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China's Government Tightens Its Grip On Golf, Shuts Down Courses

STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

The president of China is taking a step that's rich with symbolism. He's been campaigning against corruption, and he's been doing that in part by attacking the game of golf. NPR's Rob Schmitz reports.

ROB SCHMITZ, BYLINE: China's Communist Party hasn't always demonized golf.

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JIMMY CARTER: Vice Premier Deng, Madame Cho Lin, distinguished visitors from The People's Republic of China...

SCHMITZ: January 1979 - the White House. President Jimmy Carter welcomes Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping for an historic trip to the U.S.

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CARTER: ...And Vice Premier Deng, on behalf of all Americans, I welcome you here to our house.

(APPLAUSE)

SCHMITZ: Deng came seeking help to open China's economy, which had been ravaged by decades of violent political campaigns. But if American executives were to invest in China, they would need to travel there. And if they were to travel there, they would need a golf course. At a stop in Seattle, President Carter introduced Deng to Robert Trent Jones Jr., one of the world's top golf-course architects. Jones remembers Deng's reaction.

ROBERT TRENT JONES JR.: He brightened up. He said, yes, I like sports. And he said, what is golf? I said, it's a small ball hit over a big field into a hole. And people gamble about it, and they buy each other a drink. He said, oh, perfect. Chinese will love it.

SCHMITZ: Together, Jones and China's leadership built Shanghai's first golf course in the communist era. It was a milestone in China's complicated history with golf, a sport declared forbidden by Mao in 1949, only to be reincarnated by Deng 30 years later. The pendulum has now swung back, and golf is again in the crosshairs of China's Communist Party.

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UNIDENTIFIED MAN: (Speaking Chinese).

SCHMITZ: A state media report this year outlined the government campaign against the sport. Many golf courses were built on valuable farmland through corrupt land deals. Others use too much water in parched areas of the country. Most golf clubs were private, exclusive to businessmen who often invited local government officials.

As a result, the government has shut down a fifth of all golf courses in China, and it's banned construction of new courses. Party officials in the southern province of Guangdong are now forbidden from golfing during work hours. Ozzie Ling, manager of Shanghai's Yingyi Golf Club, says government inspection squads now show up unannounced.

OZZIE LING: So they will come and check on you, and then they will say, OK. So on this day, this guy was here. They actually look through your computers. And then they start checking, you know, day by day this and that. And how much did he spend. You know, how much he - who he was playing with and all that.

SCHMITZ: This new norm is a challenge for the survivors of China's golf industry.

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SCHMITZ: At Shanghai's Junior Golf Academy, young pros tee off on the driving range. Head coach Gareth Winslow, who used to coach China's national women's team, says golf has become a tricky business in this new environment.

GARETH WINSLOW: You know, you have a golf academy. We have a pro shop, a golf course, whatever it is. And you want to promote it, do some marketing. But at the same time, you want to kind of stay under the radar and not promote the fact that you're in the golf industry. So yeah, it's very challenging.

SCHMITZ: And even Shanghai's first golf course of the modern era, the Shanghai Country Club - the one that had its beginnings with President Carter and Deng Xiaoping - even that course was not immune to the party's war on golf. China's government shut it down last year for being too close to a water reservoir.

Course architect Robert Trent Jones Jr. takes it in stride. He's been designing courses for decades, and he's seen everything. When he designed the Soviet Union's first course, the Soviets were suspicious. And then Jones reminded them that Karl Marx used to play golf.

JONES JR.: Once we explained that to the Russians, the ideological drape fell down, and we moved forward.

SCHMITZ: And if the image of the founder of communism out on the links isn't enough to convince the leader of China's Communist Party to reverse his direction on golf, perhaps the rise of Chinese golfers will. Feng Shanshan, one of the best women players in the world, won a bronze medal for China at the Rio Games, leading the way for other young Chinese golfers - golfers who are playing not because they want to complete a business deal but because, in the words of Jones to former Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping, they enjoy hitting a small ball over a big field into a hole. Rob Schmitz, NPR News, Shanghai.