Marginal Revolution: Why does India win so few Olympic medals?

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Why does India win so few Olympic medals?

A loyal MR reader writes to me:

Here’s an interesting fact: despite a population of more than 1 billion, India has won a grand total of 18 Olympic medals (mostly in field hockey):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/India_at_the_Olympics

there are many obvious hypotheses, all of which may be partially right, yet one would think these apply to zillions of other countries that nevertheless have non-trivial Olympic presences.

So what is it?

My guess would be lack of government subsidies, combined with the possibility that non-democratic, authoritarian governments feel greater need to prove themselves on the international stage and to their people at home. The subsidies matter for the infrastructure as much as for the athletes. Throw in low social mobility, nutrition problems, and the relative lack of TV to inspire the young 'uns and you've got my answer. Bad roads don't help any either. Does this query have any other takers?

Here are some different yahoo attempts at an answer. Here is a Guardian article. Anirudh Krishna and Eric Haglund have a whole paper on the topic of social mobility.

Posted by Tyler Cowen on August 16, 2008 at 06:43 AM in Sports | Permalink

Comments

Because cricket is no longer an Olympic sport, and that's where the prestige and conseqently where the big money is in Indian sport.

Posted by: Alexei McDonald at Aug 16, 2008 7:49:55 AM

cricket...damn...comments failed!

Posted by: cato at Aug 16, 2008 7:50:27 AM

This is entirely the wrong question to ask.

the right questions are

1) Why is cricket not an Olympic sport - and has not been one since 1900? It is patently more popular, more widespread (and more pleasing to watch) than almost any current Olympic event?

2) Why do all other countries obsess about sport, even to the point of subsidising it, when it is an immense waste of human effort and attention? Maybe Indians are simply too intelligent to care - or prefer to spend their time on better things, such as perfecting the world's greatest cuisine.

3) Horrifically from 2012 baseball will not be an Olympic sport either - so the bunch of crooks who run the Olympics will have banished the world's two great bat & ball sports. Genius!

Posted by: Rory Sutherland at Aug 16, 2008 8:00:46 AM

Cricket games last days and days. How can they possibly fit all the games in within the schedule? They'd have to start the prelimiaries months in advance so that by the time the Olympics start there'd be only 4 teams left. And even then there's still the chance that one of the 4 games just won't end. Consider the horrible extra innings rule implemented for baseball this year, where starting from the 11th inning each team starts with runners on first and second and no outs, and the manager gets to decide who to put on base and who in the lineup bats first. Do any cricket fans want their sport bastardized this way?

Posted by: Hei Lun Chan at Aug 16, 2008 8:36:52 AM

Rory,

In re cricket, one problem is that until recently, there wasn't really a form of cricket that would be viable for the modern day Olympics. Five-day test cricket is, of course, impossible. They'd never repeat the two-day cricket of 1900. Even one-day cricket would be hard to do unless the Games were held in a country that had a *lot* of cricket grounds.

However, with the remarkable advent of Twenty20 cricket, there is a *big* push to get it into the, you guessed it, 2020 Olympics. And I think it might actually work. Sure, it's not "true" cricket, even in the sense that one-day is, but it's fast-paced and would allow more countries to field teams. Plus, you can get it 2.5x more cricket in the same amount of time as you do in one-day (20 overs v. 50 overs...yeah, I gots mad math skillz). That would allow for 2, maybe 3 matches on a ground per day...assuming the pitches could sustain that abuse. (Maybe go with artificial surfaces?)

Plus, Delhi is currently mounting a big push for the 2020 Games. Since India is the epicenter of Twenty20, I'm fairly certain their selection as host would boost the chances immensely. Lord knows they have enough cricket grounds to host an Olympic tourney.

Posted by: TheMatt at Aug 16, 2008 8:39:02 AM

Hei - test matches last days and days, other forms are shorter. One-day cricket or 20-20 should be fine.

And if I were to bastardize baseball, I would suggest a home-run derby to resolve ties.

Posted by: Jody at Aug 16, 2008 8:46:51 AM

Simple explanation: India is the nation of geeks.

In our facebook profile pictures, I'm holding a sword, my sister is in a boat, another guy is buff and shirtless, etc. We all do this because it makes us look cool.

I also have a few Indian friends: one of them actually has a profile photo showing him wearing a suit while using a computer in an office environment. He too does this to look cool, albeit to his friends at home.

With such a culture, is it really surprising that there aren't too many athletes?

(Note: I'm not criticizing, I'm a geek myself and can spread pwnage in 1/2life. Just pointing out this aspect of their culture.)

Posted by: Geek Athlete at Aug 16, 2008 9:10:38 AM

For what it's worth, the current world chess champion is Indian.

Posted by: at Aug 16, 2008 9:26:53 AM

Let's get this clear. India's underachievement in olymics exagerrates its athletic/sporting failure. If you look at tier-2 athletic events (asian games, commonwealth games, afro-asian games), India performs pretty much in line with expectations -- usually in the top 6-10 in asian games (behind china, japan, korea etc.) and top 4-5 in commonwealth games. What really happens is that when you graduate from tier-2 to tier-1 competition the change in standards at the top (think fractions of seconds and fractions of centimeters) is dramatic and overcoming the difference requires massive training and investment. Naturally india can't afford that. Add to that the decreasing marginal returns on added investments when you are at that level of competition ($1mm might improve your 100m dash from 11.5 secs to 11s but it won't take you from 11 to 10.5s). So the cost becomes unbearable, unless you are china and its a matter of making a point. Add to that the strategic angle. There are at least 3-4 sports where india could have nevertheless completed clean sweeps over the years -- chess (at least rapid chess), billiards, snooker, all dominated by india for last 20-30 yrs (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBSF_World_Billiards_Championship) . But none are olympic sports. But yes, fencing with all its remarkable spectator friendliness is. Its impossible to say how india will perform in the future, but one thing you can say is that if india is capable and willing to make that additional final bit of investment the conversion of the tier-2 performers into tier-1 performers could be pretty rapid.

One more thing, though its totally unrelated to sports/olympics -- its hard to understand why the west, especially western educated indians (even though i'll have to count myself as one of them) are so obsessed with linking everything to the caste system/social immobility. Nobody would deny its a problem, but it allows people to pass off completely spurious and senseless theories because somehow everything wrong with india has something to do with the caste system. Don't other countries suffer from vast socio-economic discrimination? How come american sports is dominated by black athletes when they don't exactly benefit from huge social mobility?

Posted by: gb at Aug 16, 2008 9:43:43 AM

just one more thing, regarding my previous post, i didn't intend to criticize tyler with respect to linking sporting underacheivement to social mobility. it was fair on his part to link to other people's opinion of the issue. this blog's coverage of india (as many other things) is much better than most other places.

Posted by: gb at Aug 16, 2008 9:50:14 AM

Genetics may also play a part. Sorry to offend, but it must be considered.

Kenyans have won lots of medals (61 actually), and they don't have good roads, tv, or East German-style athlete farms either.

Yes, cricket dominates there, but no more than baseball and football dominate the US.

Posted by: Brian at Aug 16, 2008 10:00:36 AM

I agree with gb in that it is difficult to pin the issue on social mobility since this has not hampered other Olympic participants with the same problem. I would garner that with the exception of cricket, India has no systematic manner in which to recognize budding young athletes and "push" (not in a Chinese authoritarian sense) them toward a sport where after ten or fifteen years of training they could compete at an Olympic level.

The US secondary school system excels at this task.

Posted by: J.C. at Aug 16, 2008 10:15:29 AM

It is precisely the population of 1 billion that is responsible for the poor showing at the Olympic games. Reasons are:

- The population explosion has increased the opportunity cost of pursuing sports as a career. To excel at any sport, it is necessary to dedicate yourself to it for years. If today, a kid decides to pursue a sport full time, down the line he/ she will not have the opportunity to catch up with the other kids who have been busy studying advanced math etc that would train them to be doctors or engineers. It is only the best of the lot that end up having well paying jobs. India has abt 50 million people who are unemployed right now. It is more than likely that he/ she will end up working a job that barely pays enough to support a family.
- The population has made the race to the top extremely competitive and the criteria for measurement is the kid's aptitude in math/sciences for the most part. Sports are meant only for recreation - that too if you have some time left over from studying.

People will invariably argue that China has been excelling at Olympics despite its population being larger than India's. They should not forget the emphasis that the Government of China places on good showing at that stage. This is severely lacking in India.

Population is an important reason for the poor showing, but hardly the only one.

Posted by: Prasant C at Aug 16, 2008 10:17:02 AM

qb: India dominating at snooker? geez where did that come from?

Posted by: georg at Aug 16, 2008 10:20:36 AM

Concerning the first comment, contention two: this is the wrong way to look at sport in society. Sport, sex as an enterprise, entertainment and popular culture in general develop after the necessities are handled in a general sense. If a nation struggles to feed its people on a daily basis, lacks proper roads and sanitation, training an Olympic-caliber athlete in any sport becomes more challenging than the actual Games. The issues pointed out by the author are great indicators of why India can't develop elements of culture -- in this case, sports.

We're culturally obsessed with a lot of things, but nobody I've ever met is so obsessed with everything. Some do love sports, where sometimes people make headlines for their obsession. But the same happens when people become obsessed with sex, drugs or even religion to some degree. People will always be around to criticize the hobbies of others, but isn't that the point of a free market system? Choices?

I do wonder one thing about India's lack of medals. Many of the athletes from the Olympics, regardless of the nation they are representing are attending universities in the US. Some are actually just stretching their connection to the home country, but many have been in the states since being identified as gifted in a given sport. Maybe we're just not scouting India for athletes enough, we certainly aren't ignoring the academic talent.

Posted by: Matt at Aug 16, 2008 10:31:22 AM

It's too hot and humid in most of India to want to exert physical effort in the first place. How does Thailand, Cambodia, Viet Nam, or Sri Lanka stack up?

Posted by: MsJulie at Aug 16, 2008 10:39:27 AM

I would say a major reason is because of the mostly vegetarian based diet that Hindu (and other religions in India) followers, in which the typical diet provides less protein then say the diet of other countries. Muslims in India consume meat, however the Muslim population in India tend to be generally poorer which reduces the number of participants which could participate in sports.

Posted by: jc at Aug 16, 2008 12:23:00 PM

There seems to be an element of happenstance here, illuminated by Brian, who noted that Kenya does very well for its size.

Part of that is the general medal-heaviness of athletics and distance running: there's quite a few events there.

The opposite situation is, of course, events like cricket, that aren't even represented.

So, we have China, which has spent a fair bit of money and effort to achieve Olympic greatness, and we have India, which has not.

Which country is spending its money better? The fact that I ask this question at a time when my homeland (Canada) has racked up fewer medals than Armenia is of course a complete coincidence.

Posted by: Ryan Cousineau at Aug 16, 2008 12:27:21 PM

I'd congratulate India on its good sense in spurning the arid vulgarity of the Olympics while contrubuting so much to the game they play in Heaven.

Posted by: dearieme at Aug 16, 2008 12:38:50 PM

Genetics not built for sports, lack of facilities and incentives for those few capable of and interested in sports as a career and lastly a society obsessed with academics and the career opportunities associated with a good education.

Posted by: Shyam at Aug 16, 2008 1:02:26 PM

My current Gtalk status msg is "Swimmer Michael Phelps has won more medals than either India or Mexico in those countries' respective cumulative histories"
In India, sports is not given any chance. It is culture , i think. When a kid shows some interest in sports, parents stop him "Hey, only if you study well, u can earn lot". Cricket is the only "paying" sport right now in India and i see lot of parents encourage cricket "interest" in children. Other sports don't have bright future in India.Also, for many individuals, it is a question of survival. Food or 100m dash?

Posted by: Karthick at Aug 16, 2008 1:31:54 PM

To jc above,
50% of India is too poor to afford meat on a regular basis. They aren't vegetarian by choice. That explains the lack of protein.

Posted by: Gigi at Aug 16, 2008 1:44:38 PM

India won 6 times ina row hockey gold medal

Posted by: k at Aug 16, 2008 1:55:18 PM

So basically, you are defending India on the basis that they are too smart to play sports.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IQ_and_the_Wealth_of_Nations#National_IQ_estimates

Apparently they are only ranked 10 better than Kenya in IQ. Maybe this explains why they value high paying jobs most. I think a breakdown of IQ by Caste would be interesting. I, for one, think that India has this correct.

Posted by: brainwarped at Aug 16, 2008 2:02:07 PM

There's a version of cricket out there which would suit the Olympics even more than Twenty20 or ODIs: the Sixes. It was created and popularized in Hong Kong, an Olympic venue. It would require little investment, as Hong Kong hosts an annual tournament anyway, and is immensely enjoyable.

Nutritional issues and low social mobility haven't stopped countries like Azerbaijan, North Korea, Cuba, Belarus and Zimbabwe. The lack of TV is not an issue for cricket, where national team members are idolized.

I wonder if India is not funding Olympic development because it would be hard to compete with nations like the US, China, Russia and Australia. It would take decades to bring India to the same level. As such, there are better, more immediate payoffs in other sports, including tennis, hockey and golf.

Posted by: Sundeep at Aug 16, 2008 2:02:54 PM