Did the Eurovision Song Contest in 2024 Affect Reported Crimes in the Hosting City?
Abstract
We examine whether hosting the 2024 Eurovision Song Contest affected reported crime in Malmö, Sweden. Eurovision generated large visitor inflows and a substantial police reinforcement, creating a unique disruption to the city's routine activities. Using weekly crime data for 2021–2024 and time-series regression models with log-transformed outcomes and weather controls, we find that non-police-initiated crimes declined by 10.2% and property crimes by 8.6% during the contest week, while vandalism increased by 20.6% and police-initiated detections rose by 8.0%. A formal cumulative three-week displacement test shows that the decline in non-police-initiated and property crimes is fully offset by increases in adjacent weeks, consistent with intertemporal displacement rather than a net reduction. In contrast, vandalism shows a significant net increase over the three-week window.
Fields of Study & Subjects
Sports
Gender
and Society
Soviet and Russian History
Sport and Mega-Event Impacts
Publication details
- Journal / source
- Nordic Journal of Criminology
- Publisher
- Scandinavian University Press
- Volume
- 28
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 1–9
- Publication date
- 9 June 2026
- Language
- EN