Who is China's next "Olympic City"

Per reporter Yang Jifei Per intern reporter Yu Yang

Discussions about China's next "Olympic city" are making waves again.

On September 9, Xie Dong, vice mayor of Shanghai, introduced Shanghai's promotion of the construction of a world-famous sports city that Shanghai has successfully bid for the Olympic Qualification Series and Shanghai Competition, and said that as the host of the Olympic Qualification Series, four sports will be held in May 26: freestyle BMX, skateboarding, breakdancing and rock climbing.

In the eyes of many people, there are traces of this. In May this year, IOC President Bach visited Shanghai, and Shanghai Mayor Gong Zheng proposed when meeting with Bach that Shanghai will accelerate the construction of a world-famous sports city and introduce more international top events under the guidance of the IOC. The words sparked various speculations from the outside world.

Shanghai is committed to building a world-famous sports city. Among them, the combination system of major sports events with international influence and the global leader in hosting international top major events and professional leagues are the key elements. As far as professional sports are concerned, Shanghai is not lacking in confidence, but to achieve the goal of becoming a world-famous sports city, there is still an extremely important part - to build a world-class international sports event capital.

So far, Shanghai has no experience in hosting international large-scale multi-sport events. Especially since the beginning of this year, with the Chengdu Universiade and the Hangzhou Asian Games held successively, China's "circle of friends" for international large-scale comprehensive events has been continuously expanded, and it has become a "hard indicator" for China's top cities. Will Shanghai, which has been rumored for a long time, take this crucial step?

"Olympic bid" complex

As early as shortly after the end of the Beijing Olympics, the topic of Shanghai's "bid" began to appear, and every once in a while it "made a comeback" and set off strong local attention. Looking back on this journey, it is not difficult to see the deepening longing of the local people for the "Olympic bid".

In 2011, a news that "it is rumored that Shanghai intends to bid for the 2028 Olympic Games" swept the Internet, and even revealed the area where the "Olympic reserved site" was located. But officials soon denied it in interviews, mentioning that the "fallacy" originated from a statement by then-IOC President Rogge that "Shanghai has the ability to host the Olympic Games" during Shanghai's hosting of the World Games.

Although this rumor ended in "fake news", it opened a decade-long discussion about Shanghai's "Olympic bid".

In 2014, on the one hand, Beijing and Zhangjiakou entered the process of applying for the Winter Olympics, and on the other hand, the proposal on "bidding" during the "two sessions" in Shanghai was hotly discussed. At that time, Wang Xiaoshu, then executive vice president of the People's Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries, suggested that Shanghai should consider bidding for the 2028 Olympic Games. "New York, Paris, London and Tokyo, four top international metropolises, appeared in the three Olympic cycles of 2012, 2016 and 2020", and the symbolic significance of Shanghai's "Olympic bid" is self-evident.

At that time, there were also some people who had reservations, such as Lu Xiaocong, then a professor at the School of Sociology of Shanghai University, who believed that Shanghai's "bid" must consider what the Olympics can bring and how much it needs to pay. In his view, the city's efforts to bid for a grand event that is not a top priority, and considering the value judgment of society, is not the only best way for economic growth.

However, Shanghai's degree of internationalization has become more and more intense, and the "absence" of the Olympic Games has become more and more "dazzling".

In 2015, the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences released the book "Research on Shanghai's 2028th Five-Year Plan Development Plan", which once again proposed that "Shanghai should bid to host the 2016 Olympic Games". Citing Wang's reasoning, the study also mentions the upcoming opening of Shanghai Disneyland in <>, which represents a new historical opportunity.

By 2018, officials also began to act. First, Shanghai took the initiative to reflect on the shortcomings of sports city construction, and directly stated that "it has not hosted a top-level, global comprehensive event such as the Olympic Games" is Shanghai's gap; Later, the Shanghai Government Procurement Network issued an announcement "Single-Source Announcement on the Feasibility Study Service for the 2032 Summer Olympic Games", which was interpreted by the media as "intention to bid for the Olympic Games". Subsequently, the Shanghai Municipal Sports Bureau explained that the move was "basic research on building the event system" and did not need to be "over-interpreted".

However, at this time, the voices in public opinion supporting Shanghai's "Olympic bid" have already gained the upper hand. Olympic expert Yi Jiandong even analyzed the Olympic application process according to the above announcement, pointing out that "Shanghai's discussion of the feasibility of applying for the 2018 Summer Olympics at the end of 2032 is a reasonable time node", and advance planning and layout will give the city more advantages when "bidding".

Despite being absent from the 2032 Olympic Games, Shanghai's plan has expressed its bid for top-level international comprehensive events – in 2020, the "Shanghai Outline for the Construction of a World-Famous Sports City" was issued, mentioning "giving full play to the comparative advantages of the three provinces and one city in the Yangtze River Delta to jointly bid for the hosting of top-level international comprehensive events and international individual events".

Ability to host tournaments

For large-scale multi-sport events, Shanghai is already ready.

As early as 2011, Shanghai was recognized by then-IOC President Rogge as "capable of hosting the Olympic Games". Today, as Laszlo Wajda, a professor at the Capital Institute of Physical Education and senior advisor to the Beijing International Olympic Academy, analyzes that at least ten cities in China have the capacity to host the Olympic Games in terms of regional hosting capacity and economic scale. In the face of more potential "competitors", Shanghai is not inferior.

This is highlighted by the professional events hosted by Shanghai.

In 2019, the F1 race, which is known as the world's three major competitions along with the Olympic Games and the World Cup, chose its landmark 1000,<>th stop in Shanghai. At that time, Yang Yibin, deputy general manager of Shanghai Jiushi Sports Industry Development (Group), as the organizer, mentioned that London and Russian cities were interested in fighting for it at that time. Shanghai finally stood out because of the strong local racing culture and the strength of many years of experience.

An example is that when F1 first entered China, Beijing, Zhuhai and other cities successively associated with F1, but for various reasons failed to really introduce the Chinese Grand Prix, some industry insiders analyzed, earlier to F1 to show favor Zhuhai is close to the door, but its track software and hardware have not passed the FIA acceptance, and finally had to "surrender" to Shanghai, where the hard power is more prominent.

In addition to F1, the Shanghai Tennis Masters and Shanghai International Marathon have been held for many times, and in the future, major events such as the 2024 Four Continents Figure Skating Championships, the 2025 World Rowing Championships, and the 2026 Track Cycling World Championships will fall to "Shanghai" one after another, all showing the recognition of factors such as Shanghai's regional advantages, venue advantages, supporting advantages and reception advantages by international events.

What's more worth mentioning is that not only the introduction, but also Shanghai plans to independently hold international competitions to further release the ability to host the competition.

In Shanghai's latest plan, a "3+3+3" self-owned brand event framework has been established, of which the first 3, namely "three up", is on the horse, on the boat and on the sail; the second 3, namely football, basketball, volleyball 3 rising star events; The third 3 are the Shanghai Super Cup, the Shanghai Cup Xiangqi Masters Open and the Tour de Shanghai New Town Cycling Race.

According to the "Global Sports Capital Report" jointly released by Quantum Consulting, an international professional sports think tank, and Durham University Business School, Shanghai can squeeze into the 30th place in the world without the blessing of top international comprehensive events, becoming one of the four cities in China to be shortlisted in the top 4.

City dividends

Today, Shanghai is standing at an important node to undertake large-scale international comprehensive competitions.

Last year, the Shanghai Metropolitan Area Plan was released, reshaping Shanghai's urban positioning from "excellent global city" to "excellent global urban area".

However, according to Liu Qihong, chief expert of the think tank for regional and urban high-quality development of Hohai University, none of the four major cities positioned by Shanghai have yet to be fully realized. Especially in the function of "global resource allocation", compared with New York, London, Tokyo, Singapore and other cities, the degree of internationalization of the resource trading platform is not high enough, and the influence is limited.

The internal and external environment also further affects the judgment of Shanghai by the outside world. "Shangguan News" recently published an article to analyze, in recent years, in the face of the current anti-globalization trend, Shanghai, an export-oriented hub, has also suffered serious external shocks, global resource factors may be forced to "cut off", industrial chain and supply chain may be forced to "break the chain", scientific and technological exchanges and cooperation may be forced to "decouple", some people even question, should Shanghai's eyes turn to the domestic market?

The answer lies in the Shanghai operation. Since the beginning of this year, Shanghai has continuously attracted foreign investment, strengthened its links with the world, and frequently shown an open attitude. Bidding for international large-scale comprehensive events is a favorable starting point.

It is worth looking at the two large-scale multi-sports events of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games and the 2011 Shenzhen Universiade, which have become "milestone" events in the development history of these two cities. Especially after the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, Beijing's status and competitiveness in the international community have improved significantly. According to the survey, after the 2008 Olympic Games, Beijing rose 2012 places to 11th in the 18 Global City Comprehensive Competitiveness Index.

In fact, Shanghai also has no shortage of experience in expanding its opening up due to large-scale international exhibitions. The World Expo held in 2010 allowed Shanghai to further develop the construction of an "international metropolis" and built the basic framework of Shanghai's urban appearance.

Of course, Shanghai still needs to weigh the pros and cons of hosting the tournament. However, a positive message is that the negative effects of large-scale international multi-sports events due to large investment have gradually been solved.

According to the settlement announced by the International Olympic Committee this year, the Beijing Winter Olympics achieved a surplus of 3 million yuan, overcoming the "Montreal trap". In addition, in response to the "white elephant effect" of the venues, the Beijing Olympic venues continued to be used during the 5 Winter Olympics, and the Shenzhen Universiade Center also became a training base for national athletics teams and other events.

In 1924, the first national sports organization, the All-China Sports Association, was established at St. John's University in Shanghai, opening a new era of self-sponsored sports in Chinese. Can Shanghai continue its sporting glory and achieve the glory of the city again?