Sports Mega Events

This volume offers a distinctive and timely comparative analysis of the sociological, economic, and political significance of bids for, and the hosting of, sports mega-events throughout the world.

• A collection by leading international scholars examining sports mega-events, such as the Olympic Games and the FIFA World Cup.
• Analyses the sociological, economic, and political significance of bids for, and the hosting of, sports mega-events.
• Explores the costs and benefits incurred by host cities.
• Focuses on both advanced and developing cities throughout Europe, Asia, North America, Australasia, and South Africa.

Developments in new technologies of mass communication, especially the development of satellite television, have created unprecedented global audiences for events like the Olympics and the FIFA World Cup. The influx of corporate sponsorship money into sports ‘megas’ has provided an important source of income for host cities and the international organizations running world sports events. Sports mega-events are now seen as useful in the selling of all manner of commercial products and as valuable promotional opportunities for cities and regions, showcasing their attractions to global audiences and helping to attract tourism and outside investment. The enthusiasm to host sports mega-events has grown massively in the past 20 years, but research has pointed out significant gaps between forecast and actual outcomes, between economic and non-economic rewards, between the experience of mega-events in advanced and in developing societies. This collection of specially commissioned essays asks penetrating questions about why governments and cities compete for the right to host these major international sporting events? What are the tradeoffs and opportunity costs of doing so? Do such events ultimately deliver the benefits, economic and otherwise, that their proponents proclaim?

This volume offers a distinctive and timely comparative analysis of the sociological, economic, and political significance of bids for, and the hosting of, sports mega-events throughout the world – Europe, Asia, North America, Australasia and South Africa. The contents will appeal to an international readership in sociology, geography, economics, sports studies and sports management and cultural studies. The breadth of coverage and international composition of the specialist contributors makes this a compelling and substantive addition to the sociological literature in sport, leisure and popular cultural studies.

John Horne is Senior Lecturer in the Sociology of Sport and Leisure at the University of Edinburgh. He has published many articles and book chapters on sport, leisure and popular culture and is the author of Sport in Consumer Culture (2006) and co-author of Understanding Sport (1999, with Alan Tomlinson and Garry Whannel). He is the co-editor of Sport, Leisure and Social Relations (1987, Sociological Review Monograph No. 33, with David Jary and Alan Tomlinson), Japan, Korea and the 2002 World Cup (2002, with Wolfram Manzenreiter) and Football Goes East: Business, Culture and the People’s Game in China, Japan and Korea (2004, with Wolfram Manzenreiter). He has also edited two Leisure Studies Association publications: Leisure Cultures, Consumption and Commodification (2001) and Masculinities: Leisure Cultures, Identities and Consumption (2000, with Scott Fleming).

Wolfram Manzenreiter is Assistant Professor at the Institute of East Asian Studies, Vienna University, where he lectures on modern Japanese society. His major research interests are concerned with the social and economic implications of sport and popular culture in contemporary Japan. He is author of several books and articles on popular culture, leisure and sport in Japan. Currently he is working on a new book entitled Sport and Nation in Japan. In addition to the co-edited volumes with John Horne, Football Goes East (2004) and Japan, Korea and the 2002 World Cup (2002), his recent works include the monographs The Social Construction of Japanese Mountaineering (2000), and Pachinko Monogatari: Japan's Gambling Industry (1998), both published in German.