SPORTUL CA INSTRUMENT AL PROPAGANDEI. STUDIU DE CAZ: REFLECTAREA PARTICIPĂRII ROMÂNIEI LA JOCURILE OLIMPICE DE VARĂ DE LA LOS ANGELES (1984) ÎN PRESA ROMÂNEASCĂ
SPORT AS INSTRUMENT OF PROPAGANDA. CASE STUDY: COVERAGE OF THE ROMANIAN PARTICIPATION AT THE LOS ANGELES SUMMER OLYMPICS (1984) IN THE ROMANIAN COMMUNIST PRESS

Summary/Abstract: The aim of this article is to show the way that the Romanian participation at the 1984 Summer Olympics was presented in the Communist media from Romania. The main sources consist of articles from Scânteia and Sportul, published during the Summer Olympics. Apart from that, information from memoires of Horia Alexandrescu and Ioan Drăgan was used because they were present in Los Angeles, with the Romanian delegation. The last part of this paper will analyze the way that the Romanian newspapers used the decoration of Nicolae Ceaușescu with the highest Olympic distinction for propaganda purposes.As long as sport was important and relevant for the Communist regime, it became an instrument of propaganda. Sport was used to gain international prestige, and this is very well shown by the event of 1984; and in order to create internally the idea that the Communist Party is responsible for the sportive success as well.In the context that every sport victory was possible due to the regime of Nicolae Ceaușescu, from the propaganda point of view, a depersonalization of sport merit happened.The relationship between the Communist regime and sport should get a very close attention from scholars because sport is a mass phenomenon, in which large parts of population take part. This fact makes sport a very useful tool for propaganda, the Party using it in a way in which it served the interest of the regime. This article will try to show these aspects, but it is absolutely necessary that scholars expand the scope of this analysis to the entire Communist period.

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