The Upside to Politics in the Olympic Games

Adam Ellner
Mr. Lovre
AP American Literature 5
5 Apr. 2013
The Upside to Politics in the Olympic Games Throughout the last hundred years, despite its image as a worldwide sporting phenomenon that rises above the clutches of politics, the Olympic Games has served as a catalyst and a stage for sociopolitical conflict and controversy on both national and global scales. Despite the International Olympic Committee’s (IOC) attempts to limit this infringement of politics into the realm of international sport, several historical examples illustrate positive influences on humanity’s opportunity to enjoy a peaceful, equitable, and competitive Olympic atmosphere for athletes of the world to physically test themselves against their human peers from across the globe. Throughout the Cold War, tensions felt between the Soviet Union and the United States spilled over into the Olympic arena, impacting the Games in largely positive ways. The IOC’s handling of the international situation with Apartheid represented a clear way in which politics were effectively used to better the Olympic Games. Another powerful example of this arose at the 1968 Mexico City Olympics when African American sprinters defied the IOC, using the international stage to protest social injustice in the United States. Relations between the IOC and the Soviet Union were strained from the very beginning. After the Bolsheviks defeated their opponents and created the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics in the early 1920’s, the IOC initially refused to officially recognize the new nation (Senn 37). Having been excluded, the Soviets looked on as the victorious Allies celebrated the vanquishment of the despised Germans at the 1920 Antwerp Olympics. Despite the wishes of IOC President Pierre de Coubertin to keep the Games neutral, the Allies persuaded the IOC to ban Germany from the 1920 and 1924 Olympics (World). Left wing socialists and Communists in the Soviet Bloc saw how politicized the 1920 Games was, and loathed the IOC for becoming the toy of the ruling class. Even through the IOC eventually recognized the USSR, Soviet reluctance to join the Olympic Movement lasted all the way until 1951 (Senn 67). Despite the USSR’s earlier stance that the Games should be apolitical, the 1952 Games in Helsinki signaled a new era in which the Olympics became a stage where the unfought battles of the Cold War were played out. Between 1952 and 1972, American Avery Brundage served as the president of the IOC. Brundage was a strong supporter of the Olympic morality and held fast to a firm, idealistic belief that international sport could resolve political, ideological, and ethnic conflicts (Senn 67). He was so dedicated to his job that he contributed $75,000 a year out of his own pocket to do his work, every year for the twenty years he served as president (Senn 67). Brundage was both the link and the buffer between the power politics of the rival Cold War superpowers and the Olympics. The first two Summer Games of Brundage’s term served as prime examples of the manifestation of Cold War politics at the Olympics. At the Finnish government’s specific request for the 1952 Helsinki Games, Brundage and the IOC set up a separate housing complex for Eastern Bloc athletes, off the Olympic Village and away from the other competitors’ housing (Mellbye). Miffed by their isolation, Soviet athletes were even more determined to succeed at the Games; more specifically, they were determined to outshine the American athletes (Mellbye). To the dismay of the Americans, the Soviet athletes did just that, dominating early events, many of which had been won by the US in many previous Games (Senn 102). To further emphasize their rivalry with the US, the Soviet athletes created a running points tally—comparing their results to those of American athletes—and posted it on the wall of their compound for the world to see (Senn 102). Sparked by this direct public comparison, American athletes began to compete harder than ever to keep up with the Soviets. By the time the Games ended, the USSR had accumulated 71 total medals: 22 gold, 30 silver, and 19 bronze, compared to the US total of 76 medals: 40 gold, 19 silver, and 17 bronze (Olympic). According to the Soviet point system, this equated to a dead tie between the US and USSR at 494 points each, but according to the system used by the US, the American athletes won by a margin of 614 points to 532 (Senn 103). The US National Olympic Committee and American press were angered by the Soviet point system because it placed less emphasis on gold medals—which the US garnered more of (Senn 102). Brundage opposed these confrontational point systems all together and appealed that they were “entirely contrary to the rules and spirit of the Olympic Games, which are contests between individuals with no points scored” (Senn 102). There is no doubt that this new incentive for American and Soviet athletes to outcompete each other was fueled by a political motivation to prove the superiority of their country over the other. However, this political influence—that was unwanted by Avery Brundage—greatly raised the level of competition. At the Helsinki Games, many world records were broken and the overall quality of the sport increased dramatically (Bayliss). Four years later, the international conflicts of 1956 threatened to submerge the Olympics in a wave of political controversy as crisis after crisis broke out in the year leading up to the Summer Games in Melbourne. The Hungarian people revolted against their Soviet installed socialist puppet government, prompting the USSR to send tanks into Budapest to quash the revolution (Gill). The resulting struggle ended with the USSR reinstating the unpopular socialist regime, after weeks of violent struggle between the Hungarian rebels and the Soviet military (Gill). To protest the Soviet oppression of the Hungarians, Spain, Switzerland, and the Netherlands all boycotted the 1956 Melbourne Olympics (Gill). Meanwhile, the IOC released an official statement formally recognizing Taiwan as a sovereign nation (Mellbye). This contentious decision was deplored by Chairman Mao Zedong and the Chinese government, prompting China to begin a long-term boycott of the Olympic Games which lasted all the way until the 1980 Summer Games in Moscow (Mellbye). Also in 1956, Egypt decided to nationalize the Suez canal, closing it off to foreign access. In response, France and Great Britain supported an Israeli ground invasion into Egypt, engaging the Egyptian military as European planes bombed Cairo (Senn 107). The Israeli forces took the Suez Canal by force. Egypt then successfully appealed to its ally, the Soviet Union, as well as the United Nations to force the invaders to relinquish control of the canal (Gill). The Egyptian government was furious when it discovered that the IOC was inviting Israel to the Melbourne Games, demanding that “all countries at war with them be excluded from the Games” (Senn 107). Egypt, Lebanon, and Iraq all boycotted in protest (Mellbye). Despite all of this international contention, the Games ran incredibly smoothly on the most part because every country that was involved in any of the aforementioned conflicts boycotted the Games, except for the Soviet Union and Hungary. The one major unpleasantry that stands out when one looks back on the Melbourne Games is the men’s semifinal water polo match where Hungary played the USSR. With the recent violent Soviet suppression of the Hungarian revolt on all the players’ minds, the match was intense, bordering on violent. Players on both teams taunted, cursed, and spat at each other, brawling under the water (Corwin). Malicious play erupted into full-on violence near the end of the game, when a Soviet player punched Hungarian star Ervin Zador in the face (Corwin). The enormously pro-Hungarian crowd exploded into chaos and charged the pool (Corwin). Fights broke out all around the stands and the Australian security barely kept the crowd at bay on the pool deck as officials prematurely ended the match and named Hungary victorious with a 4-0 lead (Corwin). Multiple witnesses swore there was blood in the water, and from there on out it was labeled the "Blood on the Water" game (Corwin). The only countries embroiled in international conflict to attend the Melbourne Games resulted in the only controversy of the Games. Because most of the other disharmonious nations decided to boycott, the Games was spared the negativity and dissension that those nations would have brought. Instead, the Melbourne Olympics was a huge success, with athletes from around the world coming together to enjoy the spirit of pure competitive sports. The Cold War tensions that caused such an uproar at the Helsinki Games thawed tremendously, with American and Soviet athletes interacting freely in the Olympic Village (Senn 109). Ironically, using Olympic boycotting as a tool for conflicting nations to express dissatisfaction can be beneficial to the success of peaceful international sport. The Melbourne Games demonstrated how these apparently negative political actions can result in a more pure athletic competition without the distraction of political discord. The Olympic Games have also been used as a positive political tool for the world to combat racism and for individuals to call for social equality. The Apartheid regime took hold of South Africa in 1948 with the ascendence of the National Party. This segregationist political party advocated white supremacy, and immediately instated a policy of dividing up South African society into four racial categories: “Black,” “White,” “Coloured,” and “Indian” (International). They legalized and promoted social, economic, and political discrimination, creating a Jim Crow-like atmosphere of oppression and degradation (International). In 1956, the National Party officially banned all interracial sport in South Africa (Senn 119). Within the next few years, other nations began to react by calling for the exclusion of South Africa from the IOC. Norway first brought the issue of Apartheid to the Olympic table in 1958, and soon after, IOC member Konstantin Andrianov spoke for the Soviet Union, proposing “the exclusion of the Union of South Africa from the IOC” (Senn 119). Brundage was reluctant to act because of his philosophical aversion to politics, but he finally gave into international pressure, setting a final deadline of December 31, 1963 for the National Party to “end racial discrimination in South African sport” (Senn 133). The deadline passed with no change in South Africa. In order to uphold the Olympic values of equality in sport, the IOC finally responded by banning South Africa from the 1964 Tokyo Games (Senn 133). Racism and segregation was not to be tolerated inside the supposedly sacred territory of the Olympic Village. However, when the South African National Olympic Committee announced in 1966 that “in principle it would accept the idea of a racially mixed Olympic team,” Brundage was eager to reinstate South Africa into the Olympic family (Senn 134). He appointed Lord Killanin—his eventual successor as the president of the IOC—to lead an investigation to South Africa to judge the validity of its promise (Senn 135). During the trip, no matter how much he tried to solely focus on the conduct of South Africa’s Olympic training system, Killanin found it impossible to ignore the horrific system of Apartheid he saw around him (Senn 135). He and his Nigerian colleague, Sir Ade Ademola, were not permitted to sit together on a public bench or use the same public restroom (Senn 135). In his report to Brundage, Killanin summed up that it would be impossible for the South African National Olympic Committee to “operate in open defiance of its government” by allowing a racially mixed team to be sent to the Olympics (Senn 135). Other African nations were inclined to share Killanin’s view. Twenty-two countries from around Africa banded together to form the Supreme Council for Sport in Africa (SCSA), protesting the IOC’s leniency with South Africa and threatening to boycott the 1968 Mexico City Summer Games if South Africa was invited (Senn 135). The SCSA was created for the purpose of safeguarding racial equality in African sports. By threatening to boycott the Olympics, African nations used politics to stand up against social injustice and demand positive change. So as to avoid a major boycott, the IOC excluded South Africa from the Mexico City Olympics, and in 1970 voted to no longer officially recognize South Africa’s National Olympic Committee (Senn 148). Even the seemingly beneficial political move by the IOC to exclude South Africa from Olympic competition incited further political actions which in fact greatly detracted from the integrity of the Games. The politicization of boycotting as a means of protest soon got out of hand as widespread boycotts threatened the integrity of Olympic competition in Montreal, again in Moscow, and yet again in Los Angeles. The issue of South African sports resurfaced in 1976 during the lead up to the Montreal Summer Olympics of that year. In order to shun South Africa, a wide variety of international sporting federations had banned South Africa from international competition (Senn 166). Contrary to this popular sentiment, New Zealand decided to send its rugby team, nicknamed the “All Blacks,” to tour in South Africa where they played several tests against the “Springboks” (Mellbye). The Supreme Council for Sport in Africa was infuriated by this fraternization, calling for New Zealand’s banishment from the Montreal Olympics (Senn 166). The IOC was unrelenting and somewhat mystified by the nature of the demand. Rugby was not an Olympic sport, so the IOC did not see how it could have any responsibility or obligation to take action (Senn 166). In the end, thirty African countries boycotted the Montreal Games, significantly decreasing the level of quality in many of the track and field events (Mellbye). The boycott didn’t accomplish anything for the benefit of the purity of international sport. On the contrary, it undermined the integrity of the competition. In the aftermath of the Montreal Games, Lord Killanin and the IOC established a new policy of dealing a five year suspension to any National Olympic Committee that “withdrew from the Games for unexplainable reasons” (Senn 174). It is doubtful that Killanin expected the magnitude of the boycotts that would happen within the decade. In response to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, the United States led an enormous boycott of 65 countries, leaving only 80 countries sending athletes to the Moscow Summer Games in 1980 (Milestones). This attendance was much down from the 92 countries to send athletes to Montreal, which was subsequently down from 121 at the Munich Olympics in 1972 (Participants). In reaction to the US-led boycott, the Soviet Union staged an Eastern Bloc boycott of the Los Angeles Summer Games in 1984 (Milestones). It appeared as though power politics were taking over the Olympics, soiling the amazing capability of international sport as a means to promote equality and mutual understanding. However, even as the IOC was marred by the political turmoil of Apartheid and the Cold War, one act of protest would shine as a beacon of light, beating back the ignorant darkness to illuminate the plight of black people in America. In 1968, protest movements were sprouting around the world. In the United States, students protested the Vietnam War and African Americans protested against segregation, while students rallied in France and took to the streets in Mexico City, the site of the upcoming Olympics (Senn 138). On the eve of the Games, riots in Mexico City turned violent as mobs clashed with the Mexican military leaving over 250 people dead (Senn 138). In the midst of this global atmosphere of dissent, African American Olympic athletes saw the impending Games as a unique opportunity to make a political statement against racial discrimination in America. Harry Edwards was one such athlete. In 1968, he called for an African American boycott of the Mexico City Olympics “to protest the general condition of blacks in the United States” (Senn 136-137). Following the dogma expressed by Edwards’ daring slogan: “We are not Americans, we are black people,” many African American athletes—including almost the entire American basketball squad—refused to attend the Games (Senn 137). Because many of these athletes were key local and national leaders of the burgeoning Black Power movement, their refusal drew the attention of the world to the plight of African Americans (Zirin). Nevertheless, this valiant rebellion was immensely overshadowed by the actions of the American American athletes that did attend attend the Mexico City Games. Instead of boycotting with the rest of their peers, several African American athletes— including sprinters John Carlos and Tommie Smith—decided to travel to Mexico City on a mission to “[make] a pointed statement there in front of the world” (Zirin). Inspired by their millions of African American supporters, Smith and Carlos respectively won the gold and bronze medals in the 200 meter sprint, fulfilling their goal of favorably representing the blacks of America (Zirin). Then, at their medal ceremony, they courageously made a political statement for the world to see. As the Star-Spangled Banner rang out in triumph, Smith and Carlos took their shoes off and carried them to protest poverty in America (Zirin). They wore beads around their necks to protest lynching (Zirin). Carlos even “directly violated Olympic protocol: unzipping his jacket to represent ‘his working buddies—black and white—back home in New York City’” (Zirin). Finally, they simultaneously raised their black-gloved fists to “show solidarity with the Civil Rights Movement” (Zirin). Brundage was furious and punished them by banning them from the Olympic Village and suspending them from the US Olympic team (Zirin). Tragically, for the rest of their lives, Smith and Carlos had trouble finding work and received countless death threats from people who believed that what they did brought disgrace to the American people (Zirin). Nevertheless, their actions inspired millions of people around the world and sparked progress in the American Civil Rights Movement. As Smith puts it: “We are athletes. Although I am a teacher, but not a politician. We used this stage so the whole world could see the poverty of the black man in America” (Zirin). Throughout the modern Olympic era, the IOC has strived to keep politics out of the Games, with limited success. However, many of these political influences have in fact made for more equitable and honest international sport. Even as Avery Brundage condemned Tommie Smith and John Carlos for their political statement, the closing ceremonies of the 1968 Mexico City Olympics converted into “a great festival when athletes unexpectedly surged onto the field to celebrate” (Senn 142). One Olympic observer wrote: “The Olympic Stadium was now no longer a stage, but a family circle…. The grass of the Olympic Stadium became a dance meadow. The Olympic closing ceremony transformed itself into a folk festival, unorganized, spontaneous, with infectious cheer” (Senn 142).

Works Cited

Bayliss, S., Butler, S., Klaczynski, M., Williams, A., Yip, I., & Lui, J. “Politics: Aspects of the Olympic Games.” Politics: Aspects of the Olympic Games. Imperial College, London, Feb. 2004. Web. 26 Sept. 2012.

Corwin, Miles. “Blood in the Water at the 1956 Olympics.” Smithsonian Magazine. Smithsonian Institution, 01 Aug. 2008. Web. 30 Mar. 2013

Gill, Kathy. “Politics and the Olympics.” about.com. The New York Times, 03 Jan. 2009. Web. 25 Sept. 2012.

“International Boycott of Apartheid Sport.” African National Congress. ANC, 25 May 1971. Web. 30 Mar. 2013.

Mellbye, Anne. “Politics and the Olympics.” Politics Special Reports. Guardian News and Media Limited. 2011. Web. 25 Sept. 2012.

“Milestones: 1977-1980.” Office of the Historian. Bureau of Public Affairs - United States Department of State, n.d. Web. 22 Oct. 2012.

Not Just a Game. Dir. Jeremy Earp. Perf. Dave Zirin. 2010. DVD.

“Olympic Games.” Olympic Games Medals, Results, Sports, Athletes. The Olympic Movement. Web. 25 Nov. 2012.

“Participants in Olympics.” Maps of World. n.p. 31 July 2012. Web. 30 Mar. 2013.

Senn, Alfred. Power, Politics, and the Olympic Games. Champaign, IL: Human Kinetics, 1999. Print.

“World War I: Treaties and Reparations.” Holocaust Encyclopedia. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, 11 May 2012. Web. 30 Mar. 2013.