Opinion | Blackpink’s Born Pink tour shows K-pop women are powering Asia’s post-Covid reglobalisation
- Blackpink’s concert tour marks return of one of South Korea’s biggest pop acts to the stage
- Group’s success pushed K-pop towards a new stage of globalisation, empowering young people and boosting multiculturalism
The concert will delight many Blinks, as Blackpink fans are known, from mainland China as normal travel to Hong Kong resumed on January 8.
China was one of the first countries swept up by the globalisation of K-pop and the Korean wave, after establishing diplomatic relations with South Korea in 1992. K-pop groups like H.O.T. and NRG became popular among young Chinese, and China’s state broadcaster CCTV in 1997 aired the South Korean television drama What is Love.
But after ties soured following South Korea’s 2016 deployment of the US-made anti-missile weapon system known as THAAD, the so-called K-culture wave became a target of “social purification” campaigns in China against the apparent consumerist excesses of popular entertainment. Beijing’s zero-Covid policy further restricted K-pop’s expansion in the Chinese market.
Not that it dampened interest in the sold-out tour: for young K-pop fans in China and elsewhere in Asia who were unable to meet their idols in person during the pandemic, the return of one of South Korea’s biggest pop acts to the stage marks K-pop’s transition to the post-Covid world.
Blackpink’s influence
A four-member act that debuted in 2016, Blackpink is made up of Jennie, Rosé, Lisa and Jisoo.
