great British Empire.
At that time it not only spanned the world, it also proudly claimed to have reached the apex of the white man’s civilisationary mission in the world. The Paris exhibition, like many paintings of the Impressionists, was the celebration of a new age, the age of technology and industrial power.
A few years ago we met officials who were in charge of planning the Shanghai Expo 2010. They stressed that the main goal of the giant event was “to bring the world to the Chinese people”. Of course the Expo, together with the Summer Olympics, was also to be a kind of “coming of age party”, a demonstration to the world at large that China had returned to the top table. These two events are indeed a symbolic celebration of the historic economic, technological and social modernisation that has propelled China into the 21st century.
In many ways, the Shanghai Expo is a tribute to the greatest Chinese reformer in modern times, Deng Xiaoping. He stands for the gigantic efforts with which China has overcome the dreadful legacy of chairman Mao who had left the country destroyed and impoverished.
But let us go back to the claim of the Chinese officials that the Shanghai Expo mainly serves the purpose to bring the world to the Chinese people. It is this ambitious mission which puts the Shanghai Expo amongst the most important exhibitions. The officials expect some 70 million people to visit the six-month event. The overwhelming majority of the visitors will be from China.
In comparison, the number of foreign guests will be insignificant. It is to be expected that visitors from the distant provinces and remote towns will come to Shanghai in organised groups. The Communist Party will invite deserving members. Local dignitaries from all the four corners of the country will come to Shanghai and spend a good time at the Expo. Universities will send their eager teachers and students and, of course, the Chinese media will report at great length on the smallest detail of this gigantic show.
It will be interesting to see which pavilions will rank amongst the most popular. Of course, as is normal with a country that has emerged from two centuries of humiliation by foreigners, the focus will be first and foremost on the Chinese pavilions. The Shanghai Expo does not only present the world to China, it also wants to demonstrate the rapid rise of China to the top of the world economy.
Without any doubt the pavilion of the United States will attract most attention. The Japanese, too, can expect to be amongst the very top when it comes to the number of visitors. It is a telling fact that in both cases the bilateral relations are not free from friction.
However, the Chinese are pragmatic enough to distinguish between emotions and utility. They know that their country’s future needs the top technology, which only the United States and Japan can provide. The main political message, which the Chinese government wants to spread at the Shanghai Expo has to deal with the quality of life, particularly in an urban setting.
A strong emphasis is put on the respect for nature and the environment. However, it is expected that for the huge majority the main interest will be in getting an impression of as many foreign pavilions as possible.
It will be for them the first fleeting contact with people from distant parts of the world and will raise their curiosity for the world beyond China’s borders. This then, will be the historic legacy of the Shanghai Expo.
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