- Introduction and My Position
The Olympics Games are an event that excites the world, places the host city at the center of worldwide conversations, and allows the world to tune in to support a team of athletes representing their country. However, is this the reality for the people who live in those host cities? I am addressing you today because this mega sports event is coming to your city, to your neighborhood. Indeed, Paris won the bid to host the 2024 Summer Olympics Games (Paris 2024 2020, 3). How does it concern you, the community of Seine-Saint-Denis? Because Paris 2024 is promising a focus on the department to massively contribute to its economic and social development (Paris 2024 2021, 7). While it sounds great on paper, I am writing this briefing to highlight the challenges that come with these promises, which you are currently living through, and how, as a community, you can ensure that you benefit from this pour of money and attraction.
I am writing to you, not as a member of your community but as an academic from a place close to yours who has done extensive research on your community, your history and the challenges you face. From that research, I write a list of recommendations based on other communities’ work worldwide that could ultimately benefit your case. I recognized that I am not from the same socio-political and economic background as you. Indeed, I was born and raised in France, like most of you, but in Versailles, the 4th city of more than 50 000 inhabitants with the highest standard of living in France (Molina 2020). While it is considered a banlieue as well, it is wealthy and prestigious with a very different reputation from your banlieue (Selby 2009, 90; Dikeç 2007, 4). Now you might be wondering why you should listen to my recommendations considering my background. I believe that change starts locally and focusing on communities and places around where we are from is crucial. I want to put my research skills in urban planning and community-based actions to your benefit and offer you all the tools you might need, in addition to your experiences and local knowledge, to best face the challenges you are currently experiencing. I will bring you the stories and experiences of other communities like you that have managed or attempted to fight back to ensure that new infrastructures benefit them first and that promises are kept. You will find in this community briefing a contextualisation of this case with an explanation of the history of the banlieues, the link to your community, what challenges you are facing and finally some recommendations to best face those challenges.
- History of the Banlieues and its Community
To best come up with fitting recommendations, it is crucial to understand where a community comes from and how it was created. In your case, I want to explain the origins of the banlieues, their link to France’s urban planning history and how this space has created or was forced to create, such a solid and unique community. Firstly, the word banlieue is the literal translation of suburb; however, with time, the term started to carry negative connotations (Dikeç 2007, 7). Indeed, while there are richer banlieues such as Versailles, the term is most often associated with a poor socio-political and economic situation as well as images of exclusion, social housing, unemployment and poverty that has been built and sustained by hundreds of years of French urban planning (Angélil and Siress 2012, 57; Selby 2009, 90; Dikeç 2007, 7). While banlieues can be found all around France, I decided to focus primarily on the ones surrounding Paris. These originate from the first major urban modernization undertaken in Paris by Baron Georges Haussmann at the time of Emperor Napoleon III (Gandy 1999, 23). This massive transformation looked to convert “a congested medieval city into a dynamic modern metropolis” (27). With this grand urban reconstruction came the first movement that drove the poorer classes out of the city core towards the periphery, which, after 1918, became the banlieues (Cohen 2006, 92). What followed this movement was years of French urban planning that created and maintained this divide between the city core and the periphery, where the center represents power, wealth and exclusiveness while the outskirts are reserved for the lower classes, the immigrants, the marginalized (Angélil and Siress 2012, 59). It is clear that France’s urban planning deliberately placed the banlieues, both its location and its community, at the periphery of society.
The banlieues are populated by a majority of post-war North African immigrants and, therefore, are highly racially and ethnically diverse which leads to further social injustices and exclusion as French urban policy is tightly linked to its issues with immigration and citizenship (Cohen 2006, 93; Beaman 2017, 56; Dikeç 2007, 33). These injustices, such as poor living conditions, low employment rates and poverty, have led to the growing rage of banlieues residents and rising tensions between those residents and the authorities (Angélil and Siress 2012, 58-62). You probably remember the uprising of autumn 2005 when despair led the youth of the banlieues to acts of destruction around the neighborhoods to protest the injustices and the abandonment they were facing (Cohen 2006, 99). Similar protests and unrest happened last summer after the murder of a young banlieue inhabitant by a policeman (Radford 2023), showing the sustained injustices, violence and marginalization faced by the residents of the banlieues and the divide between their community and the privileged city-core and its authorities. While those injustices create tensions, they also strengthen solidarity between community members (Beaman 2017, 59) and this solidarity and sense of community is the essence of this briefing. Indeed, it has been proven that French urban policies leave the banlieues at the periphery, so those communities must act to improve their living conditions.
The banlieues I am focusing on in this briefing are the ones in the department of Seine-Saint-Denis where the 2024 Paris Olympic Games are partly going to take place. Seine-Saint-Denis has the lowest average standard of living in Metropolitan France and the highest poverty rate of 28.4% (Insee 2021; Snaije 2022). Paris 2024 (2021) recognizes those rates and the urban, social and territorial fractures that the department faces (19) and believes that the benefits of hosting this mega-sporting event will contribute to the economic and urban development of the department (17). However, can a sports event ‘fix’ years of unjust urban planning and marginalization? Can the community benefit from the involvement of the organizers? This briefing will argue that the event itself will not ‘fix’ those injustices but if the community affected follows specific recommendations, it can attempt to benefit from the Games. The community I am focusing on, the one I am currently addressing, is the inhabitants of the banlieues of Seine-Saint-Denis who are directly impacted by the Paris 2024 games at the intersections between Saint-Ouen, Saint-Denis and l’Île-Saint Denis (Sarango 2023). It is made of the working and low-income classes who have lived in Saint-Denis for decades and have experienced the marginalization of French urban policies and faced abandonment from the rest of the country. It is also a community built on strength and solidarity which will be crucial for effective community-based actions.
- The Challenges – The Legacy of the Olympic Village
The focus of Paris 2024 on Seine-Saint-Denis poses the questions of who will ultimately benefit from new infrastructures and the amount of money poured into the department. While the city’s bid announced that it will attempt to host cheap and sustainable games and will rely on existing infrastructures to do so, 95% of the new infrastructures that they do need to build are located in Seine-Saint-Denis (Leussier 2019; Snaije 2022). 80% of the public investment unlocked for the games to build those infrastructures is therefore being poured into the department (Mella 2023). Cécile Gintrac, a geographer living in Saint-Denis since 2011, notes that there has never been such a large amount of money poured into Seine-Saint-Denis (Enjeux 2024, 2019). One prominent new infrastructure that I will focus on is the Olympic Village. It is being constructed in Seine-Saint-Denis and is planned to be mainly transformed into housing units, with the promise of 40% of public housing in the city’s bid (Saint-Denis 2023; Impact 2024 2021, 40; Gagnepain 2023). The transformed Olympic Village will welcome 6,000 residents and offer 6,000 employment opportunities (Saint-Denis 2023). The objective is to improve the area’s socio-economic development with this new neighborhood of opportunities (Impact 2024 2021, 29). Finally, the Games note that the improvement of the area is to be done in collaboration with the local stakeholders to ensure the development of an inclusive society that takes into account the needs of all its citizens (40). The Games’ promises seem to benefit the community of Saint-Denis, to include them in the decision-making and to ensure the area’s economic, social and urban development.
However, the community of Seine-Saint-Denis does not have a say in where and how the money being poured into their department will be best used and ensure that they benefit from it. Indeed, because large amounts of money are involved, decisions are made fast and the community is not taking part in the actual decision-making. While Paris 2024 is hosting public meetings in an attempt to include the locals in the decision-making process, Cécile notes that few residents show up and those that do are being ignored because it seems that the decisions have already been made under the pretense of short delays and efficiency (Enjeux 2024, 2019; Gagnepain, 2023). A similar turn of events happened during the 2012 London Olympics Games planning when tensions arose between local communities and organizers on questions of speed and efficiency as the community was ignored in favor of top-down decision-making (Davis and Thornley 2010, 97). While the games promise that the renovations are being decided upon by discussing with local actors and collectivities (Impact 2024 2021, 29), the reality shows the opposite. This reality suggests that the community cannot rely on the Games’ empty promises to benefit from the legacy of the Olympics but on its own actions.
Another main challenge that arises from the Olympic Village and the promises of new housing units is the lack of affordability for the main residents of Seine-Saint-Denis. Firstly, the price per square meter is announced at 7 500 euros while the average price per square meter in the city is 4 175 euros (Sarango 2023; Gagnepain 2023). A clear rise already demonstrates that the local community might not be taken into account as much as what was promised originally. Secondly, the promise of 40% converted public housing units has already decreased to 25%, as confirmed by the city of Saint-Denis (Mella 2023; Saint-Denis 2023; Gagnepain 2023). Residents express their despair, recognizing that they cannot afford these new apartments and fearing the influx of wealthier communities from the city-core (Sarango 2023; Leussier 2019; Kokabi 2020). The promise of inclusive public housing turns into a reality of expensive accommodations that will benefit estate agents and wealthy Parisians but not the local community of Saint-Denis. A link can be made between this reality and the history of the community of the banlieues. Indeed, they have constantly been displaced to the periphery, both geographically and socially, and a mega sports event will not suddenly fix years of exclusion and injustices. By making the Olympic Village housing so expensive, social exclusion is perpetuated within the banlieues. If the residents of the banlieues cannot afford to live there anymore, where will they go? The Games’ false promises of including the community in the decision-making process, affordable housing, and social and economic development demonstrate how the community cannot benefit from the legacy of Paris 2024.
Expectations of who will benefit and the reality are very different in the case of Olympic legacies. Indeed, it often leads to “exacerbated urban inequalities.” (Snaije, 2022) and the inexistent benefits towards existing communities (Davis and Thornley 2010, 89). The 2024 Paris Games followed the Olympic motto, “faster, higher, stronger” (Paris 2024 2020, 7), by promising faster action towards the urgent climate crisis, higher demands and strengths in numbers and community (Ibid.). However, the actual legacy of these games does not seem to follow this motto and those promises. Its legacy proves to be unaffordable housing for local communities, 6,000 new wealthy neighbors (Gagnepain 2023) and proof once again that the banlieues are placed at the periphery. Similar events happened in previous Olympics. Indeed, the London Olympics promised to be a “model for social inclusion” (Wainwright 2022) and were going to deliver 30,000-40,000 affordable housing for the area in East London (Snaije 2022; Wainwright 2022). Ten years later, only 13,000 were constructed and 11% of them were affordable to some locals (Snaije 2022; Wainwright 2022). The Athens Olympics promised to leave Athens as a modern city with new transport and infrastructure but, in reality, most of the new facilities were never converted into usable venues, leaving them abandoned (Kissoudi 2010, 2793). It is repeatedly proven that Olympic Games urban plans do not meet the promises made to local communities and suggest that any gain will have to be made through other means, such as community-based actions.
- The Recommendations
The main focus of this community briefing is to best recommend your community on which actions to put in place to best face those challenges and ensure that the legacy of Paris 2024 benefits the community of Seine-Saint-Denis socially, economically and environmentally. It is crucial to ensure that the banlieues are not related to the periphery once again and, as proven over the years, this will not be done through governmental and corporate actions but through community-based ones. I will outline how you, the residents of Seine-Saint-Denis, can use community organizing to collaborate with and learn from other organizations and establish a Community Land Trust to best ensure that this legacy benefits you. Community organizing is about engaging with the residents of an area on a challenge that concerns them directly and building connections between them and others to face those issues (Hasan 2022). In your context, all members of the community are concerned and can bring their knowledge, experiences and skills to best organize and ensure justice. Residents interviewed in the documentary Enjeux 2024 (2019) suggested the need for the community to talk, connect and build relationships so that when a challenge such as the housing situation linked to the Olympic Village arises, the community can get together and become actors of what is happening in the city. The diversity of backgrounds, ages and professions is community organizing treasure. Indeed, I recommend all to join: those who have lived in the city their whole life, those who moved recently, those with previous organizing skills and those with urban planning skills, all knowledge and experiences are needed to best face the challenge.
Members of the community have already started to organize over the issues by forming the Comité de Vigilance JO 2024 to ensure that all the money poured into Seine-Saint-Denis serves to improve their living conditions (Leussier 2019). When it started in 2017, the collective wanted to understand the Games’ impact on Saint-Denis; now, they want to ensure that the positive legacy promised will happen (Gagnepain 2023). In addition to highlighting problematic plans and other campaigning projects, they have already offered solutions and alternatives to best benefit the people of Saint-Denis (Snaije 2022). Their demands regarding the legacy of the Olympic Village include follow-up public meetings to best ensure the future of the infrastructures and ensure that the community is a part of the decision-making and an independent monitoring center focused specifically on the evolution of the housing situation (Comité de vigilance JO 2024 2023). While the demands and recommendations are already proof of effective organizing, I recommend that the community of Saint-Denis goes a step further to enact change from the community that is not dependent on higher powers.
Firstly, I recommend learning from and collaborating with other coalitions and organizations. During the 2012 London Olympics, the Counter Olympics Network was formed and brought together the different groups affected by the Olympics around questions of housing, public and green spaces (Boykoff 2014, 93). I suggest learning from this network and building one of your own by joining the European Action Coalition for the right to Housing and to the City. The EAC connects different movements across European cities to strengthen the fight and take action on European Housing issues (EAC 2023; Bonfert 2021, 524). One of the French organizations part of the EAC is the Droit Au Logement (DAL – Right to Housing) which fights for housing rights in the Paris region (EAC 2020). They believe in the collective participation of their members in the decision-making process and the elaboration of strategies to ensure affordable housing (Ibid.). I highly recommend the community of Saint-Denis and the Comité Vigilance JO 2024 to join in with DAL at the next meeting of the EAC from November 9th to 12th in Paris to discuss strategies with other groups, learn from their experience and find new skills to best fight your challenge (EAC 2023). It is crucial to learn from other communities doing similar work to figure out the best action plan. Like the Londoners in 2012, be part of a collective, share your experience and come back to your solid and connected community to disperse this knowledge and those skills and act in favor of the residents of Saint-Denis against the false promises of Paris 2024.
A practical recommendation I would like to introduce is a community land trust (CLT). A CLT is a perfect representation of a community-led response to housing problems as it leads to the ownership of the land a property is on (Engelsman, Rowe and Southern 2018, 103-105). To achieve a CLT, a non-profit collective buys the land and acts as its steward (Davis 2010, 25). The community’s poorest residents can then get priority access to affordable housing on the land (Ibid.). Moreover, the land is considered shared and preserved heritage between the community across generations to ensure that the local community always has access to affordable housing in its area and is not displaced or gentrified (4). In the context of Saint-Denis, a CLT could be established over the Olympic Village to ensure a legacy that benefits the local community now and in years to come. CLTs often originate from community organizing and activism in response to local injustices and can be seen as the defense of space from local communities (Engelsman, Rowe and Southern 2018, 109-119). One example of a successful CLT is the community of Cooper Square in New York City (Engelsman, Rowe and Southern 2018, 110). The neighborhood has many cultures and immigrant workers with a history of working-class activism (112). They organized as a community to buy and own the land to ensure affordable housing and combat displacement and gentrification (114). I would recommend the community of Saint-Denis gets inspired by Cooper Square, keeps organizing under Comité Vigilance JO 2024 and joins in with EAC and DAL to collect funding and investment to create a Community Land Trust on the land of the Olympic Village. It is a very ambitious project and it might take years to implement; the Cooper Square community took over 50 years to implement a CLT successfully (112). However, it could ensure that Saint-Denis reclaims its right to space and takes control over the legacy of a sport event that promised to benefit them but is currently failing to keep those promises.
Now all of you must realize that your community, the banlieues, deserve to be included; it is your right. Henry Lefebvre, a French philosopher, talked of a “right to the city” (Lefebvre 1967, 29), which Angélil and Siress (2012) complemented by highlighting that this right does not just come from the center of a city but also from its margins, from its periphery (64). Moreover, they note the importance of including political, economic and social equality in the meaning of this right (Ibid.). You, therefore, have a right to occupy the space you belong in and you have the right to demand fair and just treatment and affordable housing. After having been relegated to the periphery throughout France’s urban planning eras, you can use the opportunity offered by the Paris 2024 Olympics to change the narrative. Instead of being at the periphery, you are at its core. Nevertheless, do not trust the leaders to keep their promises. Instead, take the matter into your own hands and organize to ensure that the legacy of these urban plans and those Olympic games benefit you first and foremost. The right to your city and your space must be defined by your community, not others. I hope this briefing provides you with the right tools to start this work.
- Reference List
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Zimmer, Alex and Manon Vergerio, dirs. Enjeux 2024. Vimeo: Alex Zimmer, 2019.
