Comment on “The Role of Sport in International Relations: National Rebirth and Renewal”

• Date: 01 January 2016
• Author: Hal Hill
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/aepr.12129
• Published date: 01 January 2016

Comment on “The Role of Sport in

International Relations: National Rebirth

and Renewal”

Hal HILL†

Australian National University

JEL code: F5

Victor Cha (2016) has provided an interesting and readable examination of the relation-

ship between sport and international relations. As far as I am aware, this is a relatively

unexplored territory in the academic literature, and I therefore read the paper with inter-

est. The starting point is the proposition that sport creates intense national emotions

that are not easily replicated in other endeavors including music, art, and science. This

explains why the competition to host major international sporting events is so strong in

spite of the daunting costs and logistics involved.

Probing the association between sport and international relations, Cha advances four

main arguments. All are plausible. I discuss and comment on eachone br iefly. First, there

is the role of sport in nation building. This is a well-established proposition. My favorite

illustration would be the unforgettable 1995 Rugby World Cup final, held for the first

time in South Africa, and where the host nation triumphed in spite of its underdog

status. At the victory ceremony, President Nelson Mandela donned the Springbok jersey,

even though this team symbolized the decades of repressive Afrikaner rule under Apart-

heid. Another example that comes to mind is the West Indies Cricket Board that unites

the dozen or so mainly English-speaking, but otherwise quite disparate, group of Carib-

bean nations, and which for a decade nurtured the most awesome international cricket

team in the history of that game.

Perhaps here or later more could be made of the role of sport in breaking down inter-

national barriers. Who can forget the famous Ping-Pong diplomacy involving the US and

China beginning in 1971? And India and Pakistan, a troubled relationship between two

nuclear-armed neighbors, at least continue to play cricket,albeit on neutral territor y.

However,as Cha points out, there are plenty of counter examples. A notable one dis-

cussed in the paper is the failure of the spasmodic North and South Korean cooperation

on the sporting field stretching over decades to lead to a political settlement.

Second, sport can be a means of asserting independence, as illustrated in the case of

Japan and baseball. There may be other examples of this proposition, although none

readily comes to mind.

Third, sport can enable countries to exert “soft power.” This too is a plausible argu-

ment. Cha uses Australia as an example of a country that punches above its weight owing

†Correspondence: Hal Hill, Arndt Corden Department of Economics, College of Asia and the

Pacific, Australian National University,Canber ra, ACT 2601, Australia. Email: hal.hill@anu.edu.au

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doi: 10.1111/aepr.12129 Asian Economic Policy Review (2016) 11, 158–159

© 2016 Japan Center for Economic Research158