Via LGM I find this piece on anti KFC protests in China. KFC was once known as Kentucky Fried Chicken, but they have changed their name to KFC, in part to make themselves more generic and less American. It has not worked. For those of you who have never seen the great documentary The Colonel Comes to Japan KFC is a bit different in Asia than it is in the U.S. They were one of the first American chains to bring “modernity” to Asia, and the the opening of the KFC on Tiananmen Square in 1987 was a huge deal for Chinese consumers, who were utterly unaware of the joys of Western style fast food. KFC remains a major “American” presence all over, in a way that some other U.S. firms are not. Thus it is not surprising that when Chinese nationalists were looking for a place to protest the United States because they had lost a court case to the Philippines in the Hague that they would pick KFC. The government is not happy about this of course, since while they like stirring up nationalist resentment on-line they don’t care for it to spill into the streets. Apparently American imperialism is a paper tiger that is more difficult to ride that you might think.
What interests me is that the protests revolve around food. To some extent that makes sense, since the places ordinary people encounter that try to advertise their authentic foreignness are likely to be restaurants. The protests against Carrefour , the French grocery chain, before the CHINA OLYMPICS probably fit here as well, as well as all the freedom fries nonsense in the U.S. Now that I think about it, I wish I paied more attention to the presentation of Japanese food in China, and I am wondering if any of you have? I know that you can find sushi all over, but that it does not seem to be linked to Japan. Plenty of Yoshinoya Beef Bowl joints, but how Japanese do they sell themselves? Or is it just that food matters so much in identity?
