Study guide: International Power and the Olympic Games

📋 Course Outline

1. Four Lenses on the Olympic Games
2. Defining Political Power
3. Hard, Soft, and Smart Power
4. Territory and Population
5. State Stability and Cohesion
6. Diplomatic and Military Capabilities
7. Economic and Cultural Influence

📖 1. Four Lenses on the Olympic Games

★ Must-know

• Historians use:

  • archaeological sites
  • written sources
  • photographs
  • films
  • websites

• Geographers use maps, scales, and different map types and projections to study the global reach of the Olympic Games, including participating countries and host cities, and to explain inequalities.

• The Olympic Games serve as a showcase through which states display their power, while ideological and diplomatic tensions can appear through boycotts and the removal of the Olympic flame during protest.

📌 The Olympic Games are presented as inherently apolitical and as a means of easing relations, yet they become political through participation and host-location decisions and through athletes’ protests about situations in their countries.

Further detail

• Historical study considers both the long term and individual events.

📖 2. Defining Political Power

🔑 Key Concepts & Definitions

• Power: Raymond Aron - The capacity of a political unit to impose its will on other political units.
• Power: Serge, a professor of public law, defines power as the capacity to act, make others act, prevent action, and refuse to act, drawing on Raymond Aron’s pioneering work on international relations.

📝 Essential Points

• Serge’s four dimensions of power are:
  • power: acting
  • influence: making others act
  • use of force: preventing others from acting
  • independence: refusing to act

📖 3. Hard, Soft, and Smart Power

🔑 Key Concepts & Definitions

• Hard power: A form of power based on economic and military strength.
• Soft power: Joseph Nye theorized soft power in the early 1990s to explain that influence can be as effective as coercion; it is cultural and diplomatic power.
• Smart power: Since Barack Obama’s presidency, smart power has been presented as combining soft power and hard power.

📝 Essential Points

• An ideology is a generally political idea that a state or other actor seeks to spread.

💡 Memory Hook

Hard power relies on economic and military strength; soft power influences through culture and diplomacy; smart power combines both.

📖 4. Territory and Population

★ Must-know

• Territory can provide:

  • hydrocarbons (gas and oil)
  • minerals
  • arable land

• The source identifies India as the world’s most populous state, with more than 1.464 billion people, followed by China with 1.416 billion.

Further detail

• The five largest states by area, in order, are:

  • Russia (1st)
  • Canada (2nd)
  • China (3rd)
  • the United States (4th)
  • Brazil (5th)

• A large territory alone does not make a country powerful; Singapore is given as an example.

📖 5. State Stability and Cohesion

★ Must-know

• A stable political system is an essential element of state power.

Further detail

• The course mentions the democracy index as an example in its discussion of political stability.

📖 6. Diplomatic and Military Capabilities

🔑 Key Concepts & Definitions

• Diplomacy: Enables negotiations and the capacity to influence international decisions through participation in major summits and international institutions.

★ Must-know

• Military power is indicated by:

  • troop numbers
  • military spending
  • nuclear arsenals
  • military bases
  • overseas bases
  • military fleets such as aircraft carriers

• The five permanent members of the UN named in the course are:

  • France
  • the United Kingdom
  • China
  • Russia
  • the United States

Further detail

• The course identifies the United States as the leading military power.

• The course ranks nuclear arsenals in this order:

  • Russia (1st)
  • the United States (2nd)
  • China (3rd)
  • France (4th)

• The course cites:

  • COP summits
  • the G7
  • the UN
  • the WTO
  • the ICC

📖 7. Economic and Cultural Influence

🔑 Key Concepts & Definitions

• Soft power: Soft power is the capacity to influence the world through language, the diffusion of cultural goods such as Hollywood films, and gastronomy.

★ Must-know

• Indicators of economic power include:
  • produced wealth or GDP
  • the growth rate
  • stock exchanges
  • financial centers
  • spending on research and development

Further detail

• Wall Street in New York is cited as an example of a stock exchange or financial center.

• The number of transnational corporations (TNCs) is another indicator of economic power.

• The course presents the diffusion of an American way of life as one effect of the worldwide circulation of cultural goods.

💡 Memory Hook

Economic power is measured through production and investment; soft power spreads influence through language and culture.