Sportswashing. The use of sport to improve and develop the image of a corporation, government, or nation. This could be done by hosting large sporting events, purchasing or sponsoring international sports clubs. 

So, what is the first thing you think of when you hear the term Sportswashing? Perhaps a specific nation, sports club, or sporting event springs to mind. Probably one of the most controversial sporting events in recent history was the 2022 FIFA World Cup which was hosted by The State of Qatar. A nation that during the build-up to the tournament met several accusations regarding human rights violations, labor violations, corruption, and the use of the tournament as a political tool to launder its national image, gain power and increase national development.

 According to previous academic research, Qatar is far from the first example when sportswashing has allegedly been used in an attempt to achieve another goal, whether it is to create a better national image for the outside world, develop a nation, or gain power.  

This paper aimed to examine how a nation could use large sporting events such as the FIFA World Cup, as a political tool to increase a nation's power, global influence, and cultural development. In this case, the focus was primarily on Qatar since it is close in time and sparked discussions around sportswashing and human rights. This paper did also use other historical sporting events as examples to examine the effects of sportswashing and to initiate discussions about the future of sportswashing.     

This investigation found for example that sportswashing could be used as a political tool for laundering a national image, creating control over information, developing power relations, and playing an important role in the cultural development of a nation.

This desk study did not use human participants but rather relied on academic papers as its foundation, together with news articles from The Guardian and Al Jazeera with official documents from FIFA as support.