Doctoral Dissertation Research: Sporting Megaevents and Urban-Based Development Governance

这个博士论文研究项目将研究城市举办奥运会和足球世界杯等体育“大型赛事”的尝试。在过去的20年里，随着大型赛事的规模越来越大，越来越多的城市开始申办，申办已成为全球城市政策制定的一个重要组成部分。申办大型活动需要大量公共资金的承诺（2011年和2012年总计超过5700亿美元），并需要全面调整政策，以适应活动规划和建立公私治理伙伴关系。大型事件竞标现在涉及到利益相关者承诺实现的一系列“发展”目标。历史上，大型活动策划者将目标局限于城市规模的发展项目，但最近他们声称，大型活动可以带来跨国发展成果，如国家减贫、帮助穷人的旅游业发展、减缓气候变化或国家可持续发展规划。这个博士论文研究项目将研究为什么更雄心勃勃的竞标已经成为可能和必要的，以赢得主办一个大型活动的合同。博士研究生将寻求以下问题的答案：(1)为什么大型赛事的投标实践变得更加雄心勃勃？(2)决策者、非政府组织和企业如何在不同城市之间转移和应用招标实践？(3)这些不断演变的招标实践对参与发展规划的利益相关者构成的影响是什么？为了回答这些问题，他将使用档案材料和专家访谈来比较奥运会和足球世界杯的申办，这是最大的大型活动。他将分析1991年至2013年期间寻求主办2000年至2020年期间举办的赛事的100个此类竞标。学生将追踪城市投标中的国际和历史联系，包括投标利益相关者所追求的发展和规划政策目标类型的变化；城市间的资金、合同和知识共享；以及新型竞标建立新型城市-国家-跨国伙伴关系的方式。尽管有大量关于大型事件的学术研究，但关于大型事件影响的公众讨论往往受到专家及其各自支持者相互矛盾的研究结果的阻碍。潜在的大型赛事主办社区需要关于城市在竞标中承诺规划结果时所遇到的机遇和挑战的一致的、可比较的信息。该项目将提供关于参与大型活动竞标的利益相关者、他们的政策如何在城市之间转移，以及他们在通过大型活动规划实现有希望的“发展”中的作用的比较、跨国信息和见解。这些信息将告知潜在大型活动主办城市和国际活动规划组织的公民、政策制定者和学者。这项研究将通过与美国和瑞士的特大事件研究中心合作，加强研究和教育的基础设施。作为博士论文研究进步奖，该项目将提供支持，使有前途的学生建立一个独立的研究生涯。

This doctoral dissertation research project will examine the attempts of cities to host sporting "megaevents" like the Olympics and football World Cups. In the past 20 years, as megaevents have become larger and more cities have begun to bid to host them, bidding has emerged as a significant component of global urban policymaking. Bidding to host megaevents entails large commitments of public funds (more than $570 billion total in 2011 and 2012) and sweeping policy changes to accommodate event planning and build public-private governance partnerships. Megaevent bidding now involves a host of "development" objectives that stakeholders promise to deliver. Megaevents planners historically limited their objectives to urban-scale development projects, but more recently they have claimed that megaevents can deliver transnational development outcomes like national poverty reduction, tourism development that will aid the poor, climate change mitigation, or national sustainability planning. This doctoral dissertation research project will examine why more ambitious bidding has become both possible and necessary to win a contract to host a megaevent. The doctoral student will pursue answers to the following questions: (1) Why have megaevent bidding practices become more ambitious? (2) How do policymakers, non-governmental organizations, and firms transfer and apply bidding practices between different cities? (3) What is the effect of these evolving bidding practices on the composition of stakeholders involved in development planning? To answer these questions, he will use archival materials and expert interviews to compare bids to host Olympics and football World Cups, which are the largest megaevents. He will analyze 100 such bids dating from 1991 to 2013 that sought to host events held between 2000 and 2020. The student will trace the international and historical connections in the cities' bids, including changes in the types of development and planning policy objectives pursued by bid stakeholders; funding, contracting, and knowledge sharing between cities; and the ways in which new types of bids build new types of urban-national-transnational partnerships. Despite the large body of scholarship on megaevents, public conversations about their impacts often have been stymied by the contradictory research findings of dueling experts and their respective backers. Potential megaevent host communities need consistent, comparative information about the opportunities and challenges that cities encounter when promising planning outcomes in a bid. This project will generate comparative, transnational information and insights about the stakeholders who participate in megaevent bidding, how their policies are transferred between cities, and their role in promising "development" through megaevent planning. This information will inform citizens, policymakers, and scholars in potential megaevent hosting cities and in international event planning organizations. The study will enhance infrastructure for research and education by collaborating with megaevents research centers in the United States and Switzerland. As a Doctoral Dissertation Research Improvement award, this project will provide support to enable a promising student to establish an independent research career.