This introduction shares the book’s theoretical and empirical ambitions and sets out a common conceptual ground that is employed to greater or lesser degrees by the authors of each chapter, in respect to the uniqueness of each individual case. Overall, this book is concerned with the aftereffects of hosting mega-events. It makes sense of developments around the globe through the notion of soft power, aimed both internationally and at the domestic host audience; the Potemkin relationship between spectacular but superficial promises and the deleterious outcomes that occur under that surface; and the uneasy linkages between hosting and the (geo)politics of authoritarianism and great nation populism. Each chapter highlights a different global region, featuring cases from Western Europe, Eastern Europe, Asia, the Middle East, Africa, Australia, South America, and North America. By offering a standardized conceptual toolbox in this introduction, the book presents a more coherent picture of the implications of hosting mega-events in disparate areas around the globe.