White elephant
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A white elephant is a possession that its owner cannot dispose of without extreme difficulty, and whose cost, particularly that of maintenance, is out of proportion to its usefulness. In modern usage, it is a metaphor used to describe an object, construction project, scheme, business venture, facility, etc. considered expensive but without equivalent utility or value relative to its capital (acquisition) and/or operational (maintenance) costs.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Historical background
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The term derives from the sacred white elephants kept by Southeast Asian monarchs in Burma, Thailand (Siam), Laos and Cambodia.<ref>"Royal Elephant Stable" Template:Webarchive. Thai Elephant Conservation Center.</ref> To possess a white elephant was regarded—and is still regarded in Thailand and Burma—as a sign that the monarch reigned with justice and power, and that the kingdom was blessed with peace and prosperity. The opulence expected of anyone who owned a beast of such stature was great. Monarchs often exemplified their possession of white elephants in their formal titles (e.g., Hsinbyushin, Template:Lit and the third monarch of the Konbaung dynasty).<ref name="leider">Template:Cite journal</ref> Because the animals were considered sacred and laws protected them from labor, receiving a gift of a white elephant from a monarch was simultaneously a blessing and a curse. It was a blessing because the animal was sacred and a sign of the monarch's favour, and a curse because the recipient now had an animal that was expensive to maintain, could not be given away, and could not be put to much practical use.
In the West, the term "white elephant", relating to an expensive burden that fails to meet expectations, was first used in the 17th century and became widespread in the 19th century.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> According to one source it was popularized following P. T. Barnum's experience with an elephant named Toung Taloung that he billed as the "Sacred White Elephant of Burma". After much effort and great expense, Barnum finally acquired the animal from the King of Siam only to discover that his "white elephant" was actually dirty grey in color with a few pink spots.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
The expressions "white elephant" and "gift of a white elephant" came into common use in the middle of the nineteenth century.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> The phrase was attached to "white elephant swaps" and "white elephant sales" in the early twentieth century.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Many church bazaars held "white elephant sales" where donors could unload unwanted bric-à-brac, generating profit from the phenomenon that "one man's trash is another man's treasure" and the term has continued to be used in this context.<ref>Roberta Jeeves, White Elephant Rules. Template:Webarchive.</ref>
Modern usage
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In modern usage, the term now often refers in addition to an extremely expensive building project that fails to deliver on its function or becomes very costly to maintain.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Examples include prestigious but uneconomic infrastructure projects such as airports,<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> dams,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> bridges,<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref> shopping malls<ref name="businessinsider1">Template:Cite web</ref> and football stadiums.<ref name="Guardian Online March 2006">Guardian Online. Template:Webarchive – Guardian Article regarding Stadio delle Alpi March 2006.</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite news - news story about the Sangre Grande Regional Complex</ref>
Rail transport projects are also sometimes deemed white elephants. In Japan, it was feared that the Yurikamome at Odaiba would end up as a multibillion-yen white elephant.<ref name=":0">Template:Cite web</ref> In Singapore, paper cutouts of white elephants were placed next to the completed but unopened Buangkok MRT station on the North East Line in 2005 to protest its non-opening. (The station eventually opened the following year.)<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
The American Oakland Athletics baseball team has used a white elephant as a symbol and usually its main or alternative logo since 1902, originally in sarcastic defiance of John McGraw's 1902 characterization of the new team as a "white elephant".<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> The Al Maktoum International Airport on the outskirts of Dubai has also been named a white elephant.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> The Roman-styled Boothtown Aqueduct in Sydney, which was opened in 1888, has been referred to as a "white elephant" for its failure to operate as a long-serving aqueduct.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
The term has also been applied to outdated or under-performing military projects like the U.S. Navy's Alaska-class cruiser.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> In Austria, the term "white elephant" means workers who have little or no use, but cannot be dismissed.<ref>de:Weißer Elefant#Redewendung</ref>Template:Circular reference
A former Polish astronomical observatory built in the Carpathian Mountains (now part of Ukraine) in 1938 is nicknamed White Elephant due to its appearance.
See also
[edit]- White elephant gift exchange
- Hills Like White Elephants, The Hearts of Lonely People
- Bridge to nowhere
- Escalation of commitment (sunk cost fallacy)
- Pork barrel
- Abul-Abbas
References
[edit]Further reading
[edit]- Template:Cite book Contains a chapter on the white elephant in Southeast Asia.
- Template:Cite book Contains a long chapter on how Burmese generals tried to use the white elephant to consolidate power, also looks at the cosmological origins of the animal.