In football, FIFA has always put profit over people

There’s always football on, and there is even more coming. In March, FIFA confirmed their plans to extend the next men’s World Cup to 48 teams – 16 more teams, 40 more games and billions in extra revenue to further inflate FIFA’s “exceptionally robust” finances.

Despite the controversy, the Qatar World Cup was hailed “the best ever”, delivering arguably the greatest final of all time, the most goals in the tournament ever and a fairytale ending for Lionel Messi. FIFA made a record $7.5 billion in revenue. Expansion seems like a no-brainer.

Of course, the World Cup probably wasn’t a success for the roughly 6,000 migrant workers who have died in Qatar since 2010. Despite some attempts at reforms and the Qatari stance that “one death was too many”, the so-called legacy fund will not guarantee access to compensation for dead workers’ families.

It will instead focus on education and a new (but not yet agreed) memorandum of understanding with the International Labour Organisation (ILO). The memorandum will apparently uphold “human rights requirements” in the bidding process.

"Under the current rules of the game, international sporting events, irrespective of geography, are vehicles for private gain at the expense of wider social benefit"

Given Saudi Arabia’s impending bid for the 2030 World Cup, hopefully it will inhibit the state-sanctioned murder of dispossessed tribespeople and secure commitments to not murder any more dissident journalists.

Yet Western critics of Qatar and other Gulf countries’ atrocious record on human rights have rightly been accused of hypocrisy. The UK has actively supported repressive regimes in the Gulf, prioritising access to fossil fuels and financial flows into the City of London more than local demands for democracy.

Nor is the UK itself a safe haven for migrants and asylum seekers, who are either illegally deported to Rwanda (itself an authoritarian regime), end up missing or, if they’re lucky, get exploited by unregulated employers.

This isn’t to play some kind of repression bingo or create a hierarchy of exploitation but to highlight that under the current rules of the game, international sporting events, irrespective of geography, are vehicles for private gain at the expense of wider social benefit.

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FIFA's history

These debates aren’t new. Long before Gianni Infantino was schmoozing Mohammad bin Salman and Abdel Fattah al-Sisi in Qatari stadiums, former FIFA President João Havelenge stood next to military dictator Jorge Rafael Videla as Argentina lifted the 1978 World Cup in Buenos Aires.

Videla had seized power in a 1976 coup and used the World Cup to obscure the atrocities being committed by his regime. Around 30,000 people disappeared throughout his seven-year military junta, with the tournament’s final being played just a few blocks away from a brutal military prison.

As one of the mothers of the Plaza de Mayo group (a collective who protested the disappearance of their children) put it, “while the goals are shouted, the screams of the tortured and murdered are muffled.”

When Sepp Blatter took over FIFA from Havelenge in 1998, a now widely reported era of institutionalised corruption began. Blatter remains banned from football and has never been found guilty of a crime but the South Africa World Cup in 2010, the Russia World Cup in 2018 and the Qatar World Cup in 2022 were bombarded with accusations of bribery and state-sanctioned espionage under his watch.

This corruption was often downplayed by FIFA’s argument that it was just bringing football to new countries and regions, a ruse that obfuscated what FIFA claimed to be doing – remedying global inequalities – with what it was really doing – expanding into new markets to accumulate private wealth.

Take South Africa, the first World Cup to ever be held in Africa. There has been no meaningful legacy – “all we have are memories” mused one South African football expert – and the World Cup unashamedly prioritised corporate interests over local development.

Local vendors were banned from selling products and food around stadia and FIFA’s corporate partners were exclusively handed development contracts at the expense of local workers. Instead of developing pre-existing facilities, South Africa constructed entirely new stadia at significant public cost. The former option was rejected because it meant showcasing South Africa’s poverty.

In the words of one FIFA report, “a billion television viewers don’t want to see shacks and poverty on this scale.” As esteemed football journalist Andrew Jennings concluded, “[FIFA] officials and the government have sold South Africa down the river: ‘Bye Africa, bye suckers!’”

The illusion of representation

Unsurprisingly, this new wave of World Cup expansion is being touted as another great victory for internationalism. Sky Sports News chief reporter Kaveh Solhekol argues that “if you take off your blinkers” and “look at football not just from a western European perspective”, the new World Cup format is significantly more inclusive.

Yet representation without addressing the underlying political economy of world football is meaningless. This is not to demean the spectacle and importance that, say, Zambia or Syria or India’s first World Cup appearance would have for these nations – getting routed by Kylian Mbappé in the group stage is probably better than not being there at all, it’s not for me to say.

But let’s not pretend that a bigger tournament will mean anything other than bigger profit margins for FIFA and their corporate partners. The measly amounts paid to participants will do nothing to elevate grassroots football or materially change lives in new participant countries.

"But let’s not pretend that a bigger tournament will mean anything other than bigger profit margins for FIFA and their corporate partners. The measly amounts paid to participants will do nothing to elevate grassroots football or materially change lives in new participant countries"

It’s perhaps fitting that the first 48 team World Cup will be predominantly held in the United States. There will be very little uproar about the atrocious labour conditions in the land of the free. The fact that the US routinely ignores ILO conventions, systematically violates workers’ rights and now apparently encourages child labour should render any FIFA-ILO memorandum of understanding more of a farce than it already is.

As the FIFA machine rumbles on, an alternative vision for the future of football is sorely needed, where desperate governments (the UK included) don’t pander to the parochial whim of wealthy nations and corporations.

In the words of Marcelo Bielsa, the only irreplaceable thing in football is the fans. It is time that the game is run for them and by them.

Liam Kennedy is a researcher at the Communication Workers Union (CWU) and an editor at Red Pepper magazine.

Follow him on Twitter: @liamkennedy_

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Opinions expressed in this article remain those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The New Arab, its editorial board or staff.