Ping-pong diplomacy () refers to the exchange of table tennis (ping-pong) players between the United States and the People's Republic of China in the early 1970s. Considered a turning point in relations between the United States and the People's Republic of China, it began during the 1971 World Table Tennis Championships in Nagoya, Japan, as a result of an encounter between players Glenn Cowan (of the US) and Zhuang Zedong (of the PRC). These interactions sparked diplomatic breakthrough, by signaling that both sides were willing to interact and engage in dialogue. The exchange and its promotion helped people in each country to recognize the humanity in the people of the other country, and it paved the way for President Richard Nixon's visit to Beijing in 1972 and the Shanghai Communiqué. The Shanghai Communiqué was a pivotal diplomatic document issued on February 28, 1972, during President Richard Nixon's visit to China. It marked a significant shift in U.S.-China relations, as both countries acknowledged their differences while committing to improving their relationship, ultimately setting the stage for détente between the two nations. Ping-Pong diplomacy occurred during a period of tension between the United States, the Soviet Union, and China, and it helped create an opportunity for the United States and China to begin improving diplomatic relations after decades of hostility.
History
Background
The United States viewed the People's Republic of China as an aggressor nation and enforced an economic containment policy including an embargo on the PRC, following its entry into the Korean War in 1950. The exchange of table tennis players helped create a symbolic moment of goodwill that eventually contributed to President Richard Nixon’s historic visit to China in 1972. After approximately 20 years of neither diplomatic nor economic relations, both countries finally saw an advantage in opening up to each other: China viewed closer relations with the United States as a beneficial counter to its increasingly tense relationship with the Soviet Union, which had seen the outbreak of a series of bloody border incidents, while the U.S. sought closer relations with China as leverage in its peace negotiations with North Vietnam. "However, when Mao wanted to improve relations with the United States, he needed to prepare the Chinese public psychologically and politically." During the isolationist years, athletes were among the few PRC nationals who were allowed to travel overseas.
1971 World Table Tennis Championships
The more radical among China's leadership opposed sending a team to the 1971 World Table Tennis Championships in Nagoya, Japan, and many of the players believed that China should not send a team due to political considerations. Ultimately, Mao Zedong reviewed and approved the plan submitted by the team. Zhou Enlai instructed its members not to conduct propaganda to foreigners and that while they should not initiate conversations with the American team, they could shake the hands of their American counterparts at matches. Once in Japan, the Chinese players engaged in conversations after they were greeted by their American counterparts.
This World Table Tennis Championships marked the return of China's participation after a six-year absence. When the Chinese team and Cowan walked off the bus, journalists who were following the Chinese team took photographs. In the political climate of the 1960s, the sight of an athlete of Communist China with an athlete of the United States was sure to garner attention. The next day, Cowan believed it was necessary to thank the Chinese, so, as a self-described hippie, Cowan presented Zhuang with a T-shirt with a red, white and blue peace emblem flag and the words "Let It Be," lyrics from a song by The Beatles, on the following day. Zhuang Zedong described the incident in a 2007 talk at the USC U.S.–China Institute.
When a journalist asked Cowan, "Mr. Cowan, would you like to visit China?", he answered, "Well, I'd like to see any country I haven't seen before--Argentina, Australia, China, ... Any country I haven't seen before." "But what about China in particular? Would you like to go there?" "Of course," said Glenn Cowan.
During an interview in 2002 with the TV personality Chen Luyu, Zhuang Zedong told more of the story: "The trip on the bus took 15 minutes, and I hesitated for 10 minutes. I grew up with the slogan 'Down with the American imperialism!' And during the Cultural Revolution, the string of class struggle was tightened unprecedentedly, and I was asking myself, 'Is it okay to have anything to do with your No. 1 enemy?'" Zhuang recalled remembering that Chairman Mao Zedong met Edgar Snow on the Rostrum of Tiananmen on the National Day in 1970 and said to Snow that China should now place its hope on American people. Zhuang looked in his bag and first went through some pins, badges with Mao's head, silk handkerchiefs, and fans. But he felt these were not decent enough to be a good gift. He finally picked the silk portrait of Huangshan Mountains. On the following day, many Japanese newspapers carried photographs of Zhuang Zedong and Glenn Cowan. In the days following the tournament, Zedong once again surprised the world by inviting the American table tennis team to visit China and participate in a regional table tennis competition.
American team visits China
On April 10, 1971, the American team, consisting of men and woman of all ages from high-schoolers to professors, and accompanying journalists became the first official American delegation to set foot in the Chinese capital since 1949. The U.S. team spent 10-days traveling to Tianjin, Guangzhou, Beijing, and Shanghai, visiting national monuments, attending banquets, playing exhibition matches, and observing the drastic cultural differences. Upon arrival, the U.S. team was greeted by Premier Zhou Enlai and in the proceeding days, several exhibition matches took place, and those in Beijing hosted 20,000 in attendance. The American team was initially shocked by how different everything was in China. A member of the team, Tim Boggan, said "Everything is different from anything I'd ever seen. The streets were different, the food was different."
The trip also marked the return of American journalism to China, American reporters having been ousted shortly after the founding of the PRC and a prior effort to invite American reporters having been rebuffed by U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower. Nonetheless, cracks in the Chinese facade showed as "during one stopover, team president Graham Steenhoven noticed that a “Welcome American Team” banner had been hung over a wall painted with the words “Down With the Yankee Oppressors and Their Running Dogs!”
The meeting was facilitated by the National Committee on United States – China Relations. Prior to the visit by the American table tennis players, eleven Americans were admitted into the PRC for one week because they all professed affiliation with the Black Panther Party, which followed a Maoist political line.
On the first day of the American team's visit, Zhou arranged for them to watch a performance of The Red Detachment of Women, a popular model play. Nixon's decision of modifying the currency controls allowed for people of the PRC to use United States currency. Other actions Nixon took, such as lifting the restriction on American oil companies providing fuel for ships and or aircraft travelling to and from China and the importation and deportation of Chinese and American goods, were also listed in the official statement made.
The Chinese team came to the United States on April 12, 1972. Nixon met the team on April 18, telling them that "the big winner, because of this people-to-people contact you are initiating between our two peoples, will be friendship between the people of the United States and the people of the People's Republic of China."
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After the American team's visit, China welcomed Americans from diverse backgrounds to visit China, beginning with the biologists Arthur Galston (Yale University) and Ethan Singer (Massachusetts Institute of Technology).
The response to Nixon's visit
thumb|right|250px|Nixon attending a ping-pong exhibition in Beijing
Two months after Richard Nixon's visit, Zhuang Zedong visited the U.S. as the head of a Chinese table-tennis delegation, April 12–30, 1972. Notably, the Chinese delegation played a team of University of Maryland, College Park students at the university's Cole Field House on April 17, 1972. The president's daughter Tricia Nixon Cox was in the stands. Also on the itinerary were Canada, Mexico and Peru. Efforts to employ "ping-pong diplomacy" were not always successful, such as when the All Indonesia Table Tennis Association (PTMSI) refused China's invitation in October 1971, claiming that accepting the PRC's offer would improve the PRC's reputation. Because neither Soviet athletes nor journalists appeared in China following the appearance of the American players and journalists, one speculation is that the act showed the equal scorn of both countries towards the USSR.
Korean ping-pong diplomacy
1991 United Korean team
Another example of Ping Pong Diplomacy occurred during the 1991 World Table Tennis Championships in Chiba, Japan, where a unified Korean team played together for the first time since the Korean War.
The diplomatic efforts leading to the formation of this unified team were led by then-International Table Tennis Federation President, Ichiro Ogimura.
Prior to the championships, Ogimura visited South Korea 20 times and traveled to North Korea 15 times to plead for a unified team from the Korean peninsula. Ogimura also worked with local Japanese government heads to create joint training camps in the cities of Nagano, Nagaoka and Chiba, and secured agreement from the ITTF for North Korea and South Korea to compete under the unified name of “Korea”.
The Korean team played under a white flag depicting the Korean peninsula in blue and used the Korean folksong, Arirang, rather than the national anthem of either the North or the South.
The competition saw the Korean team win one gold medal, one silver and two bronze medals.
Further examples
This action has since been repeated. At the 2018 World Team Table Tennis Championships, the two Koreas entered separate teams in the competition but, when they were paired against each other at the quarter-final of the women's event, they negotiated instead to field a joint team for the semi-final.
In the 2024 Summer Olympics, the North and South Korean mixed ping-pong teams took a selfie together along with the Chinese team after the table tennis finals.
Legacy
Ping-pong diplomacy became one of the most prominent examples of people's diplomacy in the context of China-United States relations.