The Foundation and Development of the International Olympic Committee’s Athletes’ Commission

Athletes’ Commissions have been established at National and International Sport Federations to stress the application of good governance policies. Research on the realization of this objective has to be expanded to critically evaluate the institutional recognition of the Athletes’ Commission. The focus of this keynote delivery thus is on the IOC’s Athletes’ Commission (AC) which was founded in December 1981 at the IOC’s Executive Board meeting in Sarajevo. The inaugural commission members included: Thomas Bach (FRG), Sebastian COE (GBR), Ivar Formo (NOR), Kipchoge Keino (KEN), Svetla Otzetova (BUL), Vladislav Tretyak (USSR) and its chair, the Finnish IOC-Member Peter Tallberg.

Firstly, the process and discussions among sport officials that led to the decision to give athletes an official institutional representation within the IOC will be analyzed. The period under investigation spans from the Olympic Congress in Varna in 1973 up to the one in Baden-Baden in 1981. The research results to be presented are mainly based on an analysis of primary documents, including minutes of the Executive Board and the Tripartite Commission of the IOC, which was the main actor responsible for the organization of the named Olympic Congresses.

Secondly, it will be discussed how, why and when the IOC’S AC transformed from a president-appointed commission to a hybrid of appointed and elected members; this has certainly been an unusual process in the composition of IOC Commissions. Research on this will concentrate on the IOC’s 2000 Reform Commission and its recommendations for the development of a more modern and sustainable profile of the Olympic Movement. Relevant sources for this include minutes of IOC-Sessions and secondary literature such as the edited book from Heather Dichter and Bruce Kidd (2012) Olympic Reform Ten Years Later (Routeledge).