Xi Jinping at Sochi : leveraging the 2014 Winter Olympics for the China dream

This paper aims to explain why Chinese President Xi Jinping attended the widely boycotted 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics opening ceremony. The paper argues that it was not simply to witness how the Russian seaside resort celebrated the extravagant sports event but rather to further demonstrate his ability and determination to realize ‘the China Dream’. The paper concludes that all of Xi’s future foreign visits will deserve critical scholarly scrutiny, as each of them sheds important light on the ways he is seeking to achieve his political goal.