Olympic Games

The modern Olympic Games (commonly referred to as the Olympics), which began in Athens in 1896, are quadrennial sporting extravaganzas which currently exist in both a Summer games version and a Winter games version. The Summer Games are held every leap year and recent such events have featured over 10000 athletes from nearly 200 countries competing in 300 sports events in 28 different sports. The Winter Games are held in the even numbered years between the Summer event and typically approximately 2400 athletes from nearly 80 countries competing in 80 events in 7 different sports.

The Games are organized and governed by the International Olympic Committee which determines which sports are to be included and where the Games are to be held. The modern games began as a revival of the ancient Olympics through the organizing efforts of Baron Pierre de Coubertin.

Over the years since its inception, the Games have come to occupy a position of increasing significance not only in a sporting sense, but also in terms of their function in society. And they have also shared in the general problems of society as a whole, which includes political exploitation (the Berlin games of 1936) and boycotts, political catastrophe (Munich 1972), and issues such as amateurism, the role of women in sports, commercialization, and doping in sports.

The next Summer Games are scheduled for Beijing, China begining in August of 2008 while the next Winter Games are scheduled for Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada beginning in February of 2010.

Genesis of the modern Games

The 19th century witnessed a boom in organized sports of all kinds. It was during this era that many of the most important present-day sports came into being. For example, baseball and basketball in the United States were invented in the latter half of the 19th century. At the same time, older sports were revamped with rules changes (or just the first set of standardized rules). Football (to use its official Olympic name - it is commonly known as soccer in the United States), as just one example, owes its first set of standardized rules, along with significant rules changes, to the 19th century. The nineteenth century was also the era of the development and spread of the Scottish Highland games.

For all sports, increased popularity was also the norm and the first continuous, organized competitions were held while at the same time the first sports clubs and associations were founded. It was during this century that, for example, the Amateur Athletic Association was formed in the United States and intercollegiate sports competitions first became established and popular.

Sport in this era was, however, mainly an upper class, aristocratic phenomenon as here was the only element of society with the leisure time to pursue such activities.

In the late 19th century, the site of the Ancient Olympic Games was, a century after it had first been discovered, finally unearthed by the German archaeologist Ernst Curtius. Inspired by this event, as well as by his idealization of physical activity as part of a well-rounded education, Pierre de Coubertin, a Frenchman with a lengthy noble heritage, resolved to revive the Ancient Games in modern form.

When he first proposed such a plan in a lecture in 1892, he met with little success, but two years later, he convened an invitational sports congress in Paris (June 1894) at which time the participants founded the International Olympic Committee and set about to organize the first modern Olympic Games which they scheduled for Athens, Greece, two years later, planning to hold similar events every 4 years thereafter.

Those first games featured the participation of ca 200 athletes (all male) from 14 countries participating in 43 events in 9 different sports.

Growing pains

After the initial success of the first Olympic Games in Athens in 1896, the Olympic movement struggled. In contrast to the present day where potential sponsors compete for the right to host the Olympics, in the early years of the 20th century, there was no line up of bidders desirous of organizing the Games. Instead, the IOC had to search for sponsors and organizers, generally meeting with indifference or worse.

The Games of the 1900 Olympics in Paris, France and those of the 1904 Olympics, eventually held in St. Louis, Missouri (USA) after the first organizers in Chicago bowed out, were held in conjunction with world's fairs and occupied a decidedly secondary role by comparision to their host expositions. Nor was the participation of athletes up to the desired level for a truly worldwide event as the Games aspired to be. The 1904 Games in St. Louis attracted competitors from only 12 countries (fewer than at Athens 8 years earlier) and although there were over 600 entries, nearly 80% of them were from the United States. In addition, at both Paris and St. Louis, the IOC had to battle the local organizing committee for control over the Games.

Things took a turn for the better with the 1908 Olympics in London, England.

Interwar years

The 1916 Games were scheduled for Berlin, but the outbreak of World War I resulted in their cancellation. One other result was that de Coubertin decided, in the Spring of 1915, to move IOC headquarters to Lausanne in neutral Switzerland, where it has been headquartered ever since.

Issues in Olympism: women's participation in the Games

The first Games in the modern era, those at Athens in 1896, featured no women participants although, in contrast to the Ancient Olympic Games, women were allowed as spectators. The founder of the modern Games, Baron de Coubertin, felt that in reviving the Ancient Games, he should follow their lead and restrict the competition only to males and this was also in keeping with his overall hostility towards the participation of women in the Games and in sports generally. He felt, along with most of his Victorian contemporaries, that such activities as sport were unsuitable for women.

In subsequent versions of the Games, a few women were allowed to partiicipate in selected events - those considered sufficiently "feminime" so as not to upset Victorian sensibilities. Thus, in 1900, women were allowed to partiipcate in golf and tennis and some swimming and diving events for women were allowed by 1912. But women's participation in the track and field events, considered the heart and soul of the Games, was fiercely resisted.