Macro-environmental factors influencing the preparation of the Ukrainian Olympic team: a comparative PEST analysis of the Tokyo 2020 and Paris 2024 cycles

The study examined how macro-environmental factors influenced the preparation of the Ukrainian national Olympic team across two distinct crisis contexts—the Tokyo 2020 and Paris 2024 Olympic cycles. A PEST-based expert survey was applied to assess political, economic, socio-cultural, and technological factors. Two validated questionnaires were used. Twenty-four high-performance athletes who participated in the Olympic Games were involved as experts. The structure of macro-environmental influence differs between the two cycles. In the Tokyo cycle, economic factors had the greatest weight (43%), while political and socio-cultural factors played a more limited role. In contrast, the Paris cycle was characterized by a substantial increase in the importance of political (28%) and socio-cultural (25%) factors, largely related to wartime conditions. Technological factors remained constrained in both cycles. Expert agreement was moderate but statistically significant (Tokyo: W = 0.38, p < 0.001; Paris: W = 0.26, p < 0.001). The findings show that macro-environmental influences on Olympic preparation are not stable and shift across crisis contexts. The proposed instrument offers a structured way to assess the direction and relative importance of external pressures in national sport systems.