Du pain et des jeux: the domestic power of the Olympic opening ceremony…

Nekomimi is a slugger reader…

Is it the best of times, or the worst of times, for a city to host the Olympic Games? The titular two cities of the novel refer to London and Paris, and we may look on the opening ceremony of the London 2012 Olympics and compare it with events in Paris last night.

The 2012 opening ceremony to the London Games is held up as a masterful piece of modern propaganda, enthusing and reinforcing the nation and forging a concrete and proud image of a modern Britain. The show was very much aimed at a domestic audience – some of the symbols would be unknown to foreign observers, or they may wonder what all the fuss is about the National Health service when other countries also have health services. Britain had been somewhat lost in terms of its identity, with widespread rioting in British cities the previous year blamed partly on a lack of civic pride. In hindsight, the opening ceremony is also looked upon fondly as a high water mark, a moment of pride and calm before the country descended into a decade of political turmoil and farce which was to follow with Brexit. Since 2016 Britian has had very little to be proud of, the country is divided, the economy is in the doldroms, the Tory government was both incompetent and corrupt, and the humiliating spectacle of their government has been on show for the world to see. But for a brief moment, in the afterglow of the 2012 opening ceremony, it really was Great Britain, united, proud and confident.

In contrast, France saved its political turmoil for precisely this moment. Following the unexpected and inexplicable decision of Emmanuel Macron to call a legislative election on June 09th following his party’s drubbing by the far-right in the preceding European elections, the country is currently ungovernable. The common refrain is that they were elections nobody won; it would perhaps be more accurate to say they were elections everybody won but Macron. Following a campaign characterised by vitriol, slander, litigation and over fifty physical assaults on candidates or party staff, we now have a situation where the left have the most seats, the far-right have the most votes, and no-one has a parliamentary majority. Underneath this there is a desperate leadership scramble and power struggle on the left, the centre and the right. The situation is febrile and calls for calm heads and compromise and coalition-building. Nobody is prepared to offer any.

France is without a prime minister and has no prospect of finding one in the forseeable future. Macron’s PM Gabriel Attal boasted of his party’s performance and promptly resigned, only for Macron to refuse his resignation. The four parties of the New Popular Front have struggled to agree on a candidate; two weeks after the election, they still had no agreement but they now have five parties. Even if they do manage to agree it’s almost a moot point: Macron has stated he will not appoint a PM from the Left and that the PM must represent the “majority”, drawing howls of outrage from the left, the centre and the right with the only major figure to come out in support being Marine Le Pen. Critics point out that you can’t portray yourself as the defender of democracy and then just ignore the results of election. Meanwhile, PM or no PM, the Left has already started passing legislation, their first order of business being to reduce the retirement age to sixty, which is apparently top priority. Oh, and the far-right have already been stuffing ballot boxes in the National Assembly in an attempt to rig votes.

In the middle of this utter circus comes another circus: the Olympic Games. With most of the population nonplussed or actively resenting the Games, they have become a personal embodiment of Macron, who is also actively resented. Paris is currently a police state, access to streets barred by QR codes and electronic surveillance, its iconic landmarks cordoned off behind hoardings, the army on the streets with automatic rifles and their special Olympic mission patches. Macron is desperate to show France in a good and stable light on the world stage, has denied that France is in political turmoil. and even if it is, it’s not his fault (it is, of course entirely his fault) He has pleaded with the French public not to make a scene in front of the world. So of course the CGT, the largest trade union, have called for a general strike, there has been co-ordinated sabotage on the country’s rail network and a foiled neo-nazi plot to attack the Olympic Torch relay. Even God was getting in on the action, sending approximately every rain cloud in France directly to Paris to dampen the opening ceremony. The ceremony itself has been described as tacky, gaudy, uncoordinated and even boring by overseas viewers, leaving perhaps the final and ultimate act of sabotage to the creative directors.

And yet. And yet. Just like the London Games, this show was for domestic political consumption, and it went down a storm. There was a pointed and overtly political thread running through the whole haphazard mess. The values of the Republic – liberty, equality, fraternity and latterly sorority – were emphasised, perhaps drilling home that this republic was almost lost a few short weeks ago. The far-right were incensed at the performance of French singer Aya Nakamura, a French-Malian despite her Japanese stage name. The kitschy Europop soundtrack seemed to consciously re-approriate what has become the unlikely theme music of the far-right. The prominent feature of drag queens, especially the borderline blasphemous re-enactment of the Last Supper, sparked confused howling from traditionalists, a mixture of outrage and humiliation that this is the image France decides to show to the world.

But most importantly, it was a spine-tingling, resonant spectacle. The events of the last six weeks no longer matter, and nor does some foreigners thinking their stage show was tacky or offensive. A grumbling, discordant public is suddenly enthralled and in unison, pacified by dazzling lights and national pride.

We might, in saner moments, wonder why countries bid for the Olympics at all. They’re massively expensive, a huge white elephant for the host nation. Half the events are in sports no-one cares about and the other half are beset by drugs scandals. This is why. The Olympics, the whole sheer ceremony and spectacle of it, are an immensely powerful political tool. It is no coincidence that some of the most evocative moments in modern history feature the Games as a backdrop, most notably the 1936 Games and their use as propaganda by the Nazi regime (Goebbels is hopefully spinning in his grave watching the Olympic torch, instituted by the Nazis to draw a line of direct succession from ancient Greece to Aryan Europe, being carried by people of mixed races and drag queens)

“Bread and circuses” (or perhaps more appropriately in French “Du pain et des jeux”) refers to methods used by Roman dictators to keep the population under control. What is often missed is the public quite like these methods. Just as in London, or Russia, or Beijing, they provide a moment to reset and co-ordinate society with a new mission statement. The term “sportswashing” is often used to apply to Middle-Eastern petro-states using sport as a vehicle to lend legitimacy to their regime, but it works here too. From a self-inflicted position of weakness and almost universal scorn and hatred, Macron suddenly looks presidential again. After almost tearing itself apart over the last six weeks, France has a (kind of) coherent vision of itself it can buy into again. We still don’t have a government, but maybe that’s not important right now. The fighting can wait. Let the Games begin.

This is a guest slot to give a platform for new writers either as a one off, or a prelude to becoming part of the regular Slugger team.