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Aligning Indonesia’s Olympic bid and its 2045 vision
Host countries have used the Olympics not only as platform to prove their advance feats in sports, but also to display accomplishments in economic development.
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Fireworks are seen from outside the stadium during the opening ceremony of the Tokyo 2020 Olympics on July 23, 2021. (Reuters/Naoki Ogura)
O
n the sidelines of the Group of 20 Summit in Bali, President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo announced Indonesia’s formal bid to host the 2036 Summer Olympics in Nusantara, the unbuilt Indonesian new capital.
Hosting the Olympics is a giant and costly project without guaranteeing financial profits. Still, the Olympics could be used as a platform to display the host country’s feats in sports and achievements in development.
If selected, Indonesia would be the fourth Olympic host country in Asia after Japan (1964 and 2020), South Korea (1988) and China (2008). These countries used the Olympics not only as a platform to prove their advanced feats in sports, but also to display accomplishments in economic development.
At the 1964 Tokyo Olympics, Japan proved its revival from post-World War II devastation and displayed the success of a rapid recovery and economic miracle as a leading industrial economy. Then the 2020 Tokyo Olympics originally was a mission to show that “Japan is back!” with restoration from the catastrophic earthquake and tsunami plus the Fukushima nuclear reactor accident in 2011. The COVID-19 pandemic postponed the event to 2021 and focused on the value of holding the Olympics despite the virus and the urgency of having it for the athletes.
The 1988 Seoul Olympics became a stage for displaying South Korea's image transformation from a poor country under war threat to economic miracle. The Olympics was held when South Korea surpassed the upper-middle income country threshold and entered democratic system after the presidential election in December 1987.
Thanks to the five-year economic and social development plans, South Korea reached high-income country status in 1995 and now it is one of global economic, political and cultural powers.
The 2008 Beijing Olympics testified to the outcomes of China's reforms. Since 1978, China has implemented five-year development plans with an open-door policy for foreign capital and technology to improve the people’s welfare that had deteriorated during the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976). Hosting the US$40 billion Olympics in 2008, when the financial crisis smacked down “capitalist market economies,” was an affirmation that the reforms were on the right track to develop China as a "socialist market economy."
