LENSKYJ: Well, we could start with Beijing 2008. What have we seen countries do with repressive traditions in recent years with major global sporting events? I mean, we've had this question, I guess, since the '36 Olympics in Berlin under the Nazi regime there. There isn't this bridging of gaps between warring countries really.įOLKENFLIK: A spokesperson for the Saudi Embassy in Washington, D.C., told NPR this week that, quote, "the notion that the transformative reforms currently underway in the kingdom are simply an attempt to improve the kingdom's image are widely off the mark," end quote. People who have documented the reality in Olympic villages or in the background to any Olympic event of recent history know that a lot of the political differences are actually played out on the field or in the pool. LENSKYJ: The mainstream media would have you think that that's the case because they love doing these kind of feel-good human interest stories around how two opponents from different countries to embrace stuff to the event or sought asylum and got married in the host country or the kinds of stories that grab mainstream media attention. When their proponents - including myself - get involved with applying these concepts to sport, especially Olympic sport and sport mega-events, we get a very negative reception because nobody wants to hear kind of negativity around their favorite teams and their favorite events and so on.įOLKENFLIK: Is there no truth to that? That is, is there no way in which sport can bridge ideological differences, can allow people to connect across regimes, across borders in a way that perhaps cuts against the idea of repression? And that sort of opened the floodgates for a lot of scholars and activists and investigative journalists to dig deeper into sport mega-events to see the nastiness that goes on behind the scenes. investigative journalist Andrew Jennings was one of the lone voices saying - or uncovering the bribery and corruption behind the Olympic bid process. When I started looking at these issues in the late 1980s, the U.K. In that time, what shift, if any, have you seen in how consumers see how closely knit or how much they want to divide the question of thinking about politics, thinking about morality and thinking about sport on the other side?
And as an Australian colleague of mine said, not just that sport and politics mix, they're married with children.įOLKENFLIK: You began studying this question decades ago. LENSKYJ: He's walking in the footsteps of a long line of people like him who are at the head of international federations of some kind, sport federations who get a lot of mileage out of saying let's not bring politics into sport or sport and politics don't mix or something along those lines.
The head of the racing organization, Jean Todt, said this week that motorsports should not, quote, "get involved with political issues." What do you make of his statement? Nice to be here.įOLKENFLIK: The list of human rights violations in Saudi Arabia is long and daunting, including the torture and killing of dissidents, including the assassination of a Washington Post columnist. She's professor emeritus at the University of Toronto. Helen Lenskyj has studied and written extensively on these issues, as well as the politics of global sports. And Qatar hosts next year's FIFA World Cup, despite concerns over human rights violations and autocratic regimes in both countries. China will host February's Winter Olympics. That's the idea that countries with grave human rights abuses, like Saudi Arabia, use global sporting events to burnish their images. Along with it came accusations of sportswashing. When it was announced, that move brought heavy criticism.
F1 and the Middle Eastern countries signed a more than $600 million partnership last year, ensuring the kingdom would host events for at least the next decade. UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: Welcome to Jeddah Corniche Circuit in Saudi Arabia, Formula One's newest, longest and fastest street circuit.įOLKENFLIK: Sunday will feature Saudi Arabia's first Formula One Grand Prix. This weekend, a major coming-out party for racing and for a regime.
0 kommentar(er)
