The Four ‘Knowns’ of Sports Mega‐Events

Abstract

This article uses a piece of writing in The Guardian newspaper by the philosopher Slavoj Zizek (’The empty wheelbarrow’, 19 February, p. 23, 2005) about the former US Defence Secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, as a framework by which to reflect critically on major international sporting events, or sports mega‐events. It suggests that it is an academic’s duty to look critically at the assumptions, beliefs and misrepresentations that are often suppressed, or, perhaps more accurately, repressed, about sports mega‐events. The article is based on an analysis of research and writing about sports mega‐events, some of which offer more comprehensive reviews of the literature. It is argued that in their enthusiasm to host and support sports ‘megas’, politicians, senior administrators of sport, corporate leaders and even some academics may often encourage the pretence that we do not know as much as we do about things that actually form the background to them. Information is used from studies of sports mega‐events that have taken place, or are planned, in Africa, Asia, Australia, Europe and North America to illustrate the four ‘knowns’, but the main focus is on the ‘unknown knowns’.