ABSTRACT
By the outbreak of the Second World War, the Olympic Games had developed into a truly international sports festival while still framed within the philosophy, ceremonial and ritual developed by Coubertin and watchfully protected by the IOC. Yet, like the international expositions, their organisation and spectacle intimately reflected their global political context. By the end of the war, for example, what had seemed the triumph of the Berlin Olympics now cast a dark shadow over the games through its association with the Third Reich’s propaganda. From 1948 onwards, the Olympic movement struggled first to throw off this shadow and then to come to terms with the challenges of a rapidly changing world. These included decolonisation, ideological conflicts, globalisation, terrorism, political boycotts, wavering support, overt commercialism, the professionalisation of sport, cronyism and corruption. Although it is impossible to deal with these issues per se in detail here,1 they form an important background that underpins the discussion of city experiences in this chapter.
