Olympic Games and Ecological Modernization: Sydney, Athens and Beijing

Abstract

This chapter examines developments in the ecological modernization (EM) capacity of three Olympics host nations: Australia, Greece, and China. Our primary question, ‘to what extent does Olympic Games hosting lead to the EM development of the host nation?’, is here brought into focus. In particular, six EM indicators are examined in order to identify the extent to which meeting the environmental standards of the International Olympic Committee’s (IOC) coincides with changes to the institutional and policy frameworks of the host nation. These findings partly confirm those made by earlier work on the Australian and Greek cases. The addition of the Chinese case enriches the debate with important findings about the legacy of the Olympic Games, the EM capacity of host nations, and EM theory.¹