The 1928 Olympic Winter Games in St Moritz: Tourism, Diplomacy and Domestic Politics

Abstract

The 1928 Olympic Winter Games in St Moritz was the first international sports competition in Switzerland to bring together the country’s Olympic and sport circles, its hotel industry and local authorities. Doing so crystallized public and semi-public actions around an event capable of making or breaking Switzerland’s reputation as a tourist destination. In addition, the Swiss government, which did not directly initiate the project, ensured the event would serve the aims of its foreign policy by placing a foreign ministry representative on the organising committee. The involvement of these stakeholders meant that the games mainly affected three interconnected areas: tourism–hosting the Games was a way of fending off competition from other winter sports destinations; diplomacy–the event allowed the Foreign Ministry to bolster Switzerland’s image abroad; and domestic politics–obtaining and staging the Olympics led to the development of a strong sports lobby during the 1920s.