On Friday, Oct. 2, the International Olympic Committee handed Rio de Janeiro the right to host the 2016 Summer Olympics, despite strong bids from Chicago, Madrid and Tokyo. It will be the first time the Olympics have been held in South America and only the second time in a Latin American city, the first being Mexico City in 1968.

Rio exemplifies a tale of two cities. On the one hand, it is often called “A Cidade Maravilhosa,” or “The Marvelous City,” and rightfully so. The second-largest city in Brazil, Rio de Janeiro boasts a spectacular natural setting that features staggering, forest-covered mountains, breathtaking, white-sand beaches and tourist-attracting, tropical climates: a paradise in every sense of the word. Known for its festivities and zeal for celebration, Rio de Janeiro is unequivocally one of the most beautiful and welcoming cities in the world.

On the other hand, Rio is infamous for its crime rate and economic inequalities. A large portion of the 6.1 million inhabitants of Rio live in poverty, occupying shantytowns, called favelas, outside of the city. Controlled by drug gangs and private militias, many of these favelas are breeding grounds for the type of violence and crime that plagues the city. According to officials, there were just under 5,000 murders last year in Rio, half of them drug-related. In comparison, the combined number of homicides last year in Chicago, Los Angeles and New York City, an aggregate population of over 15 million, was 1,406. Additionally, the police in Rio de Janeiro only compound the problem, admitting to having killed 1,118 people in 2008 who were “resisting arrest.” American police killed 371 people in the entire country during the same time period.

Understandably, there are both voices of enthusiasm and concern regarding the city’s ability to host the Games. It will undoubtedly allow Rio de Janeiro to shine in the global spotlight and will hopefully compel the city to address many of the structural, political and social problems that afflict it. But is Rio taking on a challenge that is too big, making promises that it can’t hold? And will hosting the Olympics augment the problems of the city or remedy them?

In 2007, Rio de Janeiro hosted the Pan American Games, seen as a major triumph for the city and the country of Brazil. Yet, in winning the bid for the 2007 Pan Am games, Rio had promised to build a new light railway, a new state highway and 54 kilometers of new metro lines to accommodate the event, none of which ever actually materialized. Additionally, the Pan Am games reportedly ended up costing much more than the original estimate of $177 million, which is incredible, considering that none of the cost went to the proposed infrastructure projects. Some reports even estimated the final cost of the Pan Ams to be around $2 billion. Brazil will also be holding the 2014 World Cup and nearly two years since winning that bid, construction has yet to begin on its 12 stadiums.

These are not convincing credentials by any means, and as much as the entire world would love to see the Olympics take place successfully in the beautiful setting of Rio de Janeiro, it’s rather unsettling. The issues of lack of infrastructure and venues point to an issue deeper than just the citizens or location of Rio de Janero.   They highlight a glaring blemish on the municipal authorities that are responsible for the oversight of those projects.

There’s a certain sense of justice in the fact that South America will no longer be excluded from hosting the Olympics, an event that professes to be indiscriminately global. That being said, it’s hard to overlook the extent to which violence overruns certain sections of the city, and the obvious administrative issues that could potentially make the impact of the Olympics a negative, rather than positive one, setting Rio and Brazil back, rather than pushing them forward.

While these concerns need to be addressed, the International Olympic Committee sees vast potential. Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva claims that hosting the Olympics will unite Latin Americans in much the same way that Che Guevara’s tour of South America did. And in promoting the city’s bid, Rio organizers emphasized the city’s ability to infuse the Olympic tradition with something truly new, taking the Olympics to a level of festivity and celebration never seen before. After all, it’s Brazil. Whether or not the reality of the 2016 Olympics will meet these grand promises is yet to be seen.

Rio has more than six years to prepare for arguably the greatest global event to take place on South American soil. So as the rest of the world puts its faith in Rio de Janeiro and puts the 2016 Olympics on the backburner, we can only hope that when 2016 rolls around, these concerns are just afterthoughts.