The world’s game: politics and the World Cup

Summary

Podcast Summary: Front Burner – "The World’s Game: Politics and the World Cup"

Host: Matthew Amha (in for Jayme Poisson)
Guest: David Goldblatt (Soccer historian, journalist, sociologist)
Date: June 10, 2026
Duration: ~41 minutes

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Episode Overview

This episode explores the deep and evolving relationship between soccer’s premier tournament, the FIFA World Cup, and global politics. Host Matthew Amha and esteemed guest David Goldblatt (author of The Ball Is A Global History of Soccer) delve into how the World Cup — often framed as mere sport — has long been a battleground and showcase for competing national, social, and political agendas. With the 2026 World Cup jointly hosted by the U.S., Canada, and Mexico under especially fraught political conditions, the conversation traces historical precedents, examines current controversies, and reflects on football’s enduring role as the planet’s public stage.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

The 2026 World Cup: Three Diverging Hosts

[02:17–08:24]

• Regional Unity Lost: Originally pitched as a celebration of North American unity, tensions have fractured the event into "something closer to three separate World Cups."

  • "What was once intended as a celebration of regional integration has mutated into something closer to three separate World Cups." – Matthew Amha [03:14]

• Mexico:

  • Emphasizes cultural festivities and grassroots initiatives under a leftist president.
  • Significant investment: billions spent, 10 games in 3 cities (Guadalajara, Monterrey, Mexico City).
  • Security concerns: Efforts to dispel narco war associations, but issues remain, especially around the Azteca Stadium and gentrification.
  • Notable: Largest human football shirt created for the event.

• USA:

  • Host to political drama, travel bans, immigration disputes, and international wars.
  • "This World cup offers drama like no other. It makes Qatar, which I thought had been the most politicized World cup hitherto, seem like a bit of a tea party." – David Goldblatt [02:49]

• Canada:

  • Focus on legacy-building for youth and national infrastructure, rather than flashy new stadiums.
  • Celebrated for diversity: National team comprised largely of recent immigrants or children of immigrants.
  • "This is a whole different kind of diverse, you know, version of the Canadian nation." – David Goldblatt [08:24]

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Travel Bans & Exclusions in the U.S.

[08:45–11:49]

• Notable visa denials affect referees, athletes, officials, and fans from countries like Somalia, Iraq, Iran, etc.
• Iran's fan ticket allocation revoked.
• Unprecedented for the World Cup: "A World cup ticket basically served as your visa...So I would say at a World cup, this is completely unprecedented." – David Goldblatt [09:53]
• Some historical precedents (Indonesia’s exclusion of Israeli athletes) but vastly different in scale and scope.

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FIFA’s Leadership & Authoritarian Ties

[11:49–14:58]

• Close relationship between FIFA president Gianni Infantino and Donald Trump, with Infantino giving Trump a "FIFA Peace Prize."
• "You've used words like obsequious and fawning to describe Infantino’s…Trump charm offensive." – Matthew Amha [12:22]
• Infantino’s broader history of cozy relations with authoritarian leaders (Putin, Qatari royals, Saudi Crown Prince MBS).
• Discussion of Infantino’s strategies as “cynical and performative” or possibly sincere alignment with authoritarian norms.
• Memorable Moment: Infantino attends the premiere of Melania Trump’s film at the Kennedy Center — an example of the odd, theatrical relationships at play.

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Why Soccer Didn’t Dominate in Canada (and Other Colonies)

[16:21–21:32]

• Soccer’s weaker roots in places like Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and Ireland partly reflect resistance to British colonial identity.
• Meteorological explanations (“football is less suited to the Canadian climate”) and preference for existing “boreal” sports like hockey.
• In some places, soccer is derided as non-native, “an alien game.”
• "There are very few places in the world that have so much access to so much ice. And...it makes sense that there's a boreal game." – David Goldblatt [18:23]
• U.S. right-wing attitudes also discussed: Ann Coulter’s infamous line — "No American whose great grandfather was born here is watching soccer." [21:07]

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Historic World Cups: Politics, Power, and “Sportswashing”

Mussolini’s 1934 Italy

[21:32–23:41]

• Early example of “sportswashing,” with Italy’s fascist government using the event to tout strength, modernity, and national identity.
• "Italian fascism...becomes a way of expressing the essential militaristic masculinity of the new Italian fascist man. And winning the tournament is proof positive of that." – David Goldblatt [22:15]

South Africa 2010

[23:41–26:23]

• First African host, intended to signal post-apartheid unity and progress.
• Successes: Pulled off safely, vibrancy (vuvuzelas), "the best music at a World cup ever."
• Limitations: African teams did not break new ground; the social impact was real but complex.

Russia 2018 & Qatar 2022

[27:31–34:20]

• Russia: A “Potemkin village,” systematically hid domestic crackdowns and unrest during the Cup.

  • "...the Russian police were told, like, just lay off a tiny bit, allow the foreigners and eventually Russians to participate in...drunken reverie in public spaces, which normally would be absolutely forbidden..." – David Goldblatt [28:09]

• Qatar: Used the event for global recognition and security, not to hide but to showcase itself — misunderstood the scale of global scrutiny (migrant labor, LGBT rights, etc.). Still, Qatar saw enormous value in the exposure.

  • "Was it sports washing? I mean, we know about Qatar and its issues in enormous detail..." – David Goldblatt [32:22]

• Legacy: Russia's gains erased by subsequent actions (Ukraine war). Qatar likely satisfied with its unprecedented global profile.

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Colonial Legacies, Migration, and Modern Teams

[34:38–39:30]

• The 1998 French team (nicknamed “black, white, Arab”) showcased soccer as a mirror for migration’s impact on national identity.
• Modern squads are now often either “civic nationalist” (e.g., France, England, Belgium) or “diasporic” (Cape Verde, Curacao, Congo, etc.).
• "The teams and the squads on display are without doubt the most diverse that we have ever seen." – David Goldblatt [36:05]
• This diversity both uplifts (symbol of inclusion) and provokes backlash (“are they really French?” – far-right politicians).
• "When everything's going well, I'm Romelu Lukaku, the Belgian striker. But when things are going badly, I'm Romelu Lukako, the striker of Congolese origin." – relayed by Goldblatt [38:20]

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Football as Public Theater: The Need for Connection

[39:30–End]

• Goldblatt’s closing thoughts: Above all, football offers community and connection, a salve for our atomized modern lives.
• "There is a desperate, desperate human need in this world to feel connected. And...that's what I experience in the football stadium." – David Goldblatt [39:53]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

| Timestamp | Speaker | Quote | |-----------|------------------|------------------------------------------------| | 02:49 | Goldblatt | "This World cup offers drama like no other. It makes Qatar, which I thought had been the most politicized World cup hitherto, seem like a bit of a tea party." | | 08:24 | Goldblatt | "This is a whole different kind of diverse, you know, version of the Canadian nation. Really excited to see how that looks and how that plays out." | | 09:53 | Goldblatt | "A World cup ticket basically served as your visa...So I would say at a World cup, this is completely unprecedented." | | 18:23 | Goldblatt | "...there are very few places in the world that have so much access to so much ice. And...it makes sense that there's a boreal game." | | 21:07 | Amha (quoting) | "No American whose great grandfather was born here is watching soccer." — Ann Coulter | | 22:15 | Goldblatt | "...sport in General and football in particular becomes a way of expressing the essential militaristic masculinity of the new Italian fascist man. And winning the tournament is proof positive of that." | | 28:09 | Goldblatt | "...the Russian police were told, like, just lay off a tiny bit, allow the foreigners and eventually Russians to participate in kind of drunken reverie in public spaces, which normally would be absolutely forbidden..." | | 32:22 | Goldblatt | "Was it sports washing? I mean, we know about Qatar and its issues in enormous detail..." | | 36:05 | Goldblatt | "The teams and the squads on display are without doubt the most diverse that we have ever seen." | | 38:20 | Goldblatt [citing Lukaku] | "When everything's going well, I'm Romelu Lukaku, the Belgian striker. But when things are going badly, I'm Romelu Lukako, the striker of Congolese origin." | | 39:53 | Goldblatt | "There is a desperate, desperate human need in this world to feel connected. And...that's what I experience in the football stadium." |

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Key Timestamps

• 02:17 — How the North American World Cup split into "three."
• 04:13 — Goldblatt on past World Cup co-hosting and North America’s challenge.
• 08:45 — Impact of U.S. travel bans on Cup participation.
• 11:49 — Trump, FIFA, and Infantino’s relationships.
• 16:50 — Goldblatt’s personal soccer epiphany.
• 18:23 — Why soccer isn’t Canada’s dominant sport.
• 21:32 — Sportswashing and the 1934 Italy World Cup.
• 23:41 — South Africa’s 2010 World Cup.
• 27:31 — Russia & Qatar: managing (or showcasing) their global image.
• 34:38 — Migration’s impact on national teams and identity politics.
• 39:30 — Football’s deeper meaning as public theater and community.

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Conclusion

Throughout the episode, Goldblatt and Amha illustrate how the World Cup is deeply entwined with global affairs, contesting identities, and nation-building. Whether through soft power pageantry, migration-driven team diversity, or as a rare site of collective connection, soccer’s dimensions extend far beyond the field. The 2026 World Cup, split between three divergent national hosts under political and social strain, is set to be one of the most politically charged — and revealing — tournaments in the sport’s history.

Transcript

[David Goldblatt]

Par le tu francais, hablas espanol?

[Matthew Amha]

Par le italiano.

[Babbel Advertiser / Afonso Davies]

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[Podcast Announcer / Narrator]

This is a CBC podcast.

[Matthew Amha]

I'm Matthew Amha in for Jamie Poisson. On Thursday, 48 nations from all corners of the world will begin the competition for the most vaunted title in global sport, the World Cup. On its face, this is just another sporting competition, but really there's so much more that's going on. For nearly 100 years, leaders from all over the world have used this soccer tournament as a tool for power and politics, colonial and anti colonial regimes, warmongers and peacemakers. And to say that it's enormous would be a pretty incredible understatement. The last World cup was watched on television by more than half of the world's population. Few televised events in the history of the world have had a similar purchase. Not the moon landing, not the Olympics, not the super bowl, not state funerals. So today we're going to talk about the political history of this sport and this competition to understand how it's been used across time and how leaders like Donald Trump are incorporating it today. David Goldblatt is a journalist and sociologist and maybe the great living soccer historian. He's also the author of books such as the Ball Is A Global History of Soccer. And I'm so glad to say he joins us on the program today. Hey, David.

[David Goldblatt]

Hey. Lovely to be with you.

[Matthew Amha]

Why don't we begin with this impending World cup, which is a joint North American project. Canada, Mexico and USA have been selected

[David Goldblatt]

by the FIFA Congress to host the

[Matthew Amha]

2026 FIFA World Cup. Thank you. You know, though there's much to discuss, there's a lot of attention has been paid to the kind of current environment in the United States. You know, legally disputed travel bans, immigration, police, extreme heat, wars abroad, kind of heading into these last few days before games are set to begin, what do you most have on your mind?

[David Goldblatt]

Well, it's a kind of mixture on the one hand, as a kind of, if I may Say, connoisseur of macabre political theater. This World cup offers, you know, drama like no other. It makes Qatar, which I thought had been the most politicized World cup hitherto, seem like a bit of a tea party. So from that perspective, I'm completely fascinated to see what happens happens. I suppose I'm most interested to see how Trump tries to play this. It's not clear to me that he's worked out actually what his role in the show is.

[Matthew Amha]

I mean, when I think back to the time at which this North American bid was first made, I mean, it was originally kind of advertised as an exercise in continental unity, right? Like, for sure, Canada, Mexico and the United States would work to, quote, create a FIFA World cup that is more inclusive and more universal than ever. Since then, of course, Donald Trump became president a second time. He's launched a campaign of economic warfare on both nations, threatened to annex Canada outright, and he's threatened a narco war in Mexico. You've written, quote, what was once intended as a celebration of regional integration has mutated into something closer to three separate World Cups. Can you just talk to me a little bit more about that idea and, you know, I guess whether it's something that we've ever seen before.

[David Goldblatt]

So for sure, we've only ever seen one World cup that's been co hosted before, which was Japan, South Korea. And at the time, you know, I think we felt there was quite frosty relationships between them. They managed to carry it off, but they kind of weren't really talking to each other. But by comparison to this World cup, of course, the most extraordinary close cooperation. And I think we really do have three World Cups, this time with different legal regulations, different tax taxation regulations, a different relationship between the host and FIFA, and above all, in its kind of feeling character. So in Mexico, you know, where we have a leftist president in charge, we see quite a lot of government money being spent on creating a grassroots festival of culture, of football, of art. Mexico has invested billions of dollars in this World cup. It will stage 10 games in three cities. Guadalajara, Monterrey and Mexico City, where the first game will be played on June 11th. And, you know, some really funny and lovely kind of big art projects. So the Mexicans have created the largest human football shirt in history. Really lovely stuff like that. So that's a very different feel to what you're getting in the United States. Not that, of course, Mexico's World cup is entirely unproblematic. There are concerns around security. Mexico knows that we, when many people think of it, they Think of this during the World Cup. It wants them thinking more of this. So authorities are guaranteeing safety from the president down. We're ready for any type of situation. We're prepared, we're monitoring, and everyone coming

[Podcast Announcer / Narrator]

can be sure they'll be safe.

[David Goldblatt]

The relationship between the narco war and football is closer than many people would like and has spilled over on a number of occasions in Mexican domestic football. And there are real concerns around gentrification around the Azteca Stadium, which fabulously has been rebuilt, but it seems to be probably at the cost of the long term working class residents of the region who are feeling themselves pushed out. Alejandro lives a couple blocks from Azteca Stadium along an alleyway with 50 other families.

[Podcast Announcer / Narrator]

They often go days without water,

[David Goldblatt]

but she says the owners of the stadium have their own well and they never run out. I think it's ridiculous that a company owns a well, she says. So Mexico's got a mixture of issues going on. Canada, of course, is, you know, is a whole nother story. I mean, one of the things I've been looking forward to at this World cup is to see how Canada responds, because I think this is a real moment for soccer.

[Babbel Advertiser / Afonso Davies]

Canada.

[Podcast Announcer / Narrator]

Instead of spending billions like Qatar did

[David Goldblatt]

to build new World cup venues or

[Podcast Announcer / Narrator]

digging a money pit like Montreal's troubled Olympic stadium, Canada soccer has a different legacy in mind for this summer's tournament. We're really trying to build for the

[Matthew Amha]

future, build for the youth in the country, build a national training center, create

[Podcast Announcer / Narrator]

an infrastructure that will help the, the

[Matthew Amha]

sport for the future.

[David Goldblatt]

You know, it's never been so popular in the country. It's never had so many people playing it. Canada has hosted a very successful Women's World cup as well as establishing professional leagues. And I suppose most excitingly, you know, we have an. A very new version of Canada on show for most of the world, where the majority, I think, of, of the players in the squad are players of color and are either recent migrants themselves or families of very recent migrants to Canada.

[Babbel Advertiser / Afonso Davies]

My name is Afonso Davies. My parents are from Liberia and fled the civil war. I was born in Ghana in a refugee camp. It was a hard life, but when I was five years old, a country called Canada welcomed us in. And the boys on the football team made me feel at home.

[David Goldblatt]

And this is a whole different kind of diverse, you know, version of the Canadian nation. Really excited to see how that looks and how that plays out.

[Matthew Amha]

Just to kind of zero in on the US For a moment here. You know, there have already been reports about staff and officials unable to travel to the US for the World Cup.

[David Goldblatt]

A Somali referee who was named African Referee of the Year has been withdrawn from the list of World cup referees. This is after he was denied entry

[Matthew Amha]

to the US Omar Attan appears to have had the correct paperwork, so it's

[David Goldblatt]

not clear why he was blocked or,

[Matthew Amha]

you know, being interrogated for hours. Iraq's vice captain, for example, was held at Chicago's o' Hare Airport and questioned by immigration officials for nearly seven hours

[Podcast Announcer / Narrator]

and had his phone inspected before he was ultimately allowed into the country. Iraq's team photographer, Talal Salah, was not so lucky. He was denied entry to the US

[Matthew Amha]

and dozens of Iranian officials have been denied access to the US as well. The backdrop here are Trump's travel bans that have been challenged in court. But I'm wondering, you know, just in a kind of practical sense, how unusual a situation is this, and is it yet clear how players, family, staff, fans and officials from many of these participant nations are even going to be able to get to the US for these Games?

[David Goldblatt]

Sure. I mean, I should add, I heard today that Iran's ticket allocation for fans has been revoked as well. Well, so they won't be going. In terms of World Cups, this is most unusual. If you look at the last three World Cups, Brazil and particularly Russia and Qatar, which do not have the easiest travel and migration regulations in the world, a World cup ticket basically served as your visa. Oh, you had to download apps and stuff, but it was. If you had a ticket, it was totally unproblematic. So I would say at a World cup, this is completely unprecedented. I mean, in the same sense, it's completely unprecedented for the host of a World cup actually to be at war with one of the participants in the tournament. In terms of revoking or refusing visas in international sport more widely, there have been a few examples of this. Probably the most prominent is over the years, Indonesia has refused Israeli athletes and Israeli teams visas to attend various tournaments which resulted, you know, back in the 60s in Indonesia actually being expelled from the Olympic movement. And more recently, Indonesia has had, I believe, one of the kind of youth World Cups kind of stripped from it because of this visa issue. So it is not entirely unprecedented, but that's a very specific issue about the politics of the Middle East. Whereas here we just have, you know, crazy, aggressive, nativist, anti migrant border policies, you know, going, going on. So it's, it's not unprecedented. It's very rare in the World Cup. You know, never really before.

[Matthew Amha]

Last week, I actually produced an episode of this show, which centered on Donald Trump's relationship with UFC President and CEO Dana White. And, you know, there are kind of interesting parallels between his relationship with FIFA's president, Gianni Infantino. Infantino last year presented Trump with a so called FIFA Peace Prize. Mr. President, this is your prize. This is your Peace Prize. There is also a beautiful medal for you that you can wear everywhere you want to go.

[David Goldblatt]

This is truly one of the great honors of my life and beyond awards. Johnny and I were discussing this. We saved millions and millions of lives.

[Matthew Amha]

Infantino also had a front row seat to the President's inauguration and was part of Trump's delegation at last year's Davos conference. You've used words like obsequious and fawning to describe Infantino's, you know, Trump charm offensive, you might call it. Can you talk to me a little bit about the relationship that has been cultivated between these two men and Infantino's capacity, kind of, generally speaking, to cultivate these kinds of relationships with leaders that many would describe as authoritarian?

[David Goldblatt]

Sure. So Infantino has got a lot of experience dealing with authoritarian leaders, having been in charge at FIFA when the World cup was staged in Russia under President Putin. He has had very close relationships, of course, with the Qataris and the 2022 World Cup. And most recently, he has established very close relationships with Moham Salomon in Saudi Arabia, who now will be hosting the 2034 World Cup. But a whole bunch of other connections have been made along the way. So this is the kind of. This is the sea that he kind of has been swimming in over the last 10 years. And I suppose I interpreted at first his relationship with Trump as cynical and performative and not a bad decision if you're dealing with a man child in charge of effect. You know, the most important thing that your organization does, that everything relies upon, and you see that flattery works. And we know, we know that to be the case, then why wouldn't you go down that route? And in that regard, all the things that you've described, you know, he's played a blinder. I mean, I would say the most extraordinary thing of all was being one of the people who went to the premier of Melania.

[Matthew Amha]

Hi, Mr. President. Congratulations. Did you watch it?

[David Goldblatt]

I did not. Yeah, I will see it on the news. And he was there at the premiere at the Kennedy Center. I wonder whether he's now drunk the Kool Aid and this is no longer performative, but actually he has bought into the. The ideology and the norms of the global super rich and of authoritarian oligarchs. I mean I actually genuinely, I can't decide which one of those things is is going on.

[Podcast Announcer / Narrator]

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[David Goldblatt]

How can a woman just go missing and us put out all that effort to find her and she's still missing.

[Podcast Announcer / Narrator]

I'm David Ridgeon and this is Someone Knows Something Season 10 the Jacqueline Furlan Smith Case Listen Ad Free on Amazon Music.

[Matthew Amha]

I guess more more broadly now. I mean, you know you've written some of the most definitive works on the history of soccer, much of which centers on its connections to our political, social and cultural lives. Soccer as our greatest shared activity or even most frequented form of cultural production. If I could just ask you, as someone that has a certain focus on history and sociology, what was it that informed your decision to choose this sport as the way you wanted to talk about some of these issues?

[David Goldblatt]

Well, there's a good question. I mean, the moment really for me was in 1990 when I went to see Arsenal versus Charlton in the fourth round of the FA cup at Charlton, I hadn't been to a football game for quite a long time at this point. I'm in the middle of doing a PhD in Sociology and I walked out of the station to meet my friend Dan who'd invited me. He had tickets for the Arsenal away end and every single sociological neuron in my brain exploded simultaneously as I surveyed the invented rituals and traditions and the unspoken rules and norms and the Forms of social identity and the occupation and policing of social space that were all going on in front of me in the guise of a football match. And it absolutely just blew my mind. It was like the scales fell from my eyes. And here we are 36 years later, having gone down that, that particular path.

[Matthew Amha]

We are recording this for a largely Canadian audience. And while soccer is now growing in popularity here in Canada, it doesn't have the same kind of place or purchase in the national identity as hockey, baseball, or even basketball. But it's really interesting to me, you know, given the fact that soccer was created by the British Empire and spread through much of the world through the colonial period, and given Canada's place as a former colony of the British Empire, why do you think it is that sport never really caught on in places like Canada in the way that it did in much of the rest of the world?

[David Goldblatt]

This is really interesting. There's a whole bunch of countries, you know, particularly what were once called the white dominions of the empire, where football has not become the, the most popular game. I mean, Canada, it would be true, but also Australia, also New Zealand and other colonial countries. Island, you know, India was of course, colony of Britain. And nowhere is football number one. So I. There is something in all of them that is a resistance to British colonial rule and a need to assert some kind of independence and separate identity. So I think that's partly what's going on in all of them. Sometimes it's a very conscious decision. So in the case of Ireland, you know, in the late 19th century, Irish nationalists are making the argument that if we keep playing English games, we turn into Englishmen and we need to be Irish. And so we may need to have, have Irish games and Irish sport. And thus the Gaelic Athletic association is created and hurling and Gaelic football are codified. And these become in many ways the most popular sports in Ireland. I think the process in somewhere like Australia and Canada is less self conscious, but that's, you know, is underneath that. And I think, you know, there just is a meteorological issue. You know, football is, is less suited to the Canadian climate. And there is, you know, there are very few places in the world that have so much access to so much ice. And, you know, let's face it, Canada spends a lot of time in the winter. It makes sense that there's a boreal game. So I think that, you know, that is part of it. I mean, I don't know enough about Canada, but I wonder whether there is an, an element, as in the United States, where part of the country looks upon football, soccer, as in some senses, an alien game, a non Canadian and non American game. I mean, that's very strong in the United States where nativist and right wing nationalists, you know, will argue it's a game for women and third World peasants and immigrants who don't want to integrate. And I wonder whether there's been an element of that in Canada that's certainly a very powerful element in the United States and also in Australia, where the game became associated, you know, in mid century with the Croats and the Italians and the Serbs and the Greeks, and was therefore considered, you know, on the border of whiteness and definitely not Australian. I think there might be something like that going on as well.

[Matthew Amha]

Just for the kind of benefit of the listener, there you were quoting from a Ann Coulter, who's a conservative American commentator who has talked a about, I guess, you know, soccer's place in the national imagination in the United States. In a piece titled America's Favorite National Pastime. Hating Soccer, she wrote, no American whose great grandfather was born here is watching soccer. Pretty definitive on her part, but okay.

[David Goldblatt]

And also not true.

[Matthew Amha]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, of course, Why don't we move on now to some of the history of this storied competition that we've been talking about. And you know, I think it makes sense for us to begin in 1934 when the world cup was held in Benito Mussolini's imperial Italy. And the occasion was then used by the country's fascist leader as a kind of advertisement to the world. Really one of the early examples of a phenomenon today popularly known as sportswashing. Some might have heard of Hitler's Olympic Games, but can you talk to me about Mussolini's World Cup?

[David Goldblatt]

So the Italians put on a really good show. They build two new stadiums, they invest money in really classy design. Journalists from around the world are invited with free travel, subsidized hotel costs. So there's a real effort to put on a show in that regard. I would say the sports washing element is true because a message is of course, being sent to the rest of the world. That fascism works is the message and is mighty, but it's also the domestic audience. So much of the rhetoric around the World cup and of Mussolini's performance at the World cup where he shows up at the draw, he shows up for all of Italy's games. He actually makes a cup called the Copa del Duce, three or four times the size of the Jules Rimet trophy that is awarded to the winners. And Italian for Italian fascism, sport in General and football in particular becomes a way of expressing the essential militaristic masculinity of the new Italian fascist man. And winning the tournament is proof positive of that. And that's a message to a domestic as well as an international audience. So, yeah, all of that is going on in 1934 at the World Cup.

[Matthew Amha]

Now, if we can jump forward in time a little bit. I mean, about a decade after the nominal end of apartheid, South Africa was chosen to host the World cup in 2010, making it the first and only African country to do so. Now the event was supposed to be this testament to post colonial Africa, you know, a feel good story about what national unity and multiracialism could look like and mean for the world.

[David Goldblatt]

And here's the official welcome. It's Africa's first World cup and it's the host, South Africa against the Mexican side.

[Matthew Amha]

The reality of course was much more complicated. Can you talk to me a little bit about South Africa's World Cup?

[David Goldblatt]

Well, my experience of South Africa's World cup was covering it without a press pass. So it was very much blogging from below. I would say that at one level it was an enormous success in the sense there was so much bad press, there was so much frankly racist, anti African, this can't happen. People will be knived in the streets, it'll be a disaster stuff. And it all happened and it all happened on time. It was all functional. It was a good World Cup. Goal for South Africa, goal for all Africa. Was it the best? That's a whole another matter. But I just think at that level that was enormously important and I think it had a real South African vibe to it. I personally was an enormous fan of the Vusela. The, the little plastic, you know, stadium, big horns. Right. And a lot of people, particularly Europeans, didn't like it because it sounded like this terrible, you know, like mad bunch of bees or wasps sort of swarming. I thought it was great. And particularly inside the stadium where actually there was a lot of tonal variation and call and response. So I think at that level it was a real success. I mean, did it deliver a kind of really punchy post colonial riposte in terms of the performance of African teams? Not really. Ghana, you know, went out tragically.

[Matthew Amha]

Don't remind me.

[David Goldblatt]

Okay, to, to Uruguay assembly has the opportunity to send Ghana into the semi finals of the World Cup.

[Matthew Amha]

And he hits the bar. Unbelievable.

[David Goldblatt]

What a miss. But even then I thought it was very heartening and a really important thing that the whole of Africa really did get behind Ghana at that moment. And that there, you know, the World cup and football in general remains one of the last places where a real living Pan African identity and vibe, you know, exists and is manifested publicly. So I thought that was a really, that was a really important element of it. And if I may say, without doubt the best music at a World cup ever. You know, given the terrible, terrible music that we are subjected to at most World Cups. South Africa in the pre tournament concert that they held and actually in the opening ceremony. Absolutely different class for anything that we've had so far. You know, we'll see what happens this time around.

[Matthew Amha]

Over the course of this conversation. I mean, already we've already talked about how the tournament has been used by leaders to, you know, burnish their reputations on the world stage. And in many ways I think these last two World Cups are really pretty relevant containers for this as well. Right. You have 2018 in Russia and 2021 in Qatar. Among the reasons for controversy in Qatar were the legion of migrant workers, a labor regime that some have referred to as modern day slavery, which were responsible for building much of the infrastructure for the Cup. Russia had a number of attendant controversies as well. Can you walk me through these two competitions and you know, what their kind of legacy ultimately was?

[David Goldblatt]

So I think the Russian World cup is really best understood as a Potemkin village. And you know, Potemkin villages. Potemkin was an aristocrat who, you know, was at the court of Catherine the Great and she went on a tour of the kingdom. And obviously nobody wanted to see the actual miserable poverty of Russian serfdom. So a series of fake villages were built full of rosy, happy serfs that she passed through in her coach. And that is a Potemkin village. And the whole thing was a gigantic digital Potemkin village. You know, the Russian police were told, like, just lay off a tiny bit, allow the foreigners and eventually Russians to participate in kind of drunken reverie in public spaces, which normally would be absolutely forbidden and totally cracked down on in Russia. At the same time, you know, the Russian state took the opportunity to publish massive transformations of the Russian welfare state, including above all the pension system, which were massively popular. The World cup law that was passed meant any kind of political process in World cup cities was totally illegal. And so you had, led by Navalny at the time, protests going on in hundreds of cities all over Russia that were completely invisible to the world's press, who of course were ensconced in the few World cup cities. So that Strikes me, you know, we all came away from Russia. Many people came away from Russia going, not so bad. Not, you know, pretty normal. People had fun, all of those lovely Peruvians bringing Latino warmth to the steps. But the reality, I think, wasn't I was a Potemkin village. Qatar is more complex. You know, the Qataris, the Qataris didn't actually go into it thinking, we want, we've got something to hide here. On the contrary, the Qataris went into this process thinking, how can we be as well known as ever? Because we are a tiny pimple on the back of Saudi Arabia in a very unstable part of the world and we need people to know that we are to exist because that is the basis of this state's security and its place in the diplomatic order. And how better to get the world to know who you are than to stage the World Cup? So at that level, the Qatari World cup was enormously successful because everybody actually does know where Qatar was and their 250 billion that they spent, they're probably thinking that was money well invested. I think they were perhaps a little naive would be my impression, that they weren't going to get a hard time on a load of other stuff. And I think they were genuinely surprised and shocked when the Global North NGOs came for them, not just on migrant workers, but also on LGBT rights, women's rights, press freedom, etc. And the Qataris, you know, having taken a position, they were letting people in and continued to do so. So that meant, whereas Russia was incredibly closed and very difficult to report on, Qatar was actually a bit easier because that is the game that they are playing. And the migrant worker issue, yeah, it was, you know, very, very powerful stuff. The NGOs came in as early as 2012, 2013, saying, this many thousand people are going to die by the time this thing is over. This captured a lot of attention. So the Qataris, you know, in a way, was it sports washing? I mean, we know about Qatar and its, its issues in enormous detail. I think it's also worth remembering in this conversation that what we see as sports washing or actions we see as sports washing or problematic, are not always seen in the same way in the rest of the world. So one feature of the World cup in 2022 is the Qataris crack down on LGBT insignia. A bit in the crowd, but also what armbands teams could wear. And while, of course, in the Global north, people were completely outraged, there are many parts of the Global south where folks share their attitudes, who are going, yeah, you tell the global north, where to get off. You tell them what to do with their universal human rights. I mean, I don't agree and I don't approve, but I think we should understand that the same action can send different messages to different people in this world. World.

[Matthew Amha]

Do you think, reputationally speaking, it was a net positive for both Russia and Qatar at the end of the day?

[David Goldblatt]

I mean, I think for Russia it was, but then it's been entirely squandered by everything that's happened since, you know, Russia, in terms of reputation, globally, it's complete basket case. And the World cup is totally, it's, it's just been kind of made irrelevant. The Qataris, I think, on balance, as I said, I think they're very pleased with their 250 billion pound investment. I mean, it was a sensational, you know, they got, in a way, the most sensational World cup ever. Without doubt, the greatest World cup final ever. Please welcome the teams from, You know, they were able to stage the greatest, greatest drama ever at the World cup, certainly in living memory. A breath, a heartbeat and Messi. A goal forevermore. Mbappe. Oh, wow. Montiel, Argentina, champions of the world.

[Matthew Amha]

And the nation will tangle and as

[David Goldblatt]

you said at the beginning, with probably the greatest television audience ever. So, yeah, I think they're pleased.

[Matthew Amha]

One of my earliest footballing memories probably came during the 1998 World cup, which was held in France. I was like 3 years old, and I have a peripheral memory of the French team which ultimately went on to win the tournament. And what was interesting about that team is that it was really one of the first times that this legacy of colonialism really started to intersect with the sport in the global north, north in a really linear way. You know, here you had a team of Frenchmen, so many of whom were born to parents who had fled nations that had been colonized by France. You know, you had Thierry Henry, who was from the islands of Guadeloupe and Martinique. You have Patrick Vieira who was from Senegal. That team was known as, quote, black, white and Arab. And, you know, in a way, they ushered in a new age of sport and one that has really gone on to define the decades since then. You know, if you watch today, teams like England, Canada, the United States, Belgium, Spain, Germany and more feature the children of immigrants in pretty large numbers. You know, the current greatest player in the world is a Spanish. Well, I should say who I would consider to be the current greatest player in the world is a Spanish teenager named Lamina Mal, whose parents are from Equatorial guinea and Morocco. One of the other great players today, of course, is Kylian Mbappe, whose parents are from Cameroon and Algeria. So can you talk to me a little bit about this phenomenon and what the response has been to it from within the game and you know, how we've seen migration flows and colonial history help to shape this modern incarnation of the sport.

[David Goldblatt]

And I think this is one of the amazing things about this World Cup. Although it's taking place primarily in a country or under a regime that is, you know, incredibly anti migrant and has, you know, a very nativist and ethnic conception of the nation, the teams and the squads on display are without doubt the most diverse that we have ever seen. I think there's probably a majority teams now that I would say are sort of civic nationalist teams where you have a significant number of players who are either migrants themselves or whose parents are migrants. And as you say, all across Europe, 50 years of labor migration and more recent refugee flows have produced a French team. I calculated 22 out of 26, six have got migrant routes, 16 out of 26 for England. But, you know, you've also got, you know, Senegalese Spaniards, you've got Gambian Norwegians, you've got Albanian Germans. So that's, in a way, that's, that's, that's incredible. But you've also got the flip side of that, is the diasporic teams. So, you know, I calculated that about a third of the teams have a significant third or more of their players who were not born at home but share the, and have probably never lived there, but share the ethnic heritage of the home nation. So something like Curacao or Cape Verde, you only have one or two players who actually born in Curacao or Cape Verde. And everybody else is in the diaspora. But this is true of Croatia, of Bosnia, of Congo. You know, this world has been totally, so totally remade by immigration in this last 30, 40 years. And of course, it becomes a space in which the politics of the nation and the meaning of the nation are contested. You know, the French example that you mentioned in 1998, I mean, it cuts both ways. On the one hand, an extraordinary utopian moment in which the French nation is reimagined so explicitly and in a celebratory fashion as this multi ethnic, post colonial, you know, phenomenon. And at the same time, of, of course, you've got the French right, you know, saying, are they really French? Is this team French enough? Do they sing the national anthem, you know, loudly enough? And this politics plays out all the time, you know, Romelu Lukaku, put the kind of conditional membership of many my minority groups in European nations in perspective when he's, when he wrote, you know, when everything's going well, I'm Romelu Lukaku, the Belgian striker. But when things are going badly, I'm Romelu Lukako, the striker of Congolese origin. And Mesut Ozil would say the same about his German and Turkish identities. We've seen the same all over. So it's a really interesting space and it works both ways. The World cup and international football, I think, is one of the most effective theaters of anti racism and of challenging nativist assumptions about the nation state. But of course, it's a place where this politics is played out as well from the other side.

[Matthew Amha]

Yeah, I mean, just, just to end here. I mean, you've. You have used the language of theater there in your answer, and I've seen you use that as a framework in some of your writing. You know, football as our great public theater. And it is, of course, as we've talked about, the vessel through which you've come to understand so much of humanity. And what I wonder is what you see most today day when you watch or attend the theater of football or soccer.

[David Goldblatt]

I feel more than anything the longing for community and connection. We live in such an unbelievably atomized, individualized world, poisoned and ruined by the pernicious ideology of neoliberalism and the utter vacuity of consumption that we have been offered digital and real. And there is is a desperate, desperate human need in this world to feel connected. And that is what I sense at its best. That's what I sense and that's what I experience in the football stadium.

[Matthew Amha]

David Goldblatt, thank you so much for coming on the show today. That was excellent.

[David Goldblatt]

It's my pleasure. Thank you so much for having me.

[Matthew Amha]

That's all for today. I'm Matthew Amha. Thank you so much for listening.

[David Goldblatt]

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