2010 Shanghai World Expo

Hai Bao, meaning "treasure of the sea," looks at you with big bright eyes and a large, unchanging smile. As the ambassador of the 2010 Shanghai World Expo, he bears the message: I am embracing friends from all over the world with my open arms and confident smile. This is what visitors, tourists, and representatives from throughout the world see—a little blue character that is welcoming, happy, and secure; so, this must clearly mean the people of China are the same way. But is this really the case?

The next images that I envision come out of a hypothetical horror scene from a cartoon. It is dark, rainy, and ominous and little Hai Bao is trapped in a corner being terrorized by the Chinese government to never stop smiling and looking cheerful. Regardless of how much he is frightened, that same exact smile stays glued to his face as he is not allowed to express any other form of emotion. Similar to Hai Bao’s unwavering happy face, many critics of the Expo were silenced in order to uphold this perfect image. Some reporters, like Hong Kong’s Apple Daily, were banned from reporting even though they were initially given a license to document the event. In addition, a Shanghainese punk band criticizing the government and event were deleted off the internet.

In connection, this theme of “Better City, Better Life” evokes the same questions as Hai Bao does. Is it really a better city? And who is enjoying this better life? The theme itself revolves around the idea of the city and urbanization being the better way of life, leaving subtle inferences to be made about what Shanghai thinks about rural life. The 2010 World Expo website explaining the theme states, “With the urbanization, more and more people become urban dwellers. People’s life is inevitably affected by the development of cities.” This description of this inevitability of Chinese people to urbanize is slightly worrisome because it completely disregards the rights, desires, and lives of rural people, who may or may not want to urbanize. This continual idea of old versus new, traditional versus modern seems to be a repeating theme throughout China’s popular culture—the two constantly clash with one another, but the latter seems to be winning. What does this say for marginalized people of China?

There are further contradictions in the Expo’s theme and message of sustainable economic development. Another statement on the Expo website says, “People’s life and development of the cities are closely related. With the rapid process of urbanization, the interaction between cities and the biological circle as well as the resources on earth have become more and more strong. The relationship among people, city and earth runs through the urbanization. The three will become an inseparable complex.” People, city, and earth will become inseparable? That must mean the city is going to be good for the earth through urbanization with all of its fossil fuel excretions, deforestation, and polluting of the land.

Accordingly, an article posted by NPR discusses the question of the actual sustainability of the 2010 World Expo. There were 56 pavilions built for the Expo and only the four China ones will remain, meaning 52 will be torn down. This hardly resonates with sustainability practices and leaves the issue of what is to be done with all the left over material used to build these grand structures.

As magnificent as the 2010 World Expo is, it is important forget about what occurs behind the scenes when the grandeur is so easily distracting. China has made a lot of progress in development and has seemed so inviting to the rest of the world; however, there is still a lot to be said about its practices of human rights and its treatment of its own people.