By Vlad Los
The arguably most controversial sports event of this year is only a few days away: the 2022 football world cup will kick off on Sunday, the 20th of November in the Qatari city of al-Chaur at a stadium that didn’t exist before 2015. As it became clear that none of the 32 football associations considered boycotting the event, the big question was passed on to the public: to watch or not to watch.
The last 100 years of sports history do not lack significant events of a global scale in places that for a considerable number of people seemed to be at the very least controversial and for many, especially in the West, quite obviously the least suitable venues possible. The Olympic Games of 1936 in Berlin and 2014 in Sochi were followed by annexations of foreign territories. The 1980 Olympics took place in Moscow while the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan was going on.
International sports have always been platforms for political messaging of all kinds and space for illiberal regimes to display their strength and stability and nurture ties with the Western as well as developing democracies. It is no coincidence that many of the international sports federations and associations are sponsored, influenced, and not seldom corrupted by countries like Russia, China, Gulf states, etc. Instances of such influence include Russian and Belarussian boxers, many of whom are complicit in the Russian political agenda and supportive of the war against Ukraine, being allowed by the International Boxing Association, funded by Gazprom, to compete on the international stage.
In sports with relatively low coverage, numerous events like this usually remain unaddressed by the broad public. Now, football is a different story, with roughly half a planet having watched the latest world cup. When the right to host the event in 2018 and 2022 was given to Russia and Qatar respectively by FIFA in 2010, the non-transparent decision-making process was followed by a number of corruption scandals around the federation and drew a lot of public attention, which resulted in operational changes inside FIFA but not in the revocation of the hosting rights. Now that football’s biggest event is about to take place in Qatar more than 12 years after, the voices calling for a boycott are loud in the West. But of all these countries, Qatar is the one getting a hard time. This all only underlines the Western hypocrisy and moral downfall. But let us look at this in detail.
The grandiose sports events, like the Olympics or World Cups, are often assumed to be the engine of liberal modern ideas and higher living standards for the host countries. They supposedly display the country's openness to the world and create benefits for the local populations through investments in jobs and infrastructure. This idea, of course, has been proven to be terribly wrong on numerous occasions. The 2008 Olympics in Beijing did open the country for investments and tourism but were also followed by a significant increase in party control, repressions, and China eventually becoming a black box of a country (check out our podcast on that topic). The facilities in Brazil after the 2016 Olympics and in South Africa after the 2010 World Cup are rarely being used despite the enormous investments made. Nonetheless, beyond this narrative, hardly any host country has actually shown any noticeable improvements in human rights, social liberties or economic development.
The argument that the World Cup will suddenly make Qatar a more free and liberal country does, therefore, not hold up at all. The economic advantage is questionable as well, as well, as it is already a highly developed country with one of the largest GDPs per capita in the world. Hosting the World Cup in Qatar, even if the corruption allegations are unfounded, is a rather questionable endeavour. A World Cup in winter makes little sense with the winter holiday season approaching and the ongoing football season already having an extremely tight match schedule (followed by typically more injured players). But now that it is taking place nevertheless, is the amount of criticism it’s getting justified?
Activists do not have such a strong track record of pointing out problems within host countries:
The FIFA World Cup 2018 was held in Russia, that at the time controlled an illegally annexed Ukrainian Crimea, supporting (including militarily) the separatists in the east of Ukraine and bombing Syria. And this is without mentioning the internal political and social situation in Russia. But this was overlooked by the broad public, including that of the democratic part of the world. The event ended up being a huge success, attracting more than 3.5 billion viewers and promoting Russia’s image as an open and friendly country worldwide. For the West European public, Russia remained that imaginary place with great culture and slightly weird but friendly people, who would sell you cheap gas and shop in European luxury stores. The “business as usual” continued and the trade relations improved.
The 2022 Winter Olympics in China were one of the most bizarre events in my memory, with practically no actual snow, ultra-strict controls for the athletes, and barely any fans allowed to the country and, therefore, to the venues due to the dictatorial “zero-covid” policy of the party. It was a completely different China than in 2008. Despite raising some controversy in the western media, mostly in the US due to geopolitical reasons, this event nonetheless allowed the Chinese leadership to display how far they’ve come in concentrating their power. This barely influenced European-Chinese relations: German companies like Volkswagen kept investing large amounts of money in Chinese projects and European infrastructure was still being sold to Chinese investors with governmental ties.
Qatar is by no means a perfect place to live, especially for women or sexual, religious, and other minorities. Nonetheless, it is also one of the most important allies of the Western powers. Most of the NATO rescue flights from Afghanistan in August-September 2021 went through the USAF Base in Qatar. After Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Germany asked Qatar for quick help in diversifying natural gas imports, realising the situation it was put in by its short-sighted energy policies. Unlike Russia or China, Qatar is not an aggressive military power with imperialistic ambitions, but rather a cooperating ally. However, it is Qatar, that is getting the disproportionate amount of coverage, and boycott calls. The apparently horrendous labour conditions at the venues are being brought up, despite the data being far from reliable. The deplorable LBGT rights policies are pointed at, although they were not crucial debates in previous events.
The fight for human rights and the promotion of the ideals of individual freedoms and gender equality is a well-motivated and honourable enterprise. However, the disproportionate amount of outrage in the case of Qatar unveils another trend, which is much deeper and more insidious. Western Europeans in their asserted moral superiority, in which the human rights benchmark scale tends to only have two points (“just like us” and “deplorable dictatorship”), fail to criticize the big imperial powers to the same extent as they do with smaller, often cooperating or even allied states, such as Hungary or, for that matter, Qatar.
Timothy Snyder, a Yale history professor, once pointed out, that the EU’s purpose was to soften the fall of the European empires. The colonial thinking in Europe was therefore transformed and continued, ending up in negotiating and cooperating with flawed but big and powerful empires, while mercilessly lecturing smaller emerging countries. Until we stop giving platforms to dictators, we won’t escape the moral downfall of our own societies. Until we learn to enter the discussions with a clear mind and achievable goals, we won’t be able to nurture nor promote our liberal democratic values in the world.
Now, whether to watch the matches or not, should be a decision made by everyone individually. A remote viewing boycott is unlikely to make any significant results, considering that the broadcasting rights have already been sold and the next events planned decades in advance. What this event has already shown us, however, is that it’s high time to reexamine our own views and values. The big sports are coming back to the West: Germany and France in 2024, Italy and North America in 2026, and the USA in 2028. Time will show whether we will be able to stand up to the high standards we expect from others. And whether our current outrage is a valid manifestation of our beliefs or a hypocritical search for an easy-to-blame figure.
Vladyslav Los Vladyslav Los is the president of BridgeEurope Online Chapter since April 2021. His work is mainly concentrated on digital formats for BridgeEurope and includes the re-launch of the BridgeEurope podcast and blog. Vlad's political interests lie in promoting civility and solution-based discourse, drawing attention to importance of political and general education.
Unlike many of the members, whose background is in political science, Vlad is a third year Bachelor student in Physics, showing how the BridgeEurope debate naturally extends beyond the realm of politics students.
BridgeEurope Blog serves as a platform for reflection and discussion on current topics. The opinions expressed in the blog represent the view of the authors solely and not the view of BridgeEurope.
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The arguably most controversial sports event of this year is only a few days away: the 2022 football world cup will kick off on Sunday, the 20th of November in the Qatari city of al-Chaur at a stadium that didn’t exist before 2015. As it became clear that none of the 32 football associations considered boycotting the event, the big question was passed on to the public: to watch or not to watch.