Achievement and benchmarking of countries at the Summer Olympics using cross efficiency evaluation method

In this paper, an extension tool of data envelopment analysis (DEA), namely cross efficiency evaluation method, is used to measure the performance of the nations participating in the last six Summer Olympic Games. The model in the paper considers two inputs (GDP per capita and population) and three outputs (number of gold, silver and bronze medals won), and the weight restrictions are included to guarantee that a unit of silver medal corresponds to a higher valuation than a unit of bronze medal, and the highest for gold medal. The results for the last six Summer Olympic Games are analyzed, and a unique ordering of the participants based on average cross efficiency is provided, also cluster analysis technique is used to select the more appropriate targets for poorly performing countries to use as benchmarks.