A Most Contentious Contest: Politics and Protests at the 1936 Berlin Olympics

Abstract

Despite claims from Olympic organizers and advocates that the enterprise they cherish is invariably “above politics,” the modern Olympic movement has from the outset been rife with nationalistic rivalries, ethnic and religious antagonisms, ideological posturing, and racial prejudice. In other words, for all the talk about “international brotherhood” and “peaceful competition among the youth of the world,” the Olympic festivals have always mirrored the contentious political and social realities transpiring in the world outside the athletic arena. Yet no single modern Olympiad has betrayed this state of affairs more prominently than Berlin 1936, those infamous “Nazi Games,” which took place against a turbulent backdrop of epic ideological conflict, deep economic depression, and agonizing worries about a possible new military conflagration on the horizon. If we contend, variously, that the International Olympic Committee (IOC) reached bottom, say, when opting for Moscow in 1980, or deciding for Beijing in 2008, or in handing the 2014 Winter Games to Sochi, Russia, it would behoove us to recall what transpired in the Nazi capital and around the world in the summer of 1936. One of the less researched aspects of the 1936 Games is the number of protests and boycott campaigns that they provoked.