More than just games: the global politics of the Olympic Movement

This paper is rooted in the premise that the Olympic Movement represents an important – yet often overlooked – global political site, and it begins by situating the Olympic Movement within the global policy by focusing on its role as a forum in which participating states can both affirm their sovereignty and propagate a virtuous identity. The tension between Olympism’s normative political aims and the practical operation of the Movement is then critically examined, and it is argued that the interests of both participant states and the International Olympic Committee itself in producing an extravagant spectacle most often trump any ostensible commitment to positive political change. The final portion of the paper charts how the Movement’s interventions in the global polity are nevertheless noteworthy, particularly as regards its position at the forefront of doping control, its role as a site for acts of protest and its contradictory and complex interactions with the global citizenship regime.