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Using China as an example, this study seeks to examine whether and how a country's elite sport success would affect its soft power from international audience's perspective. Data were collected from residents of Paris through self-completion structured questionnaires. While the results of the study showed varied improvement on three national image dimensions, respondents' perception about China's government and policy worsened. Drawing on costly signaling theory and attribution theory, Olympic involvement and goodwill were also proposed and confirmed as antecedent factors influencing soft power impact through elite sports. The results not only provided empirical evidence whether Olympic achievement would actually affected a country's soft power, but offered insights on the mechanisms at work behind that effect. A number of practical implications were also drawn with a view to leveraging soft power impact of elite sport success. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The construction of coal-fired power plants (CFPPs) is an important issue in energy production and consumption, and regional sustainable development under Chinese 12th Five-Year Plan. Positively or negatively, the construction of CFPPs could affect ecological sustainability, sustainable development of cities and the surrounding areas, national energy security, and also the actions currently in place to curb air pollution. Specifically, CFFPs could create environmental hazards in the surrounding area, such as soil-related environmental problems as a serious consequence. The most significant soil-related environmental problems include the encroachment of farmland, soil erosion, and soil contamination by heavy metals. In this study, the CFPP in Xilingol, Inner Mongolia is used as an example. Ecological environmental data were collected, including details on heavy metal content in soil samples from the area. Based on these data, the potential ecological risk index was used to assess the level of soil pollution by heavy metals and ecological risks. For this CFPP in Xilingol, the heavy metal element has exhibited the highest level of soil contamination. The severity of ecological risk posed by different heavy metals was ranked in the following descending order: Hg>Cd>As>Ni>Pb>Cu>Cr>Zn. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]