SELLING LONDON'S OLYMPIC BID | AN ANALYSIS OF OFFICIAL AND JOURNALISTIC DISCOURSES

Olympic bidding has become ‘as competitive as the event itself’ (Whitelegg, 2000: 801). This book begins by exploring the motivations behind Olympic bids and how these have changed over time. An examination of the process, practices, and politics involved in Olympic bidding reveals that it is important for bid committees to attempt to influence the media to gain public support. This book thus explores how the London Olympic Bid Committee attempted to influence the Sun to communicate their key messages to the UK public and determines whether and more importantly how the newspaper carried these statements in order to discover how tensions between the discourses and practices of Olympic bid committees and those of journalists affect the ideas communicated to the reader. The analysis should be of interest to both students and academics in the fields of sport, events, media, and public relations, and may be useful to professionals responsible for securing public support for mega-event bids.