No monarch ever held sway over such vast expanse of territory.

Avery Brundage, IOC President, 1952–1972

IOC Opening Session, Rome 1960

The Olympic Games is always about building bridges, never about erecting walls. Its political neutrality ensures that all countries of the world assemble at the Games every four years, irrespective of race, ethnicity, social status or cultural differences. Universality at is noblest pinnacle.

Dr Thomas Bach, IOC President

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There is no event in the world, compressed in less than three weeks, attracting so much interest both in intensity and aesthetics, that can match the Olympic Games. Participants from every country in the world are present. Their Opening Ceremony is a major spectacle viewed globally.

In antiquity, there were many Games with different strengths and specialties. The Olympic Games was not only the most athletic of contests, but it encompassed ceremonies, rituals and symbols. It was recognized throughout antiquity as the eminent event. Visitors and contestants included the most prominent personalities of the time. Even Roman emperors of the day considered the Games in such esteem that they themselves became competitors. The victors were feted and became celebrities in their respective towns.

The characteristics of the modern Olympic Games are unique. Among their special features are their wide family and generational appeal, their universal values and their unity in time, place and action. The Games are far more than a sporting event, generating legacy in culture, education and sports participation. Most importantly, it is not an end in itself. It creates a platform for intercultural communication. The Games infrastructure is utilized to stage the Paralympic Games. Its multi-sport and multi-disciplinary program creates global interest for people of all shades of opinion and views.

Universality incorporating a multitude of sports

The Olympic Games program includes a multitude of sports and incorporates multi-events and multi-disciplinary competitions of the highest quality. This provides opportunities at the highest level of competition unequalled on any other global occasion. It allows countries to achieve fame and honour in sports which have a special history and bias specific to their respective countries as part of an international spectacle. The uniqueness is further enhanced as the Games provide both for high performance and the developmental sector. This ensures that every country is represented in the Olympic Games. This is the highest manifestation of the principle of universality.

Highest aspirations

World championships are organized for most sports. The best athletes do participate in these events; and in most cases they receive cash and value in kind awards. But their ultimate aim and aspiration is to compete in the Olympic Games. Performance at the Olympic Games far outweighs the equivalent of any world championships. “Olympic Champion” is the ultimate, not “World Champion”. Gaston Reiff of Belgium – Olympic Gold Medalist at the 1948 Olympic Games, where he beat the world renowned Emil Zatopek, and holder of numerous world records – stated that setting a world record today can be broken tomorrow, but an Olympic Medal is forever.

Moreover, it is significant to note that all the world’s best athletes would like to participate in the Olympic Games, whether their sport is on the program or not.

Olympic Village

The Olympic Village housing the athletes provides a unique venue for interaction, be it comradeship with other sports stars, ambience, dining experience catering a whole range of tastes or just absorbing the general atmosphere.

The Olympic Symbol

The Olympic Symbol made up of five interlocking rings is unparalleled. There is a 93% awareness world-wide of the rings. No other sporting symbol has such high awareness; nor do most corporate products. The symbol has the power to mobilize, catalize and inspire.

The Olympic Motto

Citius, Altius, Fortius expresses all the aspirations of the Olympic Movement. And there is no other motto equal to it in sport.

Marketing

The Olympic Symbol is also a remarkable marketing tool. Always seen and prominently visible at all Olympic venues. The symbol is so powerful that it discreetly supersedes sponsors’ logos to be seen at all Olympic venues during the Games. Yet, it does not, in any way, diminish or devalue the importance of sponsor involvement.

Olympic Flame and Torch Relay

Igniting the Olympic Flame and the consequent Olympic Torch Relay is one of the unique and binding pre-Games activities. It brings social cohesion in the host country and generates tremendous publicity along the route of the Torch Relay.

World-Wide Partners

Other than the Olympic Games, no sport or world-wide event works on the basis of “Clean Venues”. No advertising whatsoever appears at any Olympic venue. But, corporate sponsors of the Games have no qualms of partnering the IOC. The multitude of benefits accruing to the sponsors is of exceptional value to them.

Some observations

The Olympic Games are special because of their history and tradition: the flame, the rings and the emotional experience of being part of it, together with all the nations and all the varying events, different people all equal as competitors, loving sport. The Games also have a social and political relevance. Yet, when you are out there on the track, everything is so focused. If you need an extra incentive, it’s right there: the sight of the flame.¹

I invite you to suggest a more successful event anywhere in the peacetime history of mankind.²

Given that loyalty, fair play, respect for others and their dignity, and the rejection of any racist, sexist or nationalist discrimination are all fundamental to the Olympic Games, they convey a global ethical message, particularly for the young...³

There is no other organization that has such a generalized and strong relationship with the population of the whole world as the IOC, nor one which has proved so enduring [...] a majority of the world’s people attach more importance to the Olympic Games than to meetings of the UN General Assembly [...] the League of Nations, which preceded the UN, lasted just 20 years [...] The IOC has succeeded, in spite of all, in organizing the Olympic Games every four years. A more representative organization would have failed long before.⁴

It is the utter uniqueness of the Olympic Games that I find most compelling about them: an aspect of their presentation that truly distinguishes and ennobles them in fascinating and powerful ways. The modern Olympic Games are, of course, more than just Games. In fact, from the very beginning, the Games have always been distinguishable from other sporting institutions, including world championships. As their founder, Pierre de Coubertin wrote, while ‘world championships do form part of the Olympic Games, nevertheless the Olympic Games are something else as well, and it is just this something else that matters, as it is not to be found in any other variety of athletic competition’. The something else is primarily an ideology, what Coubertin called Olympism, a complex admixture of ethics, world-view, metaphysics, and mythology that Coubertin elicited from a variety of contemporary and historical sources. Their uniqueness is arguably their greatest strength and resource, their most convincing asset, because no other global rite commands the power of the Games, no other ceremony attracts our geo-global attention like the Games, and no other social, political or humanitarian organization causes us to stop and take stock of collective human, planetary progress like the Games. Even in the face of an expanding commercialism, corporatism, and politization, the Games remain one of the truly great leavening forces for good in the world, a testament to their inimitability and, hence their global appeal. ⁵

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* Many of the views expressed are mine. However, some have been extracted from presentations made by various individuals for discussions on the IOC Agenda 2020.

1. Carolina Kluft (Sweden): Olympic Pentathlon gold medallist, Athens 2004: Interview with the author, in David Miller, The Official History of the Olympic Games and the IOC; Athens to Beijing, 1894–2008, Mainstream Publishing, Edinburgh 2008.

2. Bill Bryson, well known travel writer: as quoted by David Miler, ibid.

3. Mr Robert Badinter, Former French Minister of Justice, as quoted by David Miller, ibid.

4. Ruud Stokvis, University of Amsterdam, Netherlands, as quoted by David Miller, ibid.

5. Prof. Jeffrey O. Segrave, Department of Health and Exercise Sciences, Skidmore College, Contribution for the IOC Agenda 2020 discussion.

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RAMSAMY Sam,"Special characteristics of the Olympic Games",in:K.Georgiadis (ed.), Olympic Movement: The process of renewal adaption, 55thInternational Session for Young Participants (Ancient Olympia,23/5-6/6/2015),InternationalOlympic Academy, Athens, 2016, pp.133-137.

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