A child holds up two Chinese national flags as she watches a pre-season NBA basketball game between the Brooklyn Nets and Los Angeles Lakers at the Mercedes Benz Arena in Shanghai on October 10. Photo: AP

Opinion

The View by Mark Clifford

China’s targeting of the NBA shows why it may fail at building soft power – and the Chinese dream

By narrowing the boundaries of commentary, China is gradually alienating outsiders who might see opportunities there
In attacking the NBA, which does not need China and would be difficult to replace, Beijing may have finally gone too far

Mark Clifford

Published: 3:00am, 16 Oct, 2019

Updated: 5:23am, 16 Oct, 2019

A child holds up two Chinese national flags as she watches a pre-season NBA basketball game between the Brooklyn Nets and Los Angeles Lakers at the Mercedes Benz Arena in Shanghai on October 10. Photo: AP

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Mark Clifford

Mark L. Clifford is executive director of the Asia Business Council and author of "The Greening of Asia: The Business Case for Solving Asia’s Environmental Emergency". Previously he was editor-in-chief of the South China Morning Post, publisher and editor-in-chief of The Standard, and Asia regional editor for BusinessWeek. He graduated from the University of California, Berkeley and was a Walter Bagehot Fellow at Columbia University. He has lived in Hong Kong since 1992. www.markclifford.org