by Alice Clarke
Doubtless, many of you reading this will be aware of or even involved in the discourse surrounding FIFA’s decision to award the 2022 World Cup to Qatar. However, this will not be the case for everyone, so I’ll provide some basic information.
The primary issues many people and organisations have raised concerning this decision by FIFA (the international governing body of football) are based around the numerous reports of human rights violations, from within Qatar and by international bodies. The purpose of this article is to provide a brief explanation of what is going on for those who are interested, and explore some of the questions raised by this issue, not to provide my own opinions or describe in detail the allegations made against Qatar, but if you want further detail on anything I’ll go on to mention there will be links at the bottom for further reading. To be specific, Qatar has issues regarding the treatment of migrant workers, the rights of women and LGBT people, freedom of expression and journalistic freedom, and while publicly the government has pledged to take action, make investigations and begin reform, no significant proof of action has been reported.
Now, while I will be doing my best to remain impartial, I personally do believe that every human being deserves treatment in accordance with the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, set out by the UN. This is also the official position of our government, along with every other member of the UN, (which includes most of the countries involved in the world cup). I think it is safe to say that if any of the problems reported in Qatar were to crop up in the UK there would be a public outrage, but the difficulty arises when we question exactly where our responsibility to uphold these values ends: Qatar officially submitted documents to join the two core UN human rights treaties in 2018, however it rejected major protections regarding trade unions, capital and corporal punishment, freedom of religion, expression, and Women’s rights.
There are many arguments for how relations with countries such as Qatar should be conducted, and this is not a new issue, but the decision by FIFA to award Qatar the world cup has brought it into the public view like it never has been before. The key question weighing on Fan’s minds seems clear: would supporting this World Cup be implicitly supporting Qatar? The most popular course of action will likely match the School’s: We will be showing the opening match, and potentially further ones, in public areas of the school, but without doing anything more to suggest support of Qatar, or FIFA’s decision. But Is this a question of cultural tolerance? Should something as supposedly universal as human rights be put aside in favour of international relations? Or, should this even be about any of that? Do football supporters have a duty to consider carefully if what they are consuming is ethical, or should the responsibility be placed solely on FIFA? Perhaps only the Qatar government is to blame, and if we will not intervene directly with them, we as a public have no right, or no reason, to take other action. However, perhaps awarding the World Cup was the best thing FIFA could have done to combat the situation in Qatar; these issues are anything but new, but before this recent surge of activity, who was talking about it? Perhaps all this scrutiny might pressure Qatar into taking action far better than any official report has done up till now.
It is important to remember that these questions of responsibility are not new ones: they bear striking similarities to the ethical issues around palm oil, farmed from crops planted on destroyed rainforest, or Coltan, essential for phones but largely mined by underpaid workers, often children, with no rights to speak of: I haven’t included any answers to these questions because they go far deeper than just this one world cup, and if there are any right answers, no one can agree on what they are. It’s something that you have to grapple with for yourself, and no one else can decide for you how you want to impact the world.
Amnesty International report on human rights in Qatar
Qatar Joins human rights treaties
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