The next Olympics took place at Melbourne in 1956 and saw Spain and Holland withdraw in protest against the Russian invasion of Hungry. This affected the games as two majors teams had pulled their athletes out of the events.
At the Tokyo games in 1964, the invitation to South Africa was with withdrawn because of that countries policy of apartheid. This hugely affected the outcome of the games as the South Africans were unfairly treated and were not able to compete.
The invitation was yet again withheld from South Africa at the Mexico City Games in 1968 it was because many of the black African states held anti-apartheid views. Also, many of the black athletes chose to demonstrate racial problems in their own country by giving the black power salute on the winner’s podium.
The Munich games in 1972, where perhaps those that have been most influenced by politics. Rhodesia, now called Zimbabwe, had followed the IOC guidance and selected a multi-racial team but they were sent home because many of the black Africans countries had refused to accept the idea of a multi-racial team. Also in 1972 the games were further disrupted when Arab nationalists, trying to promote their political ideals, invaded the Olympic village and killed several Israeli competitors
The 1976 Games was again full of controversy and withdrawals from the games. This time it was the Arab and black African teams that withdrew their teams because they refused to compete against New Zealand. This was because New Zealand had previously played against South Africa- by then expelled from the Olympic movement – at rugby, a non-Olympic sport. This all stunts the growth of the Olympics as all of the teams are not competing against each other making it not a true outcome.
In 1980 the games were held in Moscow and were criticised by many countries because of Russia’s poor record in the matter of human rights. Just before the start of the games Russia invaded Afghanistan, which caused the USA and many western nations to boycott the games in protest.
The following games in 1984 were held in Los Angles. The Russian’s did not attend these games they said security was not sufficient. In fact they simply wanted to pay the Americans back for their refusal to go to the 1980 games in Moscow
All of these problems such Apartheid and countries boycotting the games severely stunted the growth of the games as all of the country’s never got the chance to compete against each other. It can be argued that these events spoiled the true outcome of the competitions as many of the worlds top athletes did not attend.
Although the Olympic Games are seen as the most important international sporting competition staged, many of the athletes from Britain and the Commonwealth considered the Commonwealth games as an event of almost equal importance. The Commonwealth Games have also been used to promote political power and ideals. In 1977 at a meeting of Commonwealth leaders a declaration on apartheid was drawn up. It said that the individual governments were to: ‘take every possible practical step to discourage sporting competition with South Africa. However, in Britain the authorities who control sport were independent of government control. Some sports ignored their governments’ advice and continued to arrange fixtures with South Africa.
The most recent world events that have affected the development of sport are the terrorist acts that happened on September 11th 2001. As a result of this the 2001 Ryder Cup, which was due to be played at The Belfry in England was called off, and rescheduled with the same teams and players for September 2002, again at The Belfry.
All Champions League and UEFA Cup games were postponed and the Davis Cup tie between USA and India was played 12-14 October instead of its original date. The tragedy of September 11th had a big affect on sport and the athletes competing just as all other past world events have. But I have found that these major world events usually affect the development of sport in a bad way as the reason for sport is often forgotten about behind all the politics and manipulated by Governments to promote their countries political ideals. E.g. 1936 Berlin.