What Is a Mega Event?

This essay will delve into what Mega Events are described to be and how they are identified by academics. This essay shall portray the difference in different types of Mega Events, what all Mega Events have in common using real life examples and primarily the key elements. Bladen et al (2012) states that there are many different examples of what an Event is depending on the viewpoint, it describes the general characteristics of an Event to be temporary, gatherings of people, often ritual displays and are usually unique; however Mega Events are described as being events that are on a global scale; leaving behind long terms effects on the place in which it took place and also for the people that attended. Mega Events are usually every few years, for example the winter and summer Olympic games are every four years. Mega Events can be recognised for not only the economic impacts but also the social impacts as well as the audience scale the Event gains during it. The audience of a Mega Event is not only the number of attendees but also the number of people that watched the Event via other means of media, for example when the 2012 Olympics in London were running, not only could people watch it on television but also the internet, even some radio stations had commentary on was happening during the 2012 games.

In 2006 the FIFA World Cup held in Germany was live on television, although 3.4 million people watched the game in the stadium; the cumulative television audience was 26.3 billion. (FIFA 2007). Bowdin et al (2001) explained that Mega Events will affect whole economies and in result they are circulated widely in the global media. ‘Mega-events’ are large-scale cultural (including commercial and sporting) events which have a dramatic character, mass popular appeal and international significance’ Roche, M. (2000). Mega- events and Modernity: Olympics, Expos and the Growth of Global Culture. Abington. Routledge. Horne and Manzenreiter (2006) extended this quote by stating that Mega Events should attract media representatives and viewers from numerous nations across the world. Getz (2007) also emphasises Bowdin’s statement by adding that Mega Events also involve tourism, media coverage and also economic impacts. “Mega-events, by way of their size or significance, are those that yield extraordinarily high levels of tourism, media coverage, prestige, or economic impact for the host community or destination” (Getz 1997, p.6). Getz (1997) described Mega Events to have a measureable length and not to be permanently settled in place.

Mega Events have many key characteristics such as size, global audience and the bidding process in common. Bladen et al (2012) states Mega Events can be divided into three main divisions; cultural, political and sporting Mega Events. The publicity and expansion of both regional and national culture is the main importance of cultural Mega Events, cultural events are based on history and tradition and usually run over a number of days. Political Mega Events are held to discuss strategies on global trade, the environment and security. Sporting Mega Events are Events based on sport, they are the most studied type of event and they continue to grow significantly. Cultural Mega Events open a city to the world which usually runs over a number of days. World’s Fair or World Expo’s are the most recognised cultural Mega Event. The World Expo’s are considered to be the third largest event in the world in terms of economic and cultural impact, after the World Cup and the Olympic Games. Expos were traditionally developed to showcase new inventions and to facilitate cultural exchange between nations, they are also used to promote participating countries.

For example, Expo ’92 in Seville was used by Spain to promote itself as a modern and democratic country. Cultural Mega Events focus on the development and promotion of different countries. Since the 1970s Political Mega Events have increased in size with the positive development of globalisation. NGOs from the developed and developing world meet to debate policies on global trade, security and the environment. An example of a Political Mega Event is the United Nations Climate Change Conference Copenhagen 2009. 15,000 delegates and 5000 journalists’ attended this event which lasted for 11 days in an attempt to reach a new global agreement on the reaction to climate change. At the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen around 100,000 protesters provoked a large and costly police response. However, £80 million was raised for the local economy; the event also brought together decision-makers and political leaders with global levels of influence.

At a distance millions of other people also participated through protest (Bladen et al, 2012). Sporting Mega Events can be described by Roberts (2000) as he states that the word ‘Mega’ means events must have the ability to send promotional messages to billions of people via television and other sources of the media. 3.9 billion people was the estimated number that watched parts the 2004 Athens Olympic Games, and the cumulative TV audience estimate was 40 billion. 35,000 hours in total was devoted to its media coverage alone. The summer and winter Olympic Games that have taken place since 1992, the winter Olympic Games is roughly one‐quarter the size of the summer Games in terms of athletes and events and so some might argue that it is not a true ‘mega’ event (Matheson & Baade, 2003). The summer Olympics are every four years to date and happen to occur in the same year as the European Football Championships. The winter Olympics occur at the same time as the FIFA Football World Cup finals and the Commonwealth Games.

Within twenty years seven new sports and seventy-nine events were added to the summer Olympics. Twenty‐eight sports have featured in the Summer Olympics since 2000, although this number has been taken down to twenty-six sports due to baseball and softball being removed after the 2008 Olympics. From 1998 the FIFA World Cup Finals have expanded from 24 to 32 football teams. Sporting Mega Events are still growing considerably even if sports are being cut from schedules; they still create a huge viewing audience. An example of Sporting Mega Events growing in the industry is the summer Olympics in Los Angeles, 1984, 140 countries took part, 6797 athletes competed, and 221 events took place in 23 sports by 2004 in Athens 201 countries were involved and 11,099 athletes took part in 301 events in the 28 Olympic sports (Malfas et al, 2004) One reason that explains the increase in sporting Mega Events is with modern technology more people can watch events like the Olympics for example on television now, this creates a huge global audience and as more people are watching it, it becomes more popular.

Key academics suggest that the most important elements for a Mega Event are: The planning process, bidding process, media, public consumption, political involvement, volunteers and security, for this essay the focus will be on how the media portray Events and how the public sees this. Roche (2009) states that the Olympics are a media event before they are a national event. Horne and Manzenreiter (2006) claim that Mega events have taken off in the industry mainly due to the media and Mega Events are global events. Roche (2000) explains that the World Expos aim has always been to showcase global culture and with the rise of new media it has created competition for their targeted audience. He then stated that Mega Events such as the Olympic Games without any question do qualify as examples of ‘media-events’ and that they have also taken off in the industry due to media sources. The Olympic Games created a very large media presence. Individual journalists and media companies were given permission to report whilst the Games were live and also they were given access to areas that were constructed for them to plug directly into the global media networks. Blogs and other forms of social media for example twitter were also used to promote the Olympics. Television and other forms of media were used to portray the event worldwide. Billings (2010) examined the difference between media for masculine and feminine sporting activities and stated that the language used by telecasters for male athletes is higher than for female athletes.

The author argued that only sex appropriate sports are shown on television for prime time broadcasting, for example, swimming, track and field events. He stated that female athletes are mainly criticised and judged about their heterosexual appeal, while male athletes are judged on their skills and courage, both male and female contestants should be judged and spoken about via the media on the same topic, that topic being their skills and courage, not how they look. Whilst the media usually portray great things about the Olympics to gain a wider audience, the media can also create a negative outlook on the event not only about how contestants may not have done as well as predicted but also about the way they look. The media is aimed at the public to make them want to read more about the Olympics for example and to make the public want to get involved and watch it. Ovide and Stewart (2012) found out that during the opening ceremony of the 2012 Olympics, twitter was one of the top media networking systems used. 9.66 million tweets were sent by people worldwide, and during the Games Usain Bolt won both the 200m and 100m spirit creating over 80,000 tweets per minute.

The public feel as though they can connect with the contestants when they tweet as many of the contestants have twitter too. As Ovide and Stewart (2012) state that twitter has definitely enhanced the relationship between the public and competitors, allowing athletes to become much more like celebrities, it also helps to build relationships either from the broadcaster to viewer or from the athlete to supporter/viewer. However as great as this may sound many people feel as though they have the right to write hurtful messages to the athletes, and athletes also think they can write offensive messages and get away with it, two athletes, Greece’s Paraskevi Papachristou and Switzerland’s Michel Morganella, were booted out of the Olympics for offensive comments on Twitter. The media is seen by the public as a way of promotion however a few athletes were forced to remove comments on social networking sites about the brand of their footwear, as these brands were not sponsors of the Games in 2012. Mega Events do more than simply advertise and host an event; they build a legacy stated by Kearney (2005). Chappellet (2000) said that objective should not be to stage a huge Event because gigantism can be viewed as a threat, but to stage an Event that is more unique and special leaves a lasting mark in the history of Events. There are many impacts created from an Event, they can be both positive and negative, Preuss (2007) supports this.

Positive experiences can leave positive impacts, they can make a person feel satisfaction towards the Event, positive impacts may leave a person feeling happiness, their attitude may change towards other Events similar in the industry or even other events in general. A positive impact can be made from event perceptions being met or even beaten. Along with the positive experiences and impacts there are also negative experiences and they can create impacts such as a loss in hope, lack of satisfaction towards Events this may be due to a failure to meet expectations or the expectations could have been set to high, as described by Bladen et al (2012). This essay has shown that although Mega Events have many similar characteristics they are also different in many ways. Mega Events cover a wide range of Events such as Sporting Events and also Cultural Events, however each type of Event also has many different key elements and impacts involved as no two events can be exactly the same. This essay has mainly looked at how media can promote an event and make it much bigger than if media was not used. Media can help an event become global and is necessary for most Mega Events.

References

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