Academic Return to the Global Sport Community after World War II: The Installation of the Sport University Cologne’s First International Relations

With the establishment of the Sporthochschule Koln (‘Sport University Cologne’) two years after the end of World War II, the installation of international relations was defined as one of its main tasks. From 1947 onwards, the university’s administration staff as well as lecturers and students got in contact with visitors from many different countries. With a focus on the evaluation of the university’s first guestbook and the enlistment of various archive documents, the background and the circumstances of the Sport University Cologne’s first international relations are depicted in this paper. As the paper shows, this academic return to the global sport community was strongly fostered by the British Military Government as part of the policy to re-educate Germans. Furthermore, Carl Diem as the Sport University Cologne’s founding director supported international contacts by using his personal network. No resistance to this policy of internationality is mirrored in the Cologne archive material, neither from the German nor from the foreign side. Therefore, further international research in cooperation with partner universities from the period could be worthwhile and would surely lead to additional insights.