Event legacy framework and measurement

ABSTRACT

This article presents the development of a new approach for measuring mega sport event legacy and is based on the Olympic Games as a reference. The legacy of mega sport events has gained ever more importance during recent years for both academics and practitioners. While the sport organisations gain large revenues, cities lose. Such costs, mixed with political discussions over host government spending of public money, seem to evermore prove that there is the potential for corruption, and increased scrutiny by a variety of stakeholders has led to concerns over the benefits of the Olympic Games for the host region. Thus, the politicians call for referendums and over the past 6 years all of the referendums had negative results. Therefore, the research aims for this article are to identify the long-term costs and benefits of staging the Olympic Games and at least suggest some possible methodology for the measurement of those costs and benefits. The focus of the article is set investigating the shortcomings regarding legacy literature. A previously built theoretical framework will be expanded to provide a better manageable legacy framework.

KEYWORDS:

• Legacy
• Olympic Games
• measurement
• framework
• mega sport event

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Holger Preuss

Holger Preuss works for the Department of Sport economy and sociology, Johannes Gutenberg University, Institute for Sport Science, Mainz, Germany.