The 1928 All-Union Spartakiad in the context of international contacts of Soviet physical culture and sports

The article raises the issue of the interaction of Soviet physical culture and sports with foreign organizations in the 1920s. During that period, the international relations in the area were based on the idea of contrasting working-class physical culture with bourgeois sports, aimed, in accordance with the point of view of the Soviet leadership, at “enslaving” workers and distracting them from the struggle for the World revolution. Therefore, the main focus of international work was on the relations with the European workers’ organizations and unions, which were built with the active involvement of the Red Sports International (RSI), established in 1921 in opposition to the Lucerne Sports International (LSI), an international workers’ organization that declared peaceful coexistence with the bourgeoisie. The author analyzes this process using the documents of the Supreme Council of Physical Culture and the RSI, and also the periodical press materials. Special attention is paid to the 1928 All-Union Spartakiad, to the way it was held, to its results and significance for Soviet physical culture and the Red Sports International. The author comes to the conclusion that the successful holding of the competition confirmed the correctness of the international policy for the Soviet sports leadership and raised the status of the RSI as an international workers’ sports organization, which led to the aggravation of confrontation in the international workers’ sports movement.

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