From "Ping-Pong Diplomacy" to "Hoop Diplomacy"

The early retirement of iconic Chinese basketball player Yao Ming came as a shock to fans in both China and United States. The end of the "Ming Dynasty" in the NBA brought about a number of discussions on his contribution and impact to the two countries with his dramatic, if not groundbreaking, nine-year NBA career. His high-profile migration to the United States, under the banner of being selected the No. 1 draft pick, quickly made him perhaps the most recognizable Chinese face to the world. More importantly, he opened a door to bring the NBA to the world's most populous market with more than 1.3 billion people. But the impact brought by Yao Ming goes far beyond the basketball court; Yao was born in a very unique historical period, in the age of globalization when free-market policies and economics have come to organize the international distribution of capital and culture. In China, the communist government has greatly benefited from free-market capitalism reforming and opening-up economic policy, and energetically disseminating its power and influence to the world (e.g. Beijing 2008 Olympics). The rise of China simultaneously confronts the interest of U.S. political and economic hegemony while the mutual economic desire consequently leads to a relationship of both competitor and partner between these two giants. Considering the flexible and transnational image of Yao Ming and his symbolic status in the two societies, this thesis takes Yao Ming as an epitome of the U.S.-China relations--culturally, economically and politically--to analyze the bridge-building role he has created between the West and the East, the celebrity economic effects he has generated as a global sports icon, and the far-reaching influence in a historical period he has brought to the development of Sino-American relations.