The Women's World Games were held four times between 1922 and 1934. They were established by Alice Milliat

Alice Milliat

Alice Milliat was a pioneer of women's sport in France and around the world. Her lobbying on behalf of female athletes forced the inclusion of women's events in the Olympic Games....

 and the Fédération Sportive Féminine Internationale (FSFI) to compensate for the lack of women's sports at the Olympic Games.

1922 Women's Olympics

The first Women's Olympic Games took place in Paris, on a single day. Eighteen athletes participated in track and field events. They performed before an audience of 20,000 spectators.

1926 Women's Olympics

The second Women's World Games were held in Gothenburg, Sweden in 1922. Athletes from ten nations including Japan took place.

1930 Women's World Games

The International Olympic Committee

International Olympic Committee

The International Olympic Committee is an international corporation based in Lausanne, Switzerland, created by Pierre de Coubertin on 23 June 1894 with Demetrios Vikelas as its first president...

 (IOC) objected to the FSFI using the word "Olympic" in the title of its events. The IOC and the IAAF (International Amateur Athletics Federation therefore agreed to include athletic events in the 1928 Olympic Games

1928 Summer Olympics

The 1928 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the IX Olympiad, was an international multi-sport event which was celebrated in 1928 in Amsterdam, Netherlands. Amsterdam had bid for the 1920 and 1924 Olympic Games, but had to give way to war-victim Antwerp, Belgium, and Pierre de...

. However, they only agreed to the inclusion of a limited number of events, and in 1928 only as an experiment.

The FSFI did not find this satisfactory and, while no longer using the word "Olympic", organised the third Women's World Games in Prague

Prague

Prague is the capital and largest city of the Czech Republic. Situated in the north-west of the country on the Vltava river, the city is home to about 1.3 million people, while its metropolitan area is estimated to have a population of over 2.3 million...

, on September 7-9 1930, with over 200 participants from 17 countries and over 15,000 spectators.

Aftermath

Following some protracted arguments between the FSFI on the one hand and the IOC and IAAF on the other, the FSFI and an IAAF commission agreed that the IAAF should take control of all international women's athletic events in return for the IAAF recognising all FSFI records, a complete programme of women's Olympic events, and the IAAF holding the fifth Women's World Games in Vienna in 1938. In the event, while the 1936 IAAF Congress agreed to recognise FSFI records, it otherwise only agreed to proposing a somewhat expanded programme of Olympic events to the IOC (the IOC refused) and holding a programme of women's events in the 1938 European Athletics Championships in place of the Women's World Games. The FSFI ceased operations without ever accepting or rejecting the IAAF's decisions.