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The "century of sport" and the internationalization of the Olympic Games
The victories of Paavo Nurmi, Hannes Kolehmainen and the other "flying Finns" in the Olympic organizations between 1912 and 1936 are honoured even  today by their compatriots because they say that these athletes made their country famous. At a time when Finland won its independence (1917), the victories and especially the predominance in the middle and long distances in athletics accentuated national pride in a way similar to the "patriotic" work of the great Finnish composer Johan Sibelius. It is not a coincidence that during the opening and closing ceremonies of the 1952 Olympics held in Helsinki, where the "flying Finns" were honoured in a unique way, the organizing committee had attempted to persuade Sibelious to compose a special Olympic anthem. Although Sibelius refused, one of his compositions was used for the closing ceremony: the famous for its "patriotic" avowals "Song of the Athenians".
The example of Finland is the rule rather than the exception. The two world wars, the decolonization process, the break-up of the Soviet Union and regional wars like the one in the Balkans in the 1990s led, among other things, to the creation of a number of new states. From the interwar period and throughout the 20th century, participation and, naturally, distinction in the Olympic Games have constituted a privileged field for the international declaration of the existence and progress of a new state. The parade of the athletes at the opening ceremony behind the flag of each country, the raising of the flag and the playing of the national anthem of the winner's country, but also the unofficial list of medals won by each country have been a unique field of promotion.
It is not a coincidence that since the 1908 Olympics, the first organization which adopted the parade of athletes by nation, there have been problems with political consequences, with reference to the flag under which would parade athletes from regions that did not constitute independent states yet. This was the case of Finland in 1908 and 1912. In many other instances, the recognition by the IOC preceded the official recognition of the independence of a state by the international political organizations, as was the case of East Timor, four athletes of which participated in the 2000 Olympics as a separate team, under the flag of the IOC.
Of course, the international television coverage of the Olympic Games since the 1960s and the constantly increasing worldwide interest in viewing the Games (3,7 billion viewers from about 220 countries watched the 2000 Olympics) made this promotion possible. This concerns mostly the countries whose economic or political power does not enable them to promote themselves (in a positive or negative way) in other fields. The victories of the "barefoot" marathon runner Abebe Bikila from Ethiopia in 1960 and 1964, the impressions they created and the discussions they provoked, constituted the model for all the African countries, many of which had just won their independence.
Going back in the history of the modern Olympics, from the first steps in Athens 1896 until today, we see that the Olympic Games have spread enormously and have been internationalized in the course of a century, which could be characterized, among other things, as "the century of sport". Indeed, in the course of the 20th century the organizational structures of sport have developed at national and international level (e.g. federations, games) and the characteristics of each sport (e.g. rules) have been shaped. At the same time, during this century sport ceased to be a leisure activity that concerned for the most part the social elite of Europe and North America and was gradually adopted by wider social strata and groups in all five continents. Naturally, these processes and developments did not occur in the same way and at the same time in each of the more than 200 members of the IOC. However, the gradual increase of entries over the 100 years, and more, of the modern Olympics reveals these developments that bear on the worldwide importance of sport as an activity and as a spectacle, and on the importance of the accedence of new states to the IOC, which is the second biggest international organization after the UN.
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