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Jon Pack is a Brooklyn-based photographer whose work has been exhibited in galleries in the US and Europe, and has appeared on book covers from publishers including Simon & Schuster and Random House. His previous projects include the limited-edition book Out There; That Thing We Call Nature.
Part III City Portraits -- 13 Berlin 1936 -- 14 Mexico City 1968 -- 15 Munich 1972 -- 16 Sydney 2000 -- 17 Athens 2004 -- 18 Beijing 2008 -- 19 London 2012 -- 20 Rio de Janeiro 2016 -- 21 Tokyo 2020 -- References -- Index
This volume provides an overview of the changing relationship between cities and the Olympic Games, starting from the year 1896. Blending critical conceptual insight with grounded case studies, this book, divided into three parts, explores the historical experience of staging the Olympics from the point of view of the host city.
Hosting the Olympic Games reveals the true costs involved for the cities that hold these large-scale sporting events. It uncovers the financing of the Games, reviewing existing studies to evaluate the costs and benefits, and draws on case study experiences of the Summer and Winter Games from the past forty years to assess the short- and long-term urban legacies for host cities. Written in an easily accessible style and format, it provides an in-depth critical analysis into the franchise model of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and offers an alternative vision for future Games. This book is an important contribution to understanding the consequences for the host cities of Olympic Games.
Providing a full overview of the changing relationship between cities and the Olympic events, this substantially revised and enlarged edition builds on the success of its predecessor. Its coverage takes account of important new scholarship as well as adding reflections on the experience of staging Beijing 2008 and Vancouver 2010, the state of preparations for London 2012, and the plans for the Games scheduled for Sochi in 2014 and Rio de Janeiro 2016. The book is divided into three parts that provide overviews of the urban legacy of the four component Olympic festivals, systematic surveys of five key aspects of activity involved in staging the Olympics and ten chronologically arranged portraits of host cities. As controversy over the growing size and expense of the Olympics continues, this timely assessment of the Games’ development and the complex agendas that host cities attach to the event will be essential reading for urban and sports historians, urban geographers, planners and all concerned with understanding the relationship between cities and culture. Olympic Cities is one of the Routledge books of the month for December 2010
"The summer of 1996. In nineteen days, six million visitors jostled about in a southern city grappling with white flight, urban decay and the stifling legacy of Jim Crow. Six years earlier, a bold, audacious partnership of a strong mayor, enlightened business leaders and Atlanta's Black political leadership dared to bid on hosting the 1996 Olympic Games. Unexpectedly, the city won, an achievement that ignited a loose but robust coalition that worked collectively, if sometimes contentiously, to prepare the city and push it forward. This is a story of how once-struggling Atlanta leveraged the benefits of the Centennial Games to become a city of international prominence. This improbable rise from the ashes is told by three urban planning professionals who were at the center of the story."--Back cover.
Often seen as the host nation's largest ever logistical undertaking, accommodating the Olympics and its attendant security infrastructure brings seismic changes to both the physical and social geography of its destination. Since 1976, the defence of the spectacle has become the central feature of its planning, one that has assumed even greater prominence following the bombing of the 1996 Atlanta Games and, most importantly, 9/11. Indeed, the quintupled cost of securing the first post-9/11 summer Games in Athens demonstrates the considerable scale and complexity currently implicated in these operations. Such costs are not only fiscal. The Games stimulate a tidal wave of redevelopment ushering in new gentrified urban settings and an associated investment that may or may not soak through to the incumbent community. Given the unusual step of developing London's Olympic Park in the heart of an existing urban milieu and the stated commitments to 'community development' and 'legacy', these constitute particularly acute issues for the 2012 Games. In addition to sealing the Olympic Park from perceived threats, 2012 security operations have also harnessed the administrative criminological staples of community safety and crime reduction to generate an ordered space in the surrounding areas. Of central importance here are the issues of citizenship, engagement and access in urban spaces redeveloped upon the themes of security and commerce. Through analyzing the social and community impact of the 2012 Games and its security operation on East London, this book concludes by considering the key debates as to whether utopian visions of legacy can be sustained given the demands of providing a global securitized event of the magnitude of the modern Olympics.
This open access book describes the three planning approaches and legacy impacts for the Olympic Games in one locale: the city of Los Angeles, USA. The author critically compares the similarities and differences of the LA Olympics by reviewing the 1932 and 1984 Olympics and by analyzing the concurrent planning process for the 2028 Olympics. The author unravels the conditions that make (or do not make) LA28’s argument “we have staged the Games before, we can do it again” compelling. Setting the bid’s promises into the contemporary local and global mega-event contexts, the author analyzes why LA won the bids, how those wins allowed LA to negotiate concessions with the IOC and NOC, and how legacies were planned, executed, and ultimately evolved. The author concludes with a prediction which 2028 legacy promises might and might not be fulfilled given the local and international Olympic contexts.
This book looks at the 1968 Summer Olympic Games as a complex nation-building project. Sports mega-events have been mostly studied as homogenous government-led strategies, but more work is needed around the diverse reception and performances. The preparation period for the Olympics in Mexico and especially the year 1968 highlight the multiplicity of voices behind these exercises. Beyond the government and associated networks, the citizenry also used this mega-event to present an idea of Mexico to the world and thus reshape citizenship and nationhood. This study takes a bottom-up approach to look at the citizenry’s experiences of the 1968 Olympic Games, both the shared nationalistic values and the areas of conflict.
"A major contribution to the study of global events in times of global media. Owning the Olympics tests the possibilities and limits of the concept of 'media events' by analyzing the mega-event of the information age: the Beijing Olympics. . . . A good read from cover to cover." —Guobin Yang, Associate Professor, Asian/Middle Eastern Cultures & Sociology, Barnard College, Columbia University From the moment they were announced, the Beijing Games were a major media event and the focus of intense scrutiny and speculation. In contrast to earlier such events, however, the Beijing Games are also unfolding in a newly volatile global media environment that is no longer monopolized by broadcast media. The dramatic expansion of media outlets and the growth of mobile communications technology have changed the nature of media events, making it significantly more difficult to regulate them or control their meaning. This volatility is reflected in the multiple, well-publicized controversies characterizing the run-up to Beijing 2008. According to many Western commentators, the People's Republic of China seized the Olympics as an opportunity to reinvent itself as the "New China"---a global leader in economics, technology, and environmental issues, with an improving human-rights record. But China's maneuverings have also been hotly contested by diverse global voices, including prominent human-rights advocates, all seeking to displace the official story of the Games. Bringing together a distinguished group of scholars from Chinese studies, human rights, media studies, law, and other fields, Owning the Olympics reveals how multiple entities---including the Chinese Communist Party itself---seek to influence and control the narratives through which the Beijing Games will be understood. digitalculturebooks is an imprint of the University of Michigan Press and the Scholarly Publishing Office of the University of Michigan Library dedicated to publishing innovative and accessible work exploring new media and their impact on society, culture, and scholarly communication. Visit the website at www.digitalculture.org.
