Final Project Draft
Topic: Investigation of why Developing Countries Prefer Hosting Big Events such as the Olympic Games
Mexico presented itself in the wake of the early twentieth-century civil wars as a unified and prosperous country. Mexico City prepared itself for the 1968 Olympics ambitiously as a way to signify its arrival in the developed world arena. Castaneda (2014, 234), says that Mexico used this project to create a perspective of social harmony and most important to build a powerful megacity as the nations’ capital. Mexico was not just the first Latin American country to host the Olympics, but also the first developing country to host such a big event. The country used the international platform to display its architectural transformation. The country also revamped its status as a modernized country by displaying its traveling exhibitions of indigenous archeological artifacts and other details of key projects. These projects placed the nation on the stage of global capitalism. It is therefore important to conclude that most developing countries choose to host the Olympics so that they can create some form of image economy which cultivates economic growth and develops a new mass audience at the international level (Flaherty 2014, 392).
Most developing countries are faced with a lot of revolutionary activities such as rural social movements and active Labour movements that seek to gain fundamental human rights such as education, reliable housing, satisfactory salaries, and land ownership. According to Carey (2018, 354), Mexico was faced with similar hurdles by the time it chose to host the Olympics Games in 1968. There were rampant student movements inspired by revolutionary leaders, Labour movements, and rural social activists. The Mexican suppressed these movements by use of force and shielded the international media from covering it. Hahm et al (2018, 780) established that despite the efforts put up by revolutionary bodies, the developing countries will do anything to suppress such occurrence in order to create an internationally appealing image of their country. Referring to the Mexican case, the government might even choose to imprison revolutionists to safeguard their image and then release through some democratic openings (Carey 2018, 354).
Flaherty (2014, 381), observed that Mexico City integrated architecture, visual elements, and mass media created some temporary environments and spaces that estranged user-beholders’ visuals and spatial perceptions. This lead to immersion and interaction to build a holistic image of a modern country that is socially integrated at a time when these ideals about Mexico were not held by audiences both at home and abroad. Liu (2017, 46), examined the expected social impact of hosting the Olympic Games from a non-host perspective during the bidding stage. The author examines the effects of hosting the Olympic Games on the local population. The article establishes that the event goes beyond a basic sporting event and can lead to a positive multi-dimensional effect to the host country. According to Liu (2017, 47), the expected social impact of a sporting event is not far from the perceived social impact of a past or current event. This means that the evolution of social impacts and interests such as those that pushed Mexico to bid for the 1968 Olympic Games play a major role in similar future events.
According to Pettigrew, Stephen, and Danyel, (2016, 638), recently countries such as Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa have had the privilege to host major international sporting events. The growth of tourism from developed countries has played a major role in turning these events into a successful strategy for economic development. For instance, South Africa attracted extra-arrivals from non-Southern African Development Community (SADC) countries during the event. These numbers have a positive impact economically and most developing countries look up to such impacts in their bid to host the Olympic Games.
In conclusion, research on home advantage in the history of the Olympic Games has established that host nations have won more medals than non-host. Among other advantages, the rules for athlete qualifications for the host countries are softened and you find them presenting a larger delegation than other countries. Hosting Olympics opens the country to the international world and creates a positive perspective of the country thus ensuring economic prosperity. Developing countries choose to host world-class events such as Olympics not for the sporting activities involved but for the economic and social advantages that it brings.
Bibliography
Primary Sources
Castaneda, Luis M. Spectacular Mexico: Design, Propaganda, and the 1968 Olympics. U of Minnesota Press, 2014.
Carey, Elaine. “Human Rights and the Mexican Student Movement of 1968.” In Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Latin American History. 2018.
Flaherty, George F. “Responsive Eyes: Urban Logistics and Kinetic Environments for the 1968 Mexico City Olympics.” Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians 73, no. 3 (2014): 372-397.
Vaughan, Mary Kay. “Mexico 1968: Events, assessments, and antecedents.” In The Routledge Handbook of the Global Sixties, pp. 146-158. Routledge, 2018.
Wilton, Samuel David. “Mexico 1968: Mechanisms of State Control–Tlatelolco, the PRI, and the Student Movement.” Ph.D. diss., University of Oregon, 2014.
Secondary Sources
Dongfeng, Liu. “The Expected Social Impact of Hosting the Winter Olympic Games from a Non-Host Perspective During the Bidding Stage.”
Hahm, Jeeyeon, Asli D. Tasci, and Deborah Breiter Terry. “Investigating the interplay among the Olympic Games image, destination image, and country image for four previous hosts.” Journal of Travel & Tourism Marketing 35, no. 6 (2018): 755-771.
Peeters, Thomas, Victor Matheson, and Stefan Szymanski. “Tourism and the 2010 World Cup: Lessons for developing countries.” Journal of African Economies 23, no. 2 (2014): 290-320.
Pettigrew, Stephen, and Danyel Reiche. “Hosting the Olympic Games: an overstated advantage in sports history.” The International Journal of the History of Sport 33, no. 6-7 (2016): 635-647.