Posted: February 17th, 2022

London 2012: Did the Olympics benefit all, or leave a legacy of widening social inequality?

The Olympic Video games have grow to be a a lot type after occasion by cities round the world. It’s seen as a possibility for the metropolis not solely to boost and broaden its profile, however showcase its potential as a pretty place for funding (Hiller, 2006, p.318). This essay will discover the sociological influence that the Olympics have had on the metropolis of London and its occupants. It will likely be argued that whereas there are quite a few optimistic brief time period results that include internet hosting the Olympics, not solely are the optimistic long run results few and much between, however there’s a quantity of damaging results impacting these belonging to the decrease socio-economic group.
By inspecting what has occurred in London and evaluating this explicit Olympics to some previous cities which have performed host (Barcelona, Sydney, Athens and many others), this essay will present that whereas stimulating financial development, contributing to the brief time period happiness of the inhabitants and extra just lately, selling environmental sustainability, the Olympics usually carry few advantages for socially excluded teams. Firstly, by taking a look at the historical past of the 5 London borough’s to be reworked by the Olympics, we’ll study whether or not class idea remains to be a related subject for London and if Marx and Webber’s concepts are nonetheless relevant.
The argument will then be divided into financial, social, cultural and political spheres, with every being mentioned in phrases how they had been affected by internet hosting the Olympics in London. The Olympics could also be of solely brief length; nonetheless its influence and that means could exist far past the occasion itself for the host metropolis (Hiller, 2000, p.440). Essentially the most seen of these impacts pertains to the infrastructural enhancements. All host cities perform intensive regeneration of city areas and in London most of this “clear up and reorientation of metropolis areas” occurred in the 5 East London Olympic host boroughs of Newham, Tower Hamlets, Hackney, Waltham Forest and Greenwich. (LERI, 2007, p. 5).

Historically, East London has been the coronary heart of manufacturing and industrial work; it has been house to London’s working courses and has remained comparatively poor in comparison with the relaxation of the metropolis. In the final decade enhancements in infrastructure and the regeneration of London’s docklands has seen the boroughs grow to be socially polarised with small pockets of relative affluence surrounded by the nonetheless excessive focus of relative poverty. The current day London is vastly totally different to Marx’s 19th century model, but the re-emergence of class as a defining issue has seen a new technology of these as soon as once more being influenced by his writing and evolutionary imaginative and prescient.
Marx believed that class is finest understood in phrases of financial components; his theoretical mannequin is of a two class construction of house owners and non-owners (Habibis & Walter, 2009, p. 18). Immediately’s London just isn’t that totally different, austerity measures and rising unemployment have deepened the gulf dividing the haves and the have nots. In the New York Instances, an article by Katrin Bennhold (2012, April 26) states Greater than a third of British land remains to be in aristocratic palms, in accordance with a 2010 possession survey by Nation Life journal.
In the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition cupboard, 15 of the 23 ministers went to Oxford or Cambridge. With this in thoughts, Webber’s multidimensional mannequin of inequality and his argument that it’s energy slightly than class that finally determines the distribution of sources in society (Habibis & Walter, 2009, p.19) can be utilized to elucidate how London is at present being ruled. Webber positioned a lot emphasis on the market and in doing so was capable of account for the significance of non-material sources, equivalent to schooling and expertise. Most of these dwelling in the East London in the lead as much as the Olympics had been younger, missing a correct schooling or ability base and due to this fact had little or no relationship to the market, and so, no energy.
Like Webber, Bourdieu additionally believed that non-economic components had been vital as sources of social energy (Habibas & Walter, 2009, p. 50). He would have made a lot of the proven fact that, of London’s elite and those that at present maintain energy, most attended the similar prestigious non-public colleges, due to this fact creating “social and cultural capital” to make use of as a useful resource that few in the jap boroughs might even dream of. In the lead as much as the London 2012 Olympics the world was confronted with what has grow to be identified now as the International Monetary Disaster (GFC). This financial melancholy led to a rise in unemployment and poverty all through the world, notably in the case of these already belonging to socially excluded teams.
Social exclusion relates not solely to financial drawback however contains the exclusion of individuals or teams from participation in mainstream social and financial life (Habibis and Walter 2009, p.78). The influence of the GFC was reported as leaving a complete technology of younger individuals with alternatives that don’t dwell as much as their aspirations, to the level the place they might abandon hope for the future in any respect. The disaster means they virtually invariably face fewer and fewer nicely paid entry-level jobs at each stage, from graduate openings to manufacturing facility work (Apps, 2011).
This unrest led to the London riots solely 12 months earlier than the metropolis was to host the Olympics. London’s Olympic bid was promoted as being aimed straight at growing an in depth renewal course of to handle the social and financial issues confronted by these dwelling in the jap boroughs (LERI, 2007, p. 5). In financial phrases, the infrastructural developments and huge constructing initiatives are vital as a result of of their capacity to draw funding and enhance employment alternatives. For London, the video games associated development exercise is estimated to help a £13.5 billion contribution to the UK GDP and the equal of 267, 000 years of employment in the UK financial system between 2005 and 2017 (Oxford Economics, 2012, p.2).
Nevertheless, nationwide figures from December 2012 present a decline of 25 000 development jobs throughout the 12 months (Moulds, 2012). In the lead as much as the Athens Olympics in 2004, employment went up by 7%, nonetheless as soon as the video games had been over Greek trade misplaced 70 000 jobs, primarily in development (LERI, 2007, p.55). The financial advantages from the flagship developments and main initiatives are speculated to filter right down to all teams over time, but for socially excluded teams, there are sometimes no advantages. As a substitute, the impacts are sometimes damaging, with home costs rising and the price of dwelling growing. “Those that benefit are the present asset holders and prosperous center class” (Ryan-Collins & Jackson, 2008, p.four). The social and cultural impacts of internet hosting the Olympics have in the previous been extra about the ‘really feel good’ points of the video games (Smith, 2009, p.117), than any explicit kind of social sustainability.
Previous Olympic host cities, notably Atlanta, Athens and Sydney, have tried to make use of the video games as a possibility for long-term social legacies. Nevertheless analysis means that Sydney was the solely metropolis the place a legacy for a socially excluded group (the Homelessness Protocol) was lasting (Minnaert, 2011, p.370). For East London, three vital modifications have taken place since the Olympics. Firstly, transport providers to the space, particularly Stratford have been dramatically improved. Secondly, with a purpose to compete with the big new Westfield procuring centre, the native Stratford procuring centre was given a makeover, but remains to be offering low-cost, reasonably priced items for low earnings households.
And at last, native colleges have benefitted to the extent that they’ve lifted their efficiency from very poor to have the ability to compete with the nationwide ranges (Energy, 2012). Minnaert (2011, p.363) has recognised three rising Olympic legacies for socially excluded teams; expertise/volunteering, employment, and sports activities participation. The Olympics has been acknowledged as offering volunteering programmes that enhance expertise and employability, but Hiller (2006, p.320) highlights that the mannequin for the Olympic volunteer is finest suited to primarily white collar employees.
The overwhelming majority of London’s unemployed are younger, with a poor schooling and little ability base. As identified by Habibis and Walter (2009, p. 134) ours is a data primarily based society and those that possess the data and expertise (the extremely educated) are the ones who achieve entry to the rewards. The identical subject applies when reviewing the thought of elevated employment alternatives for the host metropolis inhabitants. While it’s abundantly apparent that sure, there are extra jobs, most should not evenly distributed; employment alternatives normally benefit those that have already got the expertise and schooling required to hunt and procure work, with or with out, these elevated alternatives (Minneart, 2011, p. 363).
The financial influence of the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic video games (2012, p.32) states that 3000 beforehand unemployed employees (70% of them from the host boroughs) had been employed in the development of the Olympic Park and Athletes village, but these jobs are unlikely to be everlasting as analysis into the legacies of the Barcelona and Athens Olympics means that job creation tends to be short-term, typically stuffed by migrant and transient employees, with little or no change in total employment charges (East Thames Group, 2007 p.four).
One of London’s guarantees throughout the bidding for the 2012 Olympic video games was to encourage a new technology to take up sport (DCMS, 2012, p.three). In the previous the Olympics has been linked to elevated participation in sport (Minnaert, 2011, p.363), but there’s little to counsel that these new members are from any socially excluded teams. Though cash, or lack of it, could play a half on this, one other inhibiting issue is that sport involvement can also be linked to cultural capital (Minnaert, 2011, p.363). Bourdieu used cultural capital to discuss with a kind of worth related to consumption patterns, life-style decisions, social attributes and formal qualifications (Habibis & Walter, 2009, p. 48). It’s corresponding to different sources like financial capital in that it not solely impacts existence but in addition life possibilities.
Bourdieu believed cultural capital could possibly be transformed to financial capital by way of schooling. By sending their kids to costly non-public colleges, working class mother and father should buy the cultural energy wanted to maneuver into center class jobs (Habibis & Walter, 2009, p.109). It’s nonetheless too early to inform whether or not London has succeeded in getting extra individuals to take up a sport, however proof means that in the previous the Olympics has failed to indicate sustained participation as soon as it’s over (Minnaert, 2011, p. 363).
Those that make the selections in London at this time hail not from backgrounds that anybody in East London might probably relate to. The present UK conservative-liberal coalition authorities is comprised primarily of the prosperous, privately educated, higher class. They and the world enterprise leaders of the world had been the determination makers for the London Olympics and determined how London was to be modified and regenerated. Western nations are at present seeing a rising affect of neoliberal discourses the place the shift to a market influenced distribution has taken the place of a state associated redistribution (Habibis & Walter, 2009, p.105).
Certainly the London Olympics has even been referred to as the Neoliberal video games (Renton, 2012). Renton (2012) argues that with all the company sponsorship from entities equivalent to BP, McDonalds, and Rio Tinto, the 2012 Olympic video games are a reflection of the injustices and inequalities of the present financial system.
One of the 5 authorities guarantees of the Olympic legacy was to display that the UK is a artistic, inclusive and welcoming place to dwell in, go to and for enterprise (LERI, 2009, p.6). But in the lead as much as the video games, there was solutions of ‘social cleaning’ occurring as councils tried to relocate these claiming the housing benefit to areas outdoors the metropolis (Bowater, 2012). There’s additionally nonetheless debate over whether or not the Olympic legacy of reasonably priced housing will eventuate. Inexpensive housing was additionally meant to be one of the legacies of the London Olympics, but with the latest cap on the housing benefit, many are uncertain that these with low earnings will be capable to stay in the regenerated areas (Moore, 2012).
In conclusion, it’s famous that whereas internet hosting the Olympics boosts a cities worldwide profile, notably concerning funding and tourism it doesn’t benefit all. Whereas some enhancements have been seen in the host boroughs like higher college performances, extra hopefulness and resilience, the growing world monetary pressure is inflicting cuts to funding and sources that will now flip the clock again and leave these areas even worse off than they had been earlier than the Olympics. The lasting legacy could possibly be that with the native sporting services eliminated to make approach for the massive Olympic complexes, many will not be capable to afford to make use of them.
With class nonetheless taking part in such an vital position in figuring out life possibilities, notably in London, the have to construct a social system the place schooling and expertise acquisition are genuinely primarily based on meritocratic principals slightly than class hierarchy is the solely approach that inequality could be diminished. The Olympics has at all times been primarily based on such meritocratic principals and it’s the socially duty of these in energy to see that as a lot public funding is spent on financing such a massive occasion, that it may well solely be justified if all benefit by being utterly socially inclusive.

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