In the Herald, McDonald writes: ‘China has gone to ridiculous excess in hosting the current Games, combining the fanaticism of a Maoist ‘rectification’ drive with East German-style incubation of athletes in its drive to be top medal winner. … India, almost alone in the world, seems to apply the notion that sport is all about participation, not winning’. He finds in this ‘something truly Olympian’, and concludes that ‘something sort of noble will be lost’ if Shashi Tharoor is right that ‘the newly globalised India can no longer content itself with mediocrity in this global competition’. McDonald also quotes Rajeev Srinivasan as critical of India’s failure in ‘identifying an overarching goal: that of being the best in the world’, along with other obstacles such as rural poverty and ill-health as well as sporting bureaucracy cronyism.

Japan seems to have more efficient bureaucrats, and certainly fewer socio-economic inequalities along with better sporting facilities throughout the nation. So perhaps its own relatively poor medal tally reflects a similar ‘Olympian’ ideal of participation, rather than of winning at all costs. And maybe that has lessons for us when reading Emmott’s book. That neatly reviews Japan’s socio-political transformation since the 1990s and its economic revival since 2002, as well as China’s now very visible rise. Emmott also identifies some remarkable recent developments in India’s economy, no longer just the world’s source of cheap outsourcing services. Indeed, the book begins by highlighting the US administration’s rapprochement in security matters in 2005, to counterbalance China’s military expansion, paralleling Nixon’s rapprochement with China during the Cold War. Emmott’s thesis of economic and geopolitical rivalry, already evident between China and Japan but also foreseeable as economic development accelerates in India, certainly helps makes sense of contemporary events. One recent example is Benjamin Reilly’s posting on ‘Japan’s aid to the South Pacific and the China factor’.

Emmott’s book also suggests some striking historical parallels between China now, and Japan from around the time of the 1964 Tokyo Olympics, when it too rejoined the world by dazzling us with gleaming facilities. China’s per capita GDP is similar, and its economy also involves massive investment, an undervalued currency and access to cheap credit. Japan managed very well through to the 1980s, but will China achieve a softer landing than Japan and other more market-based major economies? Looking even further forward, can India’s better demographic profile be matched with further reductions in inequality, improved education, less red tape, and a more functional legal system?

Even so, will this mean such intense rivalry as Emmott envisages, and hence the need for all the radical reforms to regional and global institutional infrastructure that he proposes? Perhaps India and Japan, at least, will prove a little more “Olympian” in addressing some of the pressure points he addresses, such as global warming (discussed also by Yongsheng Zhang). I hope so, for everyone’s sake.