ABSTRACT
In comparison to the two major sporting ‘mega-events’, the Olympic Games and the FIFA World Cup, the Commonwealth Games is a relatively neglected event in terms of past academic consideration (Black 2014; Palmer 2013). This is unsurprising given that, rst, these two ‘megaevents’ have been given a great deal of attention in the sociological study of sport (Black 2014); and, second, ‘mega-events’ have increasingly drawn attention from academics from non-specialist elds outside of sport, including sociology, politics, history, economics and tourism, amongst others. Furthermore, the common denitional oerings regarding which international sporting events qualify as ‘mega-events’ have resulted in a degree of exclusion for the Commonwealth Games, with leading authors such as Horne (2007) arguing that the only events which successfully meet the criteria to be deemed true mega-events are the Summer Olympic Games and the FIFA World Cup.
