On October 25, 1979, the International Olympic Committee met in Nagoya in Japan and adopted a resolution by which the Olympic committee of the People's Republic of China was recognised as the body representing China, and the body that had been recognised in Taiwan was told to take part under a different name and flag, as a regional committee. The vote settled a dispute that had kept Chinese athletes out of the games for more than twenty years. The dispute was long. The decision is known as the Nagoya resolution.
China had been represented at the games before 1949, and after the founding of the People's Republic the question of which committee should be recognised was argued at every session of the International Olympic Committee through the 1950s and 1960s. The committee in Beijing withdrew from the movement in 1958 in protest at the position taken on Taiwan, and China did not take part in the games of that period. The argument divided the sporting movement for two decades.
The resolution of 1979 followed a change of policy in the international federations and a series of visits and negotiations, and it was framed so that one country would have one recognised Olympic committee. Under the decision, the committee in Taiwan took part under a different name and with a different flag and anthem, and the formula was used as a model in other international bodies. China returned to the Winter Olympic Games in 1980 and to the Summer Games in 1984 at Los Angeles. The seat came back.
The restoration of the seat was followed by a rise in Chinese results. The results improved. A weightlifter won the first gold medal of the 1984 games, and China finished in the top group of the medal table by the 1990s, and it later hosted the Summer Games in Beijing in 2008 and the Winter Games in 2022. The resolution of 1979 is described as the basis on which China's place in the Olympic movement has rested since.