Foreign direct investment and Olympic Games: A systematic literature review

Abstract Motivated by the urban transformations observed in cities that hosted the Olympic Games in the recent years, this article aims to map and analyze the scientific publications that linked mega sporting events to foreign direct investment in different times and realities in order to understand the positive and negative impact that such a conjuncture causes on the business environment with different challenges and opportunities for the companies located in these regions. We believe that although the Olympic Games were chosen to represent this study, its results and propositions can be applied to other mega event contexts occurring in either developed or emerging locations. To this purpose, a systematic review of the literature was made based on the combined search of the terms "Foreign Direct Investment" and "Olympic Games," which gathered a final sample of 170 publications from 17 of the most relevant databases in the world. It was verified that although few studies have dealt with this issue as a central theme of discussion, they have been gaining relevance mainly since the Beijing Olympics in 2008. Thus, after mapping what has been discussed in the area, the main themes explored, theoretical perspectives, research gaps have been identified in order to contribute to a better understanding of the phenomenon. At the end, a theoretical framework is presented with the objective to guide future studies in the area.