Sports and the Inescapability of Human Rights

Image Credits: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-60867042

 

Summary: The 2022 Qatar World Cup and the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics are two recent examples of sport events which came under fire for violations of human rights in the preparation and execution of the events. Yet, the sporting world reacted in unison to condemn Russia when they invaded Ukraine in the same year. What explains this inconsistency in upholding human rights, and how important is it for the governing bodies of sports to uphold them?

​

On April 4, 2024, the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) announced that the WTA Finals Tournament will be held in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia from 2024–2026, confirming rumours that go back to 2023. The announcement sealed the WTA’s commitment to a partnership with Saudi Arabia — a highly controversial choice criticised by many for the Kingdom’s poor human rights record, its status as an authoritarian state, and the limited rights it offers women. The country also criminalises homosexuality, circumstances particularly pertinent to the WTA — the representative body for a women’s sport that houses several openly queer players. Ultimately, Saudi Arabia’s deep pockets and willingness to part with its money triumphed over such concerns. 

 

This case is the latest in a long line of sports-related controversies which evince the oft-overlooked connection between sports and human rights. In 2022, the Qatar World Cup and the Beijing Winter Olympics faced similar outcries over their respective host country’s spotty human rights records, which include Qatar’s exploitation of migrant labour to build tournament facilities and China’s abuse of the Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities in Xinjiang. Yet, the very same Sports Governing Bodies (SGBs) that held those events have also committed elsewhere to promoting inclusion and upholding justice. In the aftermath of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, SGBs universally condemned and censored Russia and its athletes. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) banned the Russian Olympic Committee and limited Russian and Belarusian athletes to participating in the 2024 Paris Olympics under a neutral flag. The Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) moved the 2022 Champions League Final from Russia to France, and to this day Russian and Belarusian athletes in tennis must compete under a neutral banner. Similarly, the Formula 1 racing series launched their #WeRaceAsOne initiative in 2020 in response to COVID-19 and rising inequality to affirm the sport’s commitment to inclusivity.

 

Most SGBs have adopted a “pick and choose” approach to human rights. The IOC condemned certain violations like Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in the harshest terms, but abuses like the forceful mass eviction of homeless people in preparation for the 2016 Olympics in Rio were also condoned, with a blind eye turned to the host country’s actions. This raises a fundamental question: why bother championing for justice in select cases if morality is not a pressing concern for SGBs? 

 

SGBs are typically large, transnational non-profit entities which decide, standardise and enforce the rules and organise competitions in any sport. The IOC oversees the Olympics and is the world’s leading SGB. Most sports are managed by a single SGB, like the International Skating Union (ISU) for competitive ice skating, the Fédération internationale de football association (FIFA) in soccer, and the Badminton World Federation (BWF) in badminton.  

 

Despite being non-profit organisations in name, most SGBs are largely commercial in nature, with sporting events like the World Cup and the Olympics being immensely popular revenue-generating machines. Yet, most of the revenue in sports is not brought in by ticket or merchandise sales. Instead, the industry is sustained by the sale of broadcasting rights and commercial sponsorships. Corporate sponsorships are the backbone of most sports today and a significant way in which athletes, teams and SGBs make money. For example, the Olympic Partner Programme allows for brands to advertise at the Olympics in exchange for a hefty sum. 

 

What this means is that the main channel which ties SGBs to accountability is their catalogue of sponsors — private companies with the primary aim of generating profit. Additionally, the cost of maintaining and growing a sport is exorbitant. It is thus no surprise that historically, SGBs have cared little for monitoring and criticising the actions of the countries that host their competitions, considering the astronomical amount of state funding which such events typically entail (to host the Singapore Formula 1 Grand Prix, for instance, the government spends between S$135 million and S$140 million a year). There is not only little incentive for SGBs to condemn human rights violations committed by their host countries (both relating and not relating to the sporting event being held), but also significant upsides to SGBs taking a subdued stance in upholding human rights. Many authoritarian countries with poor human rights records, after all, happen to be rich (such as Saudi Arabia, China and Qatar). 

 

However, SGBs’ prioritisation of profit and flimsy moral stances are not harmless — they enable the phenomenon of sportswashing and set the conditions for human rights violations to occur. Sportswashing occurs when brands or countries invest in sports to improve their reputation by distracting people from their unethical conduct elsewhere. In recent years, countries from the Middle East, particularly Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), have brought many sports into their countries by means of heavy investment. In addition to the aforementioned tennis WTA Finals, Saudi Arabia hosts the Jeddah Formula 1 Grand Prix and will host the FIFA World Cup for football in 2034. These countries aim not only to improve their reputations, but also increase their soft power on the global stage and diversify their economies by introducing sports events as a new form of revenue. 

 

Apart from the more abstract moral issues that partnering with authoritarian states presents, concrete consequences are also to be expected. In her paper on addressing human rights violations at mega-sporting events, Dr Daniela Heerdt of Asser Institute explains how awarding the right to host a sports event to a country with poor labour laws and limited civil rights facilitates the human rights violations that inadvertently occur during or in the lead-up to the event. The list of such violations is substantial, notable ones in recent history being the increase in police brutality, including the killings of young black males in Rio, before the 2016 Rio Olympics and Chinese censorship of the mass media and athletes from sharing negative news about the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics. As such, SGBs prioritising profit over human rights is not merely a matter of morality but also a matter of harm.  

 

Nonetheless, commitment to (if not the successful upholding of) human rights is essential to SGBs because they do not operate in a vacuum and need to maintain their legitimacy to operate. To SGBs, legitimacy from two sources is essential — social legitimacy, approval or acquiescence to the actions taken by SGBs from sports fans and society in general, as well as legitimacy from the United Nations (UN) and local governments. In the first case, the sustainability of SGBs and sport in general relies on media consumption levels. The ubiquity of social media has made human rights violations more difficult to conceal from audiences. This threatens sporting events, which benefit from projecting a ‘clean’ image as it reduces the chances of their profit margins being affected by audience boycotts. However, boycotts due to human rights violations do not commonly occur on a sufficiently large scale to hurt SGBs, especially in cases when the sport has an immense audience. 

 

The second sort of legitimacy is more crucial for SGBs to secure. SGBs are autonomous organisations that have largely undisputed control over the sports they govern. They require legitimacy from the United Nations (UN), the primary human rights body in the world, to continue functioning without intervention from outside sources like local governments. SGBs are affected by two UN resolutions: the 2011 United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs) which declares that all commercial bodies (which SGBs count as since they conduct commercial activity frequently) have a responsibility to maintain human rights to a certain standard, and the 2018 UN General Assembly resolution which encourages “relevant entities involved in delivering mega sport events to respect applicable laws and international principles”. In his paper on sport and human rights, Schwab argues that maintaining an adequate level of human rights in sports is “minimally expected” of SGBs in today’s world, without which their autonomous nature comes under threat from outside regulation.   

In the modern day and age, SGBs have to strike a balance between abiding by the moral standards they are expected to meet and the cash flow which sustains not only themselves, but also the sports which they govern. Undeniably, there is a need for SGBs to be more discerning in selecting countries to host events in. This can be improved by tightening their selection criteria or requiring host countries to meet set out labour standards in preparation for the events. While most big organisations like FIFA and the IOC have acknowledged their responsibility to uphold and promote human rights, this is not yet a universal phenomenon and more progress can be made.

​

May, 2024.