A brief history of the boycott

The practice was named after surname of Captain Charles Cunningham Boycott - a British land agent who was ostracized by his local community in Ireland as part of a campaign for agrarian tenants' rights in 1880.

The aim of campaign was the "Three Fs" (fair rent, fixity of tenure and free sale) to protect tenants from exploitation, the Irish Land League under Michael Davitt withdrew the local labourers required to save the harvest on Lord Erne's estate. When Boycott tried to undermine the campaign, the League caused the local community  to refuse to have any dealings with him. Neighbours would not work for him and talk to him, local shops stopped trading with him,  labourers refused to tend his house, even the postman refused to deliver his mail.

Charles  Cunningham Boycott, VanityFair

In the end, his crops were harvested by fifty Orangemen from County Cavan who worked under the protection of nine hundred soldiers from the Royal Irish Constabulary. The entire episode was estimated to have cost the British government and others over £10,000 (R. F Foster, Modern Ireland) to harvest approximately £350 worth of potatoes, according to Captain Boycott's estimate of the harvest value.

The campaign against Boycott became a cause célèbre in the British press. The events aroused so much passion that his name became an instant byword. It was first used — in our modern sense of collective and organised ostracism — in the Times of London in November 1880.  Within weeks it was everywhere. It was soon adopted by newspapers throughout Europe, with versions of his name appearing in French, German, Dutch and Russian. By the time of the Captain’s death in 1897, it had become a standard part of the English language.

The boycott is used chiefly by consumers, business groups and labor unions Boycotts may be either primary or secondary. A typical example of a primary boycott is the refusal of aggrieved employees and their supporters to purchase the goods or services of an employer.

A secondary boycott occurs when the aggrieved party attempts either to boycott a third party or to coerce it into joining an ongoing boycott. Thus, workers instituting a boycott may refuse to patronize firms that continue to deal with the initially boycotted party.

Outstanding examples of political boycott are the refusal of American colonials to buy British goods after the passage of the Stamp Act (1765), the Chinese boycott of U.S. goods (1905) because of the poor treatment of Chinese in America, the refusal of Gandhi's followers to buy British-made goods in India, and the Arab League boycott (1948) of all companies dealing with the state of Israel.

In the history, the Olympic Games hosted by a dynamic, powerful dictatorships  were also being boycotted:

-     in 1936 in  Nazi Germany (Berlin)

-    In 1980 in Comunist Soviet Union (Mockva)

-    In 2006 in Comunist  People’s Republic of China (Beijing)

Learn more about these historical precedent to find, why awarding Sochi Winter Olympic Games organization in 2014 is impermissible.