Orientalism and its Effects on Modern Day Sportswashing

Wahaj Ali, Verrazzano Class of 2024, completed major in Biology

I have been a huge fan of sports, particularly soccer, from a very young age and as I have grown up I’ve begun to see the actual power of the sport. Soccer, a sport that is played by youth all over the world, was in fact plagued with corruption at all levels. The 2015 uncovering of the exploitation at the highest level of football completed by the higher-ups of FIFA, became the tipping point for many viewers, as it highlighted the value of money over the integrity of the sport.

Match-fixing has always been prevalent; however, we’ve never had cases of nations paying FIFA members to be able host World Cups until now. I began to realize the power of not only soccer, but other sports as well, and as the 2022 World Cup inched closer the term “Sportswashing” became more apparent.

Sportswashing is the use of soft power, which is power through attraction as opposed to coercion, in order to divert controversial issues a nation is facing.

I looked at Sportswashing as a new concept; however, through completing this project I learned that while it is a new phrase, the concept itself has been around for years. I learned how Sportswashing has a very strong impact on a nation's geopolitical standing. Sports are an easy and safe way to promote tourism, show off your prominent cities, and take away any negative news coming out about your nation.

As this process became more mainstream, regular media outlets would write about its dangers. I began to realize that many of these articles were highlighting the usage of Sportswashing by MENA nations (Middle East and North Africa). 

Its concept has recently been used by Russia (2018 World Cup), and China (2008 Summer Olympics and Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics). However, their usage was not highlighted. Instead, the takeovers of soccer teams by Qatar and Saudi were protested against, deals that if deemed harmful could easily be blocked by the English parliament. Learning more about Orientalism and how prominent it is in our society, I began to put two and two together and found that many of the views pushed out about Sportswashing were derived from Orientalist views.