Internationalism and the first editions of the Modern Olympics William Douglas Almeida, Katia Rubio International Sports Studies 40 No. 2 (2018) https://doi.org/10.30819/iss.40-2.04     pp: 34-46     2018-12-20

Internationalism and the first editions of the Modern Olympics

Stichworte/keywords: Olympic Games, globalization, internationalism, sport geography

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Abstract
The Modern Olympic Games were created in the late nineteenth century, in a context in which various entities with an internationalist character were emerging. From the beginning, there was a concern that the event should receive participants from different countries, bringing together the best competitors in the world. In addition to technological advances and the media, the building of a great competition bringing together various sports disciplines and participants from all corners of the globe was only possible thanks to diplomatic agreements. It was necessary for the initial concept to undergo several adjustments. For example the very standardization of the rules of the disputes was a problem faced in the early Modern Olympics. This paper demonstrates how during this early phase of the modern Olympic Games, the Olympic Movement had to undergo a continuous process of adjustments, which enabled its systematic growth. The support for this hypothesis is found in the analysis of texts by Baron Pierre de Coubertin, texts by other authors who study Olympism, and also the search of historic contextualization. It is observed that such has been the power of sport and the significance of the Olympic Movement as an agency of internationalism that it has effectively generated a functional geography of its own to rival the more familar political atlas.