Politics threatens to spoil Paris 2024 Olympics

France doesn’t want politics to tarnish its big Olympics moment. Good luck with that, though. 

In less than 200 days — and exactly a century after it last took place in France — Paris will host millions of visitors for the 33rd edition of the Summer Olympic Games.

There are just a couple (well, more than a couple) political problems looming for Olympics organizers: the Russia-Ukraine war, the Israel-Hamas conflict, a dispute over public transport, terrorism, homelessness, furious booksellers on the Seine and even a surfing wave in Tahiti are already threatening to overshadow the City of Light’s big party.

With both domestic and international politics bubbling over, French President Emmanuel Macron’s chances of enjoying a politics-free nirvana this summer look slim. Or even non-existent.

“All Olympic editions since the creation of the Games in 1896 have been political and geopolitical,” said Lukas Aubin, sports geopolitics specialist and a research director at the Institute for International and Strategic Relations. “The level of attention is very high today … it’s probably the tensest moment we’ve seen since the end of the Cold War. So, we’re going to see a highly politicized edition.”

Tony Estanguet, president of the Games’ organizing committee and a former Olympic canoe slalom champion, recently said he doesn’t want politics to become the dominant theme of the event — but even he knows it won’t be easy.

“It’s true that the international context is particularly tense today,” he said, adding, “but it’s up to us … to talk about sports and not to politicize the subject too much.”

Israel-Hamas headache

For months it looked like the decision on whether to allow Russian athletes to compete would be the biggest political headache facing France and the International Olympic Committee (IOC). But then Hamas attacked Israel.

The Israel Defense Forces’ massive retaliation in the Gaza Strip, which has killed more than 25,000 people according to the enclave’s Hamas-controlled ministry of health, has sparked global outrage from politically active athletes hailing from Arab countries — but also from further afield.

In a sign of the protest that could roil Paris 2024, French basketball player Emilie Gomis had to step down from her role as one of Paris 2024’s ambassadors after she posted anti-Israel comments on Instagram following the October 7 attack by Hamas.

Gomis’ post “breached required neutrality,” the Games’ organizing committee wrote, which led to her resignation.

With Russian athletes being forced to compete as neutrals over President Vladimir Putin’s ongoing full-scale invasion of Ukraine, accusations of inconsistency are set to dog Olympic bosses with regard to Israeli athletes.

“The controversy is likely to grow as the event draws nearer,” Aubin, the sports politics specialist, said — adding that “many are likely to point at the double standards” with Russian athletes.

A spokesperson for the IOC said in an emailed statement to POLITICO that it is monitoring the situation “and the impact it has on Israeli and Palestinian athletes,” noting that “discrimination has no place at the Olympic Games” and that the national Olympic committees of Israel and Palestine “have been operating in peaceful co-existence for several decades.”

The participation of Russian and Belarusian athletes has been a heated debate since Putin launched his all-out war on Ukraine in February 2022, leading to a blockade on Russia by a plethora of sports governing bodies. Macron said no Russian flag would be flown during the competition but didn’t speak for barring athletes.

Despite the IOC’s ultimate recommendation to allow Russian and Belarusian athletes to participate in Paris as neutrals — that is, without a national flag or anthem — the International Gymnastics Federation recently decided not to include any Russian gymnasts on the list of athletes permitted to take part in qualifying competitions for the 2024 Olympics.

The president of World Athletics, Sebastian Coe, also said in December that Russian and Belarusian athletes will be barred from the Games, even under a neutral banner. Putin, in a fit of pique over the partial snub, suggested he’d set up his own version of the Olympics, hosted in Russia.

Domestic drama

Global conflicts aren’t the only issues keeping organizers up at night, however. Domestic politics is also trampling all over the run-up to the lighting of the Olympic flame on July 26.

The lead-up has also been marked by a police raid over suspicions of fraud, undocumented workers being employed to build competition infrastructure and numerous national controversies, often pitting Macron’s liberal central government against the socialist mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo.

Hidalgo and former Transport Minister Clément Beaune clashed after the mayor said public transport infrastructures “won’t be ready” in time for the Games. (Beaune himself, not mincing his words, had earlier admitted the Olympics would suck for Parisians.)

Now, both transport workers and police unions are threatening to strike if they don’t get raises and better working conditions, which would almost certainly bring chaos to the city.

The interior ministry has been clearing squats and pushed homeless people outside the city in an apparent attempt to improve the French capital’s image ahead of the Games, according to Reuters — something that drew the ire of NGOs.

Similar criticism erupted when local authorities decided to requisition student housing over summer 2024 to host Olympic staff. Students affected by the measure would get €100 and two tickets for the Games as compensation.

Hidalgo’s (both professional and private) trip to the South Pacific French territory of Tahiti — which will host the surfing competition and has seen locals protest the construction of new infrastructure because of its potential negative environmental impacts on the corals — made waves. She was attacked by her political opponents who alleged possible misuse of public funds.

As if that wasn’t enough, the opening ceremony on the River Seine, set to be attended by 400,000 people, poses a major security and terror risk. “Certain groups could use it to send a message,” Aubin said, as the ceremony will be watched by millions of people across the world. “It’s going to be a very tense moment.”

Social legacy falls flat

Paris is also struggling to sell the Games to the locals.

There was a row about the expensive price of tickets; then residents of Seine-Saint-Denis, one of the poorest neighborhoods located in the north of Paris and site of the Olympic stadium, warned against a one-off Games-linked investment that won’t tackle the roots of poverty and unemployment in the region.

The Olympic Village that will host the 14,000 athletes has been built in Seine-Saint-Denis precisely to regenerate the area and provide the traditionally working-class labor force with more modern and energy-efficient housing.

But local media Le Parisien reported that there had so far been little appetite to purchase the Olympic Village flats, questioning the social legacy of the Games and whether they’ll effectively improve the livelihoods of low-income communities as the organizers initially promised.

The iconic booksellers on the banks of the River Seine have also been fiercely protesting against the interior ministry’s decision to temporarily displace them to make space (and improve security) during the Olympics’ opening ceremony.

Despite the tide of bad press, local organizers still hold out hope they can stage a spectacular sporting extravaganza this summer.

Estanguet noted that “France will be watched from all around the world … and it’s important that France shines.

“We have a collective responsibility to talk about sports, to talk about the positive and not just pass on the negative statements, the things that irritate and upset us.”

Let’s see whether politics backs off in time.