Major sports events can be exciting from multiple points of view: you can obviously watch and enjoy the performances of the athletes, discover new disciplines or get inspired by the uniforms of a team, the style choices of a particular athlete or team or the choreographies and costumes at the opening and closing ceremonies.
Yet such events can also be attempts at sportswashing: Benito Mussolini hosted the 1934 FIFA World Cup, Adolf Hitler the 1936 Olympics, while today the 2022 FIFA World Cup is kicking off in Qatar. The event is overshadowed by the fact that Qatar has a bad record when it comes to human rights violations, ranging from the mistreatment of migrant workers to the discrimination that people from the LGBTQ+ community have to face and to the repressive laws curbing the freedom of expression.
Architecture-wise the event offers some great entertainment: since December 2010, when it was announced that the World Cup was going to take place in Qatar, the country launched a building programme that included new stadiums, a new airport, roads and hotels.
While the Khalifa International stadium is the transformation of a facility built in the late '70s, the other stadiums, notable mega structures with a massive capacity, were built from scratch.
In most cases the structures can be considered as architectural extravaganzas, exotic and at times even bizarre. Some of them represent metaphors for elements borrowed from Qatari culture: Studio Dar Al-Handasah's stadium in Al Khor, hosting the football tournament's opening game today, is inspired by the traditional bayt al sha'ar tents used by nomadic people; a traditional gahfiya cap worn by men throughout the Middle East inspired instead the Al Thumama Stadium by Qatari architect Ibrahim M Jaidah.
Then there's the "diamond in the desert", a stadium with a diamond-like pattern by Fenwick-Iribarren Architects and Pattern Design.
Foster + Partners designed instead the gargantuan 80,000-seater Lusail stadium, with a shape and facade that call to mind the decorative motifs on bowls and other vessels of the Arab and Islamic world.
Design-wise, the building that most people have learnt to recognise is maybe Zaha Hadid Architects' Al Janoub stadium: allegedly inspired by the sails of a dhow, it became notoriously famous when critics stated it looked like a vulva (frankly, it is difficult to disagree...).
Stadium 974 is instead the most sustainable: its name refers to Qatar's international dialling code, as well as the number of shipping containers used to build its staircases, kiosks, bathrooms and parts of its exterior.
Designed by Spanish practice Fenwick-Iribarren Architects, the stadium is a tribute to the local maritime history as well as the industrial heritage of its site near Doha's port. Stadium 974 is made with a modular structure that can be completely dismantled and repurposed, in whole or in parts, and this could be an inspiring idea also for other types of buildings/structures in the future.
Yet behind these inventive architecture designs there are issues that should be examined - the environmental and above all the human cost of all these structures.
For what regards the former, well, the environmental impact of the constructions should be considered (despite Stadium 974 can be dismantled and the Al-Rayyan Stadium by BDP Pattern was made using the rubble from the former Ahmad bin Ali Stadium that was demolished in 2015) as well as the damages caused by the air conditionining systems (surely the extreme temperatures should have played against Qatar when FIFA considered awarding it the competition...). Some stadiums are destined to be resized and shrunk once the World Cup is over, in some cases the upper tier will be removed and parts will be reconverted into hotels, housing units or even schools and health clinics, but this makes you wonder why did they have to build such huge structures in the first place.
The most tragic aspect of this World Cup remains its human cost, though: the stadiums and the other structures were indeed built by low-wage workers.
Qatar is reported to have spent $200bn on getting the World Cup ready, but organisations such as Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International have highlighted that, since Qatar was awarded the tournament, thousands of migrant workers from India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka died (over 6,000 according to surveys), or were injured, exploited, lived in squalid, filthy and overcrowded accommodation, suffered abuse, ended up working 14-18 hours a day for roughly $300 a month, and often without paid overtime. Many of them also had to pay a recruitment fee (now illegal) to get these jobs, a fee that generated high debts for them and for the families of those workers who died.
The causes of death for these workers vary: some of the workers died on stadium construction sites, but other deaths were attributed to "natural causes", the most common reason, as the workers died in other locations such as their accommodation, often from acute heart or respiratory failure.
In these cases, and under Qatari labour law, compensation for the deaths was not issued to the families of the deceased as the deaths occurred somewhere else and are therefore not considered as work-related. Yet, medical studies carried out in 2019, highlighted that hundreds of Nepali workers died of cardiac arrest and cardiovascular causes that could have been prevented if there had been heat protection measures.
Also women workers suffered from abuse: in particular migrant workers in the hospitality industry were victims of sexual harassment and gender based violence. Many women are reluctant to speak because they fear losing their jobs while, quite often, those who report rape end up being prosecuted as the police believe men claiming it was consensual.
Labour reforms about minimal wage were introduced in more recent years (after 2018) and the kafala or "sponsorship" system (which meant that workers couldn't change jobs without their employer’s permission) was abolished, but this was too little and too late and abuses and deaths continued, leaving behind devastated families. Human rights organisations believe FIFA should help compensate migrant workers who have died or suffered injury in Qatar with the equivalent of the World Cup's total prize money - $440m (the winners of the Qatar World Cup will receive $44 million).
But money is inducing many to lose their integrity over this World Cup: David Beckham, former England captain, husband to the former Spice Girl-turned-fashion designer Victoria, and gay icon, has taken up the role of ambassador for Qatar, a job that comes with a promotional fee of $170m over 10 years.
In a video promoting the country, Beckham, forgetting the situation of the migrant workers, the fact that in Qatar homosexuality is illegal, same-sex sexual activity is punishable by seven years in prison or may even lead to a death sentence (on November 8, Khalid Salman, a 2022 FIFA Qatar World Cup Ambassador, appallingly described homosexuality as "damage in the mind" in an interview with ZDF, a TV channel in Germany), smiles as he is filmed going around the country, visiting a market and stating "It's one of the best spice markets that I've ever been to" (pun intended? unintended? We will never know...), blissfully ending with "This is perfection for me."
But there other people who have or will be losing their integrity over the World Cup in the next few weeks, many linked also with the fashion industry. Between the semifinal and final matches of the World Cup, there should be the Qatar Fashion United by CR Runway, the Carine Roitfeld-helmed organization. The show is curated by Roitfeld, in association with a Qatar-based non-for-profit foundation, Education Above All.
The event - that should take place at the 40,000-seat Stadium 974 - will feature 150 brands and designers, among the others, according to official sources, Dior, Gucci, Louis Vuitton and Prada. In a way this is surprising as the decision to take part in the event clashes with the principles that some of these fashion houses have been trying to promote. Gucci, for example, celebrated diversity in its S/S 23 runway and featured in its designs references to F.U.O.R.I. the "Fronte Unitario Omosessuale Rivoluzionario Italiano" (Italian Revolutionary Homosexual Unitary Front), the first Italian gay movement.
Prada is a brand representing women's empowerment, but in Qatar women are subject to a discriminatory system as they must obtain permission from their male guardians to marry, study abroad on government scholarships, attend mixed-gender universities, work in many government jobs, travel abroad until certain ages, and receive some forms of reproductive health care. Women also have to show proof of marriage to access some sexual and reproductive health care, for example, prenatal care, transvaginal ultrasounds, pap smears, and sexual health checks. The discriminatory system also denies women the authority to act as their children’s primary guardian, even when they are divorced and have legal custody.
The Qatari royal family is very interested in fashion, though, since it owns (through private investment groups) brands such as Valentino (that for this reason also scored a major exhibition at the M7 in Doha this year - yes, sadly, Valentino's trademark red shade, as vivid as blood, is very trendy for this World Cup), Balmain and Pal Zileri, British department store Harrods and French chain Printemps.
Money makes you easily forget your social conscience and integrity, but it is about time for brands to take a stand and some sponsors have been doing so: Sony and Johnson & Johnson dropped out of the World Cup as sponsors, others like the Belgian team sponsors (chocolate brand Côte d’Or and courier service GLS), announced they will not be going to the tournament. As consumers we can make our voices heard by boycotting those brands joining the World Cup shenanigans without calling for remedy and compensation for the bereaved families of the workers.
There is something that FIFA could do as well. After previous World Cups, FIFA contributed to the creation of legacy funds to support projects following events, allocating funds with former hosts South Africa ($100 million), Brazil ($100 million), and Russia ($60 million), for example. The remedy fund in this case should be allocated to the families of migrant workers who died in Qatar between 2010 and 2022.
In July Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and FairSquare sent an open letter to FIFA's14 corporate partners and World Cup sponsors urging them to call on the football body to remedy abuses of migrant workers linked to preparations for the World Cup. Four sponsors - sportswear giant Adidas, that also produces uniforms and garments for seven national teams, McDonald's (Download Qatar_McDonalds), AB InBev/Budweiser and Coca-Cola (Download Qatar_CocaCola) issued a statement of support for such financial compensation. Ten other sponsors - Visa, Hyundai-Kia, Wanda Group, Qatar Energy, Qatar Airways, Vivo, Hisense, Mengniu, Crypto and Byju's - offered no public support and did not respond to written requests to discuss tournament-related abuses.
Is there something positive about the World Cup, well, there will be three women referees - Stéphanie Frappart from France, Yoshimi Yamashita from Japan and Salima Mukansanga from Rwanda - and three women assistant referees - Neuza Back from Brazil, Karen Díaz Medina from Mexico and Kathryn Nesbitt from the USA. Yet, while this is encouraging, it's just a drop in the ocean of shame that is engulfing this World Cup.
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