Olympia – IOC Chairmanship: Five cities for the five rings

Morinari Watanabe has a big promise: »As a compass, I wish that the Olympic Games will be loved again by everyone and everywhere. That’s what I want to move towards.” Watanabe said this in September last year when the Japanese announced that he wanted to become the next president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC).

The head of the World Gymnastics Federation also has a vision for the largest sporting event in the world that appears almost democratic in the spheres of the IOC: “Instead of an event where everything is decided from above, I want to strengthen the grassroots processes. I want influence from below.” What Watanabe means specifically: An IOC like a parliament, with a lower house made up of 206 National Olympic Committees and an upper house made up of 120 IOC members.

With Watanabe as the new president, decisions should become more transparent and fair. At the IOC meeting from March 18th to 21st in Athens, it will be decided who will hold the position of the most powerful sports official in the world in the future. The concepts of the seven candidates who applied are already circulating and will be finally presented on January 30th in Lausanne. The German Thomas Bach, IOC President since 2013, will not run again.

Seven candidates for Bach’s successor

Bach seems to assume that things will change after he leaves. He indicated this at the end of last year with a view to the future of the games. »We have to learn now. If we wait until the next games and things don’t go well then it will be too late,” explained the 71-year-old. “So now that we are still enjoying the success of the last Games in Paris, we have to work to develop ourselves further.” So the IOC is in the middle of an election campaign.

The candidates’ seven programs have many parallels: They promise more gender equality, more influence from athletes, digitalization and sustainability. How exactly all this is to be achieved often remains unclear. Candidate Sebastian Coe, currently head of the World Athletics Federation, wants to better prepare Olympians for their careers after competitive sports.

Faisal Bin al-Hussein, Prince of Jordan, is promoting a reorganization of the competition calendar to better address the challenges of climate change. Johan Eliasch, head of the International Ski Association, wants to rotate the Winter Games between permanent locations and secure rainforest areas in their size. David Lappartient, chairman of the International Cycling Federation, also promises that the Olympics would no longer damage the planet, but rather protect it.

Games in five locations and an IOC parliament

Kirsty Coventry, ex-swimmer from Zimbabwe, wants to focus on the use of artificial intelligence in sport. And Juan Antonio Samaranch Junior, son of the former IOC president of the same name, would allow athletes to promote themselves more. But the most original suggestions come from Morinari Watanabe – because it’s not just his idea of ​​an Olympic Parliament that is now being discussed worldwide.

»The Olympic Games in five cities on five different continents at the same time? This is the brilliant idea of ​​the Japanese Morinari Watanabe!” was the motto last week in a panel discussion on the Brazilian broadcaster Jovem Pan. »His program is probably the most radical of the seven candidacies. Because the sports would be divided into different locations and thus the center of the games as a whole.

If the Olympics were held simultaneously on five continents, many things would be different than before: certain sports could take place in places with the right climate. By using different time zones, sports could be broadcast live around the clock. Audience ratings are likely to increase significantly as a result. This could address several points of criticism about the way the Olympics have been organized so far.

The Olympics could become more affordable

At least that’s how Jules Boykoff, a politics professor at the US Pacific University and a well-known Olympic critic, sees it: “Despite the major problems surrounding the Olympics – from high public spending to militarization to greenwashing – the games have so far been popular with the public.” But This is less the case in the host cities. “In fact, most cities that hosted the Olympics would not want to host the Olympics again.”

With Watanabe’s concept this could change. Not just because with an IOC parliament the decisions would have to become more transparent. With several host cities at the same time, the costs per venue would also fall – and hosting the Olympics would become affordable for more countries. Another point of criticism from Boykoff would hardly be affected: “The Olympic Games have long balanced between cosmopolitanism and chauvinism.”

The way the world’s largest sporting event has been organized so far promotes nationalism. “If the games were about internationalism instead of hypernationalism, for example, all the shot putters or all the soccer players could come together at the opening ceremony,” says Boykoff. “Instead, the athletes run according to country, which promotes political nationalism.”

Watanabe is just an outsider

This is not only due to national comparisons such as the medal table, but also to the often nationalistic advertising campaigns of the host cities. And these could even increase if five cities suddenly compete for global attention at the same time. Morinari Watanabe has so far emphasized that he does not see his ideas set in stone. He also wants to get in touch with National Olympic Committees in order to achieve a reorganization of the Games through dialogue.

However, the 65-year-old – who was never a top athlete, but is a sports manager for the multinational Aeon – is considered an outsider in the election for the IOC presidency with his revolutionary ideas. Favorites are the Briton Coe, the Zimbabwean Coventry and the Frenchman Lappartient. Since Watanabe’s ideas are already being discussed, he could already have had an influence on the Olympics of the future.