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Preparation for an international sport event: the promotional strategies of 2009 Kaohsiung World Games.

2010; Volume: 13; Issue: 4 Linguagem: Inglês

1543-9518

Steve Shih-Chia Chen, Ronald Dick, Ashley McNabb, Yin-chu Tseng,

Sports, Gender, and Society

Introduction The International World Games Association (IWGA), which currently includes 33 international sports federations, has been holding its competitions every four years since 1981 (24). The World Games is considered one of the largest sport competitions, other than the Olympic Games (7). The City of Kaohsiung was fortunate to be awarded the opportunity to host the World Games after a competitive bidding process (11,25). The 2009 World Games were held in the largest port city of Taiwan, Kaohsiung, from July 16 to July 26, 2009. Past literature has shown that hosting a gigantic international sport competition has provided a golden opportunity for the hosting country to demonstrate power and wealth, to boost economics and tourism, to increase publicity and media exposure, and to improve the hosting cities' infrastructure (10,12-14,33). In addition, an enormous amount of national pride is often associated with the host countries when they host mega-events such as the Olympic Games or Federation Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) World Cup (1,14,29,39). For the aforementioned reasons, the administrators and citizens of Kaohsiung City sincerely hoped that the city could realize economic benefits from the 2009 World Games. The Mayor and citizens of Kaohsiung City believed the 2009 World Games was a main event that would launch Kaohsiung to the center of the world stage (21). According to Tsai's comments on the city government's approach (37), the World Games was a perfect opportunity for the Kaohsiung residents to reaffirm their identity and loyalty toward the city. The potential economic profits and benefits brought by the events could also help the central government reevaluate the importance and development of the city. With the support of Kaohsiung citizens and volunteers, the Kaohsiung Games was described as the most successful World Games by the IWGA President, Ron Froehlich (16,18). In this investigation, the researchers went beyond the scope of a case study by presenting administrative and marketing-related information on how Kaohsiung City prepared for its first-ever major international sport event. The collected information and analyzed results may serve two specific purposes. First, the collected information can be valuable for the city to plan its bidding proposal for 2012 University Games. Second, the information may also provide great insights for other Taiwanese cities in preparing for any future international major sport events (i.e., the 2009 Deaflympic Games in Taipei and bidding for the 2010 World University Games). Background History and Facts about the World Games When the IWGA was formed in 1980, it had 12 international sport federations as charter members (7). The 2009 Kaohsiung World Games was the IWGA's 8th competition and included 31 different sports. Since 1981, the number of participants in the World Games has increased from approximately 1500 to approximately 3400 in 2005 (7,24). Prior to the 2009 Kaohsiung World Games, it was estimated that the city would host more than 4,500 athletes, coaches, and staff. Athletes competed in 31 different sports which were divided into six categories, artistic and dance, ball sports, martial arts, precision sports, strength sports, and trend sports (24). In general, the seven previous World Games were all financed through a virtual company or foundation established by the government of the hosting countries (35). The hosting city was also responsible for covering the lodging, transportation, and dinner costs for all of the participants (34). Building the venues for competitions was considered the most difficult challenge in preparing for the World Games. Kaohsiung City started two major constructions as early as 2004 (9). The Main Stadium of the Kaohsiung World Games was designed by the famous Japanese architect, Toyo Ito. It has a capacity of 40,000 seats and 15,000 standing spaces (9). The total construction cost of the stadium was estimated around $150-million USDs (31). …