Compilation of the most important documents and speeches by Pierre de Coubertin on Olympism and the Olympic Games.

A fundamental component of the Olympic ideal is the concept of Olympic education. This is the notion that sport can help children and young people develop essential life skills. Olympic Education: An international review is the first book to offer a comprehensive survey of the diffusion and implementation of Olympic education programmes around the world. The book includes 28 chapters with 21 national case studies of countries on every major continent, including Australia, Brasil, Canada, China, France, Germany, Japan, Russia, Spain, the UK, the US and Zambia. Each chapter examines the cultural, pedagogical, political and societal challenges of teaching Olympic education, as well as the national, individual and institutional programmes that have emerged. It explores key practical and conceptual issues, such as the incorporation of Olympic values in PE curricula, sport coaching and coach education programmes, while also taking into account the collaborative efforts of the governmental bodies, sport federations and Olympic institutions responsible for policy and implementation. This is important reading for all students, researchers and professionals with an interest in the Olympics, sport education, sports coaching, sport policy or physical education.

The first summer Youth Olympic Games (YOG) were held in Singapore in 2010 and the first winter Youth Olympic Games in Innsbruck in 2012. The IOC hopes that the YOG will encourage young people to be more active and that they will bring the Olympic movement closer to its original founding values. This is the first book to be published on the Youth Olympic Games. It critically examines the origins of the Games and the motives of the Games organisers, as well as the organisation and management of the Games and their wider impact and significance. The first part of the book discusses the relationship between the YOG and the ideology of Olympism, in the context of broader developments in youth sport competitions. The second part investigates a wide range of managerial aspects including the bidding process, finance, the prominent role of young people on the organising committees and as volunteers, the role of media and sponsors, and the distinctive competition structure. The final part of the book assesses the current and likely future impact of the YOG on the host cities and countries, the IOC and on national youth sport policies. The Youth Olympic Games is essential reading for any researcher, advanced student or policy maker with an interest in Olympic Studies, sports development, sport policy, youth sport or event management.

In 1973, Wilson Carey McWilliams (1933Ð2005) published The Idea of Fraternity in America, a groundbreaking book that argued for an alternative to AmericaÕs dominant philosophy of liberalism. This alternative tradition emphasized that community and fraternal bonds were as vital to the process of maintaining political liberty as was individual liberty. McWilliams expanded on this idea throughout his prolific career as a teacher, writer, and activist, promoting a unique definition of American democracy. In The Democratic Soul: A Wilson Carey McWilliams Reader, editors Patrick J. Deneen and Susan J. McWilliams, daughter of the famed intellectual, have assembled key essays, articles, reviews, and lectures that trace McWilliamsÕs evolution as a scholar and explain his often controversial views on education, religion, and literature. The book also showcases his thoughts and opinions on prominent twentieth-century figures such as George Orwell and Leo Strauss. The first comprehensive volume of Wilson Carey McWilliamsÕ collected writings, The Democratic Soul will be welcomed by scholars of political science and American political thought as a long-overdue contribution to the field.

"Olympic Education" is not only a text book for students and teachers in physical and sport education but also for course instructors and coaches in children's youth sport programmes, as well as for executives in sports federations. It answers the question, what the term "Olympic" really means in the broader context of the Olympic Games movement and as a global purpose and new challenge for a balanced physical, social and moral education. Olympic education has a traditional vision and an important future mission that is relevant for all children and youths, in schools as well as in sport clubs. In five parts and fifteen chapters, the book shows why the Olympic ideals are a modern challenge not only for a new physical and sport education but also for the development of essential life skills for today. It introduces pedagogical and didactical fundamentals for an Olympic education, in order to bring motor abilities, social behaviour and moral actions in sports and everyday life back together again - in the mind, learning and actions of children and youths, but also of grown-ups in the social settings where young people live.

The Olympic Games are a sporting event guided by philosophy. The modern Olympic Charter calls this philosophy "Olympism" and boldly states its goal as nothing less than "the harmonious development of humankind" and the promotion of "a peaceful society concerned with the preservation of human dignity." The ideas and ideals behind Olympism, however, are ancient-tracing their roots to archaic and classical Greece, just like the Games do. This collection of essays explores the ancient Hellenic roots of Olympic philosophy and explains their application to modern sport. It examines the philosophical heritage of the Games, the ethics implied by Olympic values of sport, the educational goals of sport, the relations between justice and fair play, the political ideals of peace and world community, and modern challenge of multiculturalism as expressed in the philosophical contrasts between East and West. Anyone who truly loves sports, knows that the Olympic Games are special. Olympic philosophy is what makes them special; the essays in this book attempt to explain why.e

This book examines the relationship between athletics and philosophy in ancient Greece and Rome focused on the connection between athleticism and virtue. It begins by observing that the link between athleticism and virtue is older than sport, reaching back to the athletic feats of kings and pharaohs in early Egypt and Mesopotamia. It then traces the role of athletics and the Olympic Games in transforming the idea of aristocracy as something acquired by birth to something that can be trained. This idea of training virtue through the techniques and practice of athletics is examined in relation to Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle. Then Roman spectacles such as chariot racing and gladiator games are studied in light of the philosophy of Lucretius, Seneca, and Marcus Aurelius. The concluding chapter connects the book’s ancient observations with contemporary issues such as the use of athletes as role models, the relationship between money and corruption, the relative worth of participation and spectatorship, and the role of females in sport. The author argues that there is a strong link between sport and philosophy in the ancient world, calling them offspring of common parents: concern about virtue and the spirit of free enquiry. This book was previously published as a special issue of the Ethics and Sport.