There is not a single person that has not heard about the Olympics, especially as it is one of the biggest sporting events in the world. In the last olympics – which took place in Paris – athletes from nearly 200 National Olympic Committees competed. An even bigger sporting event is the World Cup. The common denominator of international sporting events is that every nation supports and cheers for their national heroes, thus uniting the nation in a common cause. Does this effect, however, spread to other nations as well, or do sporting events cause more harm than good on a global scale? Let’s discuss the significant impact they might have on promoting peace and stability worldwide.
Olympics sports throughout the ages have pulled different parts of a nation and subsequently the world closer even in states of turmoil. A good illustration of this is the Ancient Greek Olympics which started in 776 BC, held every four years. Every ancient Greek city, called polis, sent their best athletes to compete in the games. There is no doubt that all Greeks celebrated the winners together regardless of their culture, uniting them in joy and war where these champions were in the first row, proudly standing. Considering the diverse nature of Ancient Greece, one could consider it as a condensed version of the modern world. Even though nearly 2000 years have passed, we still inherited these traditions.
Additionally, even after such events, the world still celebrates the winners and their nations, despite their competitive nature. We could, for instance, consider World Cup matches as ‘wars’ where one nation defeats another. Nonetheless, all of these champions and their nations are respected worldwide. Therefore, it is not solely about viewing these sporting events from a competitive view.
We can conclude that international sporting events help to keep peace worldwide. Since the world experiences regular instability in various forms, political or otherwise, we are in dire need of tools and methods that foster a diverse and united humanity.