Long Shot: The Prospects and Limitations of Sports and Celebrity Athlete Diplomacy

Michael K. Park, journals.openedition.org

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Excerpt:

Résumé

This paper seeks to explore some of the unique features of sport as an instrument of American soft power. Informed by Cooper’s theoretical perspective on celebrity diplomacy, this work extends the celebrity diplomacy discourse into the area of sports celebrities and explores the unique features of celebrity athletes as an instrument of diplomacy. This work also expands the discourse on celebrity athletes as non-state sanctioned antidiplomats, and examines Dennis Rodman’s “basketball diplomacy” efforts in North Korea as a case study to examine the power celebrity athletes can have—contrary to what one would expect—toward fostering engagement with even the most reclusive and hostile governments. Moreover, this works examines North Korean media accounts of Rodman’s basketball diplomacy, in order to evaluate the potential limitations of celebrity athlete diplomacy and to offer cautious conclusions when celebrity athletes are used as instruments of engagement.

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Entrées d’index
Keywords :Sports communication, celebrity diplomacy, sports diplomacy, soft power, sports celebrity diplomacy

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Plan
Introduction
U.S. – D.P.R.K.: Hard Power Relations
The Soft Power of Sport: Attraction and Consumption
Sports Diplomacy: A Brief Taxonomy
The Cult of Celebrity and Sports Celebrity Diplomacy
From Ping-Pong Diplomacy to Basketball Diplomacy: A Case Study
The Contested Terrain of Sports Celebrity Diplomacy
Conclusion ...

Conclusion

45Although recent revelations of torture, drone warfare, and intrusive surveillance activities have badly maligned the credibility of the U.S., citizens from around the world continue to follow, consume, and idealize U.S. cultural products, including sports. During his 2015 visit to Cuba, U.S. Congressman Charles Rangel noted that sports were atop a long list of things Cubans said they loved about America. It comes as no surprise that sports—via soccer, baseball and basketball—is being used as an early soft power resource to further thaw relations between the U.S. and Cuba—a historically hard power environment, now at the dawn of a new era of rapprochement. In June of 2015, the New York Cosmos soccer club became the first U.S. professional team to play in Cuba since 1978. In March 2016, President Obama capped his historic visit to Cuba with a baseball game between Major League Baseball’s Tampa Bay Rays and the Cuban national baseball team—a symbolic “people-to-people” engagement centered on a sport that both countries share a common passion for.

46Sports diplomacy via the celebrity athlete are a nascent and underutilized soft power resource worth further consideration to bridge dialogue and diplomatic relations between publics, including estranged nations and their heads of state. Public diplomacy efforts are marked by new economic challenges (e.g. China), and ideological challenges from militant Islam and rogue states such as North Korea. It is therefore a critical time to revisit the U.S.’s soft power currency in order to evaluate and utilize it effectively pursuant to legitimizing its actions and policies abroad, and to win the information war against both extremist groups like the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and the global public. With a vast array of cultural products encoded with American values and ideals, the U.S. possesses deep reserves in soft power, including the attraction of its global sports teams and celebrity athletes, which can influence international relations due to their universal appeal.

47Although nations have employed sports diplomacy to bolster their image and brand, this essay explores the unique features of sports celebrities as an instrument of diplomacy. Furthermore, this essay expands Cooper and Vanc’s work on celebrity diplomacy into the realm of celebrity athletes—as antidiplomats—with a case study that examined the attraction and value sports celebrity diplomacy can have toward fostering engagement within the most rigid, hard power environments. Finally, this work also underscores some of the major limitations that this soft power resource poses in the area of public diplomacy. Further research needs to explore how to measure and assess the efficacy of these sports diplomacy strategies for both state-sponsored and private actor initiatives. Another valuable research inquiry could involve a comparative analysis on celebrity diplomats from the diverse fields of entertainment, including sports, music, film and television, in order to uncover if certain fields lends itself to greater credibility and attraction than others.