# Do you think that Beijing is the world capital?



## peacedot (Apr 10, 2008)

Well, have been travel all over the world, Beijing is somewhat special, one of the most tolerant cities, or NYC


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## The Cebuano Exultor (Aug 1, 2005)

*@ peacedot*

^^ WHAT?!

What kind of a question is this? I mean, what do you mean exactly?

If you're asking whether any city on Earth deserves to be called the world's capital, then my answer is no.

The world's continents are geographically dispersed enough to render any single location as the political and cultural center of all countries and territories.

The closest city to this description, by far, is London. _London lacks a strong presence of Hispanic culture._ Paris and New York are also extremely cosmopolitan, but to a slightly lesser degree.

BTW, this thread might be short-lived because these sort of topics are prohibited.


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## peacedot (Apr 10, 2008)

No, I don't think that this thread will be closed, it is not about compitition, from my perception, so far, a city that can compare with NYC is Beijing. Anyway, people are different, but my feeling is when I was in Beijing, there are as many as NYC in term of international people there even more than in NYC, Mogolians, Arabians, Russians, Americans, Latinos, Korean, Brazilians...etc. They are from everywhere. Such a huge city.


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## Bahibak (Oct 5, 2008)

you make the conclusion from the perspective of internationalism???


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## Xusein (Sep 27, 2005)

There is no such thing as a world capital.


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## Madman (Dec 29, 2003)

Taking aside politics, Beijing struggles to be the capital in China let alone the world, culturally and economically HK and Shanghai are way ahead.


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## The Cebuano Exultor (Aug 1, 2005)

*@ Madman*

^^ I think his assessment is slightly true. Beijing feels more cosmopolitan than Shanghai, IMHO.


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## The Chemist (Feb 19, 2003)

The Cebuano Exultor said:


> ^^ I think his assessment is slightly true. Beijing feels more cosmopolitan than Shanghai, IMHO.


Really? I feel completely the opposite - Shanghai is extremely cosmopolitan, while Beijing is far less so, IMO.


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## city_thing (May 25, 2006)

The Cebuano Exultor said:


> ^^ WHAT?!
> 
> What kind of a question is this? I mean, what do you mean exactly?
> 
> ...


I agree. If any city _could_ be considered a world capital, it'd be London. But even then it doesn't hold near enough power to be a 'capital of the world'.

Beijing though? It's the capital of China. That's it.


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## hudkina (Oct 28, 2003)

New York, London, and Tokyo would be the "world" capitals.


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## null (Dec 11, 2002)

Madman said:


> Taking aside politics, Beijing struggles to be the capital in China let alone the world, culturally and economically HK and Shanghai are way ahead.



HK and Shanghai?

In most Chinese eyes, they are typically _cities without a culture_.


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## fri (May 2, 2009)

I see where you're coming from, Beijing is the capital of China and China has the most people in the world, plus Beijing is an international city... But no, I don't think Beijing can be the world capital. There are lots of other cities which are more connected and (arguably) more important, etc...


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## The Cebuano Exultor (Aug 1, 2005)

*@ The Chemist*



The Chemist said:


> Really? I feel completely the opposite - Shanghai is extremely cosmopolitan, while Beijing is far less so, IMO.


^^ Yes. There are loads of foreign tourists in Beijing. In fact, I believe Beijing might very well be the world's most popular tourist destination in a decades time.


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## bonivison (Jan 17, 2007)

considering economy,politics,culture,population etc.
Beijing has a potential
But for now
It is not for sure


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## The Cebuano Exultor (Aug 1, 2005)

*@ bonivision*

^^ Okay. I'm going on a limb here and say that *Beijing* and Shanghai may very well become the new Asian world cities in the year 2030, supplanting Hong Kong and Singapore. And when I say "world cities", I mean cosmopolitan or international-converging urban areas (and not world capitals).


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## whizz_pat (Jul 30, 2008)

In this multipolar world, I would say that it is very difficult to say that one city can be said to be the capital city of the world.

As many have pointed out, many countries have cities that are not political capitals, but are very important to the functioning of the country. eg Shanghai, New York, Sydney. Different cities play different roles. For example, you could argue that Washington D.C. is the capital of the world, since it is the seat of power of the world's most powerful economy and military.


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## OtAkAw (Aug 5, 2004)

All this world capital talk is bullcrap. Embrace diversity.


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## The Cebuano Exultor (Aug 1, 2005)

*@ whizz_pat*



whizz_pat said:


> In this multipolar world, I would say that it is very difficult to say that one city can be said to be the capital city of the world.
> 
> As many have pointed out, many countries have cities that are not political capitals, but are very important to the functioning of the country. eg Shanghai, New York, Sydney. Different cities play different roles. For example, you could argue that Washington D.C. is the capital of the world, since it is the seat of power of the world's most powerful economy and military.


^^ AGREED. :yes:


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## Chrissib (Feb 9, 2008)

There was never such thing as a world capital and will never be.


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## Inkdaub (Dec 28, 2006)

San Francisco is where the United Federation of Planets is headquartered. So...


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## The Cebuano Exultor (Aug 1, 2005)

*@ Inkdaub*

^^ LOL :lol:

But still, UFP's most powerful member race were the Vulcans.


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## Golden Loon (Mar 14, 2005)

for overseas Chinese, HK is the world chinese capital in their heart


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## PedroGabriel (Feb 5, 2007)

lol at the thread... he thinks NYC is the capital of the World and Beijing is rival to that position. :lol:

seriously, are you high?


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## peacedot (Apr 10, 2008)

What do you mean by saying: " Are you high?" 

I say Beijing is the world capital is because there was a TV Program that I watched about Beijing, and the how the people there care about the minority people. It is a great city.


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## rosn19 (Oct 10, 2008)

i wouldnt consider china as a hole to be cosmopolitan or cultural world leaders or whatever, that country is just so different and so in it's own "world".


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## oldirty718 (Feb 21, 2009)

yea of course it is, we're all Chinese after all. It's the diplomatic, economic, strategic, political, cultural and most important Capital in the world. Besides, Mao Cha Cheng, Chong Chao Lee, Ching Choy Yong and Chew Chacho Lee come from Beijing.


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## ChinaboyUSA (May 10, 2005)

^^ I haven't heard any of them that you mentioned above.


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## oldirty718 (Feb 21, 2009)

^^But then again, is Beijing the diplomatic, economic, strategic, political, cultural and most important Capital in the world?? :nuts:

Hey I'm just kidding  Beijing is not the Capital of the world, I'm not ever sure if there is such thing anyway...

Peace bros


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## rosn19 (Oct 10, 2008)

china is weird, just as japan, its very bizarre all that region of the world.


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## peacedot (Apr 10, 2008)

No, China is not Japan. They have their own features although they are close to each other. The only thing that reminds me the same thing between China and Japan is Chopsticks and Chinese Characters. China is China.

-- 

I think that so far, New York City is the world capital, but comprehensively, London and Beijing has an advantage for their historic accumulation, anyway, this is not about city vs city, what I am talking about is that if a city can respect the minority people like Beijing, I believe that we can have nothing to worry about.


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## Minato ku (Aug 9, 2005)

^^ Even chopsticks are different between those two countries. 
China is a so big country that you can't generalize it.

Is I think that Beijing is the world capital ? No I don't think that a such thing exist.
Anyway Beijing is a world capital like London, New York, Moscow, Paris, Sydney... (I admit that some of those are not the official capital of their countries).
Beijing is the capital, one of biggest and most important city of one of most important country in the world.


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## jcarloschile (Jul 12, 2008)

Bejing is nowhere near Paris, NYC, London or Tokyo.


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## ClubWorld (May 4, 2009)

whizz_pat said:


> In this multipolar world, I would say that it is very difficult to say that one city can be said to be the capital city of the world.
> 
> As many have pointed out, many countries have cities that are not political capitals, but are very important to the functioning of the country. eg Shanghai, New York, Sydney. Different cities play different roles. For example, you could argue that Washington D.C. is the capital of the world, since it is the seat of power of the world's most powerful economy and military.


Yes but how about something more international, a city, that blends all cultures, or should we describe it as an ‘arch de triomph’ of freedom, a symbol of what human aspirations can achieve in such a short span of time.... a global city like New York? 

I also agree with your idea whizz_patt, several cities should represent the globe in the future, cities with distinguished historical, cultural, and civilizational backgrounds, like London, Beijing, Jerusalem, New York and Rio de Janeiro.


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## Anderson Geimz (Mar 29, 2008)

I swear...threads get more ludicrous by the day on here...


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## Ribarca (Jan 28, 2005)

Beijing is still rather provincial. It will take a longer time to gain relevance.


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## brisavoine (Mar 19, 2006)

Economically speaking, Beijing is still quite a long way from the top world cities.

There were the Gross Metropolitan Products of some of the most economically powerful metropolitan areas in 2007 (the last year available), in US dollars, at market exchange rates:
- Tokyo metro area: $1,386.4 bn (pop: 34,826,000)
- New York metro area: $1,378.3 bn (pop: 21,961,994)
- Los Angeles metro area: $846.6 bn (pop: 17,755,322)
- Paris metro area: $758.1 bn (pop: 12,413,000)
- Osaka-Kobe-Kyoto metro area: $580.1 bn (pop: 17,036,000)
- Washington-Baltimore metro area: $526.5 bn (pop: 8,241,912)
- Chicago metro area: $512.5 bn (pop: 9,745,165)
- San Francisco Bay Area: $488.3 bn (pop: 7,264,887)
- Seoul-Incheon metro area: $462.6 bn (pop: 23,451,232)
- Nagoya metro area: $371.4 bn (pop: 9,464,000)
- Moscow metro area: $366.8 bn (pop: 17,116,000; could be 21.5 million if Russian migrants without a residency permit are included)
- Madrid province: $254.7 bn (pop: 6,112,078)
- Hong Kong: $207.2 bn (pop: 6,926,000)
- Singapore: $161.3 bn (pop: 4,589,000)
- Shanghai municipality: $160.2 bn (pop: 18,580,800; could be 25.2 million if Chinese migrants without a residency permit are included)
*- Beijing municipality: $123.0 bn (pop: 16,330,000; could be 20.5 million if Chinese migrants without a residency permit are included)*
- Dubai-Charjah-Ajman : $72.3 bn (pop: about 2.6 million)

If you want details about the territorial composition of a particular metro area, just ask me. All figures come from the national statistical offices, as of 2007.


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## oliver999 (Aug 4, 2006)

beijing is culture and political center , while shanghai is economy center. it's difficult to say shanghai and beijing which one is better. but shanghai and HK called culture desert in china. beijing film, opera, artists are so great.


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## jcarloschile (Jul 12, 2008)

brisavoine said:


> Economically speaking, Beijing is still quite a long way from the top world cities.
> 
> There were the Gross Metropolitan Products of some of the most economically powerful metropolitan areas in 2007 (the last year available), in US dollars, at market exchange rates:
> - Tokyo metro area: $1,386.4 bn (pop: 34,826,000)
> ...


Source?


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## brisavoine (Mar 19, 2006)

^^It's explained in the post.


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## Anderson Geimz (Mar 29, 2008)

Yeah and somehow London is left out...:|
(And Milan, and Randstad, and Rhein/Ruhr)

Your such a character Brisavoine...


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## brisavoine (Mar 19, 2006)

@Anderson Geimz: I specifically said some metropolitan areas, not all the metropolitan areas of the world. Data are not available for all the metropolitan areas, and then there are hundreds of metro areas anyway, so no single person could have enough time to compute data for all the metro areas of the world (FYI, were also left out: Dallas, Boston, Toronto, Mexico, Sao Paulo, Mumbai, Kuala Lumpur, Sydney, and many many more). The list I posted just gives an idea about Beijing's Gross Metropolitan Product compared to some other metro areas of different sizes and on different continents, that's all.


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## null (Dec 11, 2002)

> in US dollars, at market exchange rates


Everyone knows that RMB has been artificially kept low for a long time.

In China, inflation is proceeding concurrently with the rise of the renminbi (RMB) against the U.S. dollar, and the fall of the internal value of the Chinese currency is contrasting sharply with the rise of its external value. This means that purchasing power parity (PPP) does not hold and the RMB's real exchange rate (RER) is rising.


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## Skybean (Jun 16, 2004)

Golden Loon said:


> for overseas Chinese, HK is the world chinese capital in their heart


This man speaks the truth! Well they are usually the ones who build businesses and buy property. However, the trend now is increased immigration from the Mainland and much less so from HK. Hong Kong has its own culture shared in large part with Guangdong Province - culinary culture such as dim sum and yum cha. For most foreign cities, Chinese food = dim sum. But this is not entirely true, since it is uniquely Cantonese fare.

Film culture: Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan, Chow Yun Fat, Stephen Chow (Kung Fu Soccer), John Woo, Wong Kar-Wai...


If a world capital is one in which people from all races live harmoniously with probably the highest percentage of visible minorities and no dominant ethnic group, look no further than Toronto. 







































source: http://spacing.ca/wire/?p=2618



*Toronto CMA*

Between 2001 and 2005, the *Toronto CMA attracted an average of 107,000 international immigrants each year, The City of Toronto welcomed two thirds (69,000).* As well, 10,738 foreign students chose to study in Toronto originating from countries including South Korea, Japan, China and India. (Source: The Monitor, Fall 2005 - Citizenship and Immigration Canada) 

The foreign-born population accounted for *45.7% of the CMA's total population of 5,072,100*, up from 43.7% in 2001. (Toronto is the largest CMA in Canada, stretching from Ajax and Pickering on the east to Milton on the west and New Tecumseth and Georgina on the north.)

source: http://www12.statcan.ca/english/census06/analysis/immcit/toronto.cfm
*

Toronto City*

*Almost three-quarters of Torontonians aged 15 or older have direct ties to immigration. About one-half (52%) are themselves immigrants while another 22% are 2nd generation immigrants with at least one parent born outside of Canada. The remaining 26% of the Toronto population (aged 15 or older) is comprised of individuals who were born in Canada to two Canadian-born parents. *
(Source: Immigrants in Canada's Census Metropolitan Areas - Grant Schellenberg, Statistics Canada).


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## Northsider (Jan 16, 2006)

> Do you think that Beijing is the world capital?


No. No I do not.


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## simcard (Feb 18, 2009)

Xusein said:


> There is no such thing as a world capital.


:applause:

the answer to the question is NO, Beijing is not a world capital


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## flesh_is_weak (Jun 16, 2006)

when the chinese decide to take over the world (and im sure that once they do, they'll most likely succeed), then beijing would indeed become the capital of the world~

china would then finally live up to its name: middle kingdom


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## Nsch (Feb 19, 2009)

Chrissib said:


> There was never such thing as a world capital and will never be.


i totally agree...:nuts. I think that ís too easy to say "my city is the world capital" without knowing "the world". One century ago, maybe you could say something like that, because there were only a few "big" cities... but that is not a reality any more. Descentralization is a reality nowadays


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## caelus (Jan 21, 2009)

how do you define "world capital"???? IMO, i dont want to use the world "capital", i guess the term "*Global City*" is the closest definition to "world capital" if there is one......

from wiki, a *global city* is:



> A *global city* (also called *world city*) is a city deemed to be an important node point in the global economic system





> Global Cities
> 
> Well rounded global cities
> 
> ...


source: hxxp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_city

I sort of agree with what wiki said, Beijing is far from being a world class city, let alone a "world capital".........


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## spongeg (May 1, 2006)

:lock::lock::lock:


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## binhai (Dec 22, 2006)

No lol, of all the cities in the world, only New York comes close; it has every ethnic group in the world in just 5 small boroughs but I'm more of the opinion that there are no world capitals, it's just each place is what it is and some places are good with a lot of diversity and some places are not. It doesn't mean one city's better than another, Beijing is great but the diversity isn't high enough yet to even be remotely considered as a world capital (capital of Asia, maybe, but only after 20 years; Tokyo is definitely #1 in Asia for now).


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## RawLee (Jul 9, 2007)

IMHO the closest thing to a "world capital" is Brussels,as its a kind of capital of 27 countries...


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## peacedot (Apr 10, 2008)

caelus said:


> how do you define "world capital"???? IMO, i dont want to use the world "capital", i guess the term "*Global City*" is the closest definition to "world capital" if there is one......
> 
> from wiki, a *global city* is:
> 
> ...


Too old, it was a 2004 list. Now, it is 2009.


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## whizz_pat (Jul 30, 2008)

^^
To become a 'global capital', you'd think that a city has established itself as an important centre for quite a while now. For example, Dubai, no matter how amazing it is, would not become a 'world capital' just because it has been an important city only very recently.

Similarly, if we were to select a global capital, we would have to select a city that has remained important for a long time now, and not only became important between the periods of 2004 and 2009.


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## poshbakerloo (Jan 16, 2007)

I don't think it is...the culture is too different compared to none east Asian places...


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## James Saito (Nov 6, 2002)

The capital of Asia is definitely Tokyo.

What makes you think Beijin has a chance to be the world capital while it's not even the capital in Asia?


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## null (Dec 11, 2002)

> The capital of Asia is definitely Tokyo.


huh?


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## tigerboy (Jun 7, 2006)

Xusein said:


> There is no such thing as a world capital.



Agreed. Curiously enough globalisation is actually revealing the diversity of the world rather than a sameness. There are world Capitals eg London is a financial Capital, LA a movie Capital, Milan afashion capital etc etc but there is no pre-eminent city.

We can use the indefinate article "a" but not the definite article "the".


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## drunkenmunkey888 (Aug 13, 2005)

null said:


> HK and Shanghai?
> 
> In most Chinese eyes, they are typically _cities without a culture_.


Are you kidding? Shanghai might be _ancient/traditional_ cultural desert that lacks any _Chinese_ characteristics. But it is by far the culturally richest city in China in terms of pre-Communist modern culture. In fact when most Chinese cities including Beijing were backward, outdated, pre-industrial slums, Shanghai was a dazzling city filled with grand art-deco and neo classical buildings bustling with the latest technicolor films, jazz clubs, and 30's era theater. No other city in China can boast such an abundance of early 20th century Western culture. 

So I totally agree with people who say that Beijing needs to catch up with Shanghai before it can claim any international titles. And it has a long way to go...


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## peacedot (Apr 10, 2008)

^After Olympic Games, Beijing is more sophisticated than Shanghai from international culture to infrastructure, World Expo is a good opportunity for Shanghai to catch up, but it is not as the Olympic effect. One thing for sure is that Shanghai will be the future world financial center. I agree with a multiple sided world as it can balance a lot of aspects, I live in New York City, and the UN headquarter is here, it is something that any other cities are not matchable so far including Washington D.C. In my perception, Beijing and Shanghai will be playing the same role of NY an DC for the next 20 - 30 years, while NY and DC will keep strong but more balanced than today. 

War is not a solution in 21st centry, cooperation and dialogue. China is the biggest developing country in the world, and the US is the biggest developed, there are so many things to make up each other for a better world. 

P.S. In regarding to some westerner people's state-of-mind, I want to say that I am not from the Chinese goverment, nor working in any Chinese government organs, I am a Chinese who were born in China and currently living in NYC.


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