Policy-makers, the media and the public tend to assume that winning medals at the Olympic Games promotes grassroots sporting activity, bringing health and wellbeing benefits for the whole population. Research evidence suggests that there is no such effect.
The Olympic Games attract huge amounts of interest every four years. The International Olympic Committee claimed that Paris 2024 was on track to break broadcast and digital records.
But despite this interest, the effects of the games on grassroots participation in sport are not as universally accepted as is often assumed.
Ever since Greek antiquity, the Olympics have been considered a mega event that attracts the interest of states, well-known personalities and the public. Much like today, the Greek city-states were very proud if their athletes won any of the sporting competitions of the time.
At their peak, the ancient Olympics included 16 sports – in Paris 2024, there have been 32 sports with many categories and medals available within each.
The competition for Olympic medals: athletes and governments
Some research suggests that most athletes compete primarily for their own economic benefit and fame rather than for their respective countries (Papanikos, 2020).
The competition between athletes to win medals is not as fierce as the competition between nations. It is not surprising that governments around the world use all means available to win medals in the Olympics. Many spend significant amounts of scarce resources to prepare their athletes by developing the necessary public infrastructure and financing their training.
Some countries even offer financial incentives to their athletes for winning medals. For example, at the Paris games, Hong Kong was offering to pay $768,000 to their gold medallists.
What is all this about?
First, it is argued that the Olympics have wider economic, social and political effects. If a country wins a high number of medals relative to its population and income, the government can use this to strengthen its hold on power.
Political systems are even compared in terms of their efficiency and effectiveness by how many medals they win. For example, during the Cold War, the Soviet system competed with the Western system. Today, the Chinese system competes with the US system of governance. Somehow, winning medals makes them appear better.
The Olympics are also used to promote international diplomatic objectives by generating a positive media image for a country. This is particularly true if a country hosts a big international competition, such as the recent World Cup in Qatar (Papanikos, 2023). There is an ex-post Olympic legacy too – with most cities (countries) around the world considering that hosting the games has an overall positive effect (Papanikos, 2022).
Second, governments and other stakeholders claim that the Olympics prompt participation in sport among the public. This is good both for individual health and for the country as a whole.
The benefits of this grassroots participation include improvements in individual wellbeing, as well as in the health of the population, thereby reducing state and private health expenditure. Participation in sport also increases people’s productivity at work. If the effects of physical activity on health and productivity are considered together, then participation in sport may be regarded as an investment in human capital.
It is also thought that sport-related physical activity increases not only the quantity of health as measured by life expectancy but also the quality of life. Health economists measure this through an index called quality-adjusted life years (QALYs).
Do Olympic medals promote grassroots participation in sport?
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) assumes that winning Olympic medals does encourage participation in sport. As a result, it has designed a policy called Fit for Life to promote what it calls smart investments to increase grassroots participation. Unfortunately, no evidence is provided to support this claim: it is simply assumed.
One recent study questions this widely held belief (Donnelly and Kidd, 2024). The authors find – contrary to what many people think – exactly the opposite effect for Canada. The more medals Canadian athletes won in the winter and summer Olympics, the lower the rates of participation in sport in Canada. A similar assessment is provided by the House of Commons for the UK.
Another way to answer this question is to assume that higher grassroots participation in sport increases the health of the population and therefore life expectancy. Of course, life expectancy depends on many other factors, but we can test this hypothesis by looking at two countries that have hosted the Olympics.
Greece and Spain
Greece and Spain share many common characteristics, including their level of economic and social development, as well as being members of the European Union. They also share a common currency.
One may also safely assume that Greeks and Spaniards share a common attitude towards sport and that the Olympic effects on grassroots participation in sport, if any, might have been the same.
Both countries have hosted modern Olympics: Spain (Barcelona) in 1992 and Greece (Athens) in 2004. Did the games have a positive effect on life expectancy?
Figure 1 shows the life expectancy in the two countries from 1960 to 2022. This data set includes the effect of Covid-19, which serves as a good natural experiment to test how various events may influence life expectancy.
The first observation is that Greek and Spanish life expectancy at birth follows a similar time trend. To use statistical jargon, both time series have one unit root, implying that their first difference (changes) is a random walk.
The second observation is that organising and hosting the Olympics does not appear to have had an effect on life expectancy in Spain in 1992 or Greece in 2004. But this can be tested using a statistical test (called a Chow test) for a breakpoint.
Using various years around 1992 for Spain and 2004 for Greece, the test shows that there is no breakdown in the time series around these years. This evidence does not support the hypothesis of an Olympic effect on life expectancy at birth in both countries. This finding is consistent with the results from the Canadian study.
Figure 1: Life expectancy at birth, Greece and Spain (1962-2022)
Source: World Bank
If we assume that this health effect relates to grassroots participation, then we may conclude that hosting the Olympics has no impact on participation.
There are concerns around surveys that measure grassroots participation in sport, whereas using life expectancy data provides a direct test of the basic argument made by governments that grassroots participation improves the health of the wider population. A good indicator of this is life expectancy at birth.
Lastly, the effect of Covid-19 was dramatic. In both countries, life expectancy drastically decreased. In Greece, life expectancy in 2020 decreased by 0.43%, while there was a 1.79% drop in Spain. These two rates were the highest annual decreases in life expectancy since 1960.
Conclusions
Consistent with many different aspects of the Olympic legacy, hosting the games does not seem to increase grassroots participation in sport. If we measure this by examining the increase in life expectancy, then the scant evidence from Greece and Spain does not support this hypothesis.
International sporting competitions are here to stay because they serve many other purposes beyond promoting grassroots participation. This requires a different policy approach that should systematically combine health, productivity and the enhancement of human capital for all citizens, especially those facing inclusion challenges. No matter how many medals a country wins, the objective of increasing grassroots participation is unlikely to be achieved.
Where can I find out more?
- The more medals Canadian athletes win, the fewer Canadians participate in organized sport: Article in The Conversation by Peter Donnelly and Bruce Kidd.
- The participation legacy at Olympic Games: Article in the Athens Journal of Sports by Gregory Papanikos.
- Leveraging sporting events to create sport participation: A case study of the 2016 Youth Olympic Games: Article by Svein Erik Nordhagen in the International Journal of Sport Policy and Politics.
- Grassroots participation in sport and physical activity: UK House of Commons report.
Who are experts on this question?
- Peter Donnelly, University of Toronto
- Bruce Kidd, University of Toronto
- Svein Erik Nordhagen, Inland Norway University of Applied Sciences, Lillehammer, Norway
- Gregory Papanikos, Athens Institute
