Chinese Miss World Sparks Debate

BEIJING, Dec. 4, 2007 — -- For 54 years, the Chinese Communist Party has banned beauty pageants as decadent and demeaning to women. Several years ago, the ban was lifted and this weekend Zhang Zilin, a 23-year-old secretary and part-time model, emerged from more than 100 contestants to become Miss World 2007.

Zhang, a statuesque 6-foot beauty from the industrial city Shijiazhuang, is the first Chinese contestant to win the Miss World pageant since its inception in 1951.

Wearing a sparkling blue evening gown and speaking in halting English, Zhang said, "I'm now standing on the stage of Miss World because 1.3 billion people in China support me."

Going into the competition with home country advantage, she was the overwhelming favorite, eclipsing traditionally popular contestants from the Dominican Republic and Sweden.

"I'm the first Chinese to win the title and more importantly I won in my own country," Zhang said in Sanya, a popular resort on China's Hainan Island, which has hosted Miss World four out of the last five years.

Zhang's victory is seen not only as a victory for her, but also an accomplishment for China. After Zhang's title was announced, her blog was flooded with more than 1 million hits, mostly entries bursting with national pride and delight.

Li Li, manager of a Beijing beauty salon, said, "It is a great honor for China. This is not easy. I hope that she will represent us well."

Zhang's coronation has validated the Chinese government's decision to lift its longtime ban on beauty pageants and welcome the Miss World competition to Sanya.

The Miss World competition is highly profitable for China. Although the government pays the Miss World organization to host the pageant, the event has pushed tourism in Sanya and the island province of Hainan to an all-time high.

In the spring, Sanya's director of tourism announced the city had welcomed more than 16 million tourists annually and experienced an 83 percent increase in international tourists since it first hosted the Miss World pageant in 2003.