ABSTRACT

The focus of our work (Gratton, Shibli and Coleman, 2005) was the economic regeneration potential for cities from major sports events. The use of sport for urban regeneration first emerged as a policy in the USA in the early 1980s, most notably in Indianapolis. In the late 1980s and early 1990s a few British cities, in particular Sheffield, Birmingham and Glasgow, adopted a similar strategy. In this chapter, we will look at the theoretical rationale behind such strategies and how this has changed in recent years.