It looks like it just might. According to this NY Times article,
nongovernmental organizations and other groups appear to have scored a surprising success in an effort to link the Olympics, which the Chinese government holds very dear, to the killings in Darfur, which, until recently, Beijing had not seemed too concerned about.
Nearly any angle that is used to make headway here is worth pursuing in my mind, so this one is no different.
What is interesting here is that this is essentially a play on Chinese Vanity. Again, from the article:
…there is growing concern inside China that Darfur is hurting Beijing’s image.
Why haven’t these sorts of plays on the arrogance of other countries been more effective? I’d argue that the U.S. is just as concerned about it’s image as China in many respects (with the glaring exception being the so-called “War on Terror”).
It has always been thought that the way to get people or governments to act was to appeal to their [economic] self interests. The Olympics do have economic implications for China, but I don’t see that as being the predominant factor here. Perhaps we need to start doing vanity plays more often.
One Love. One II.
