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Sunday, February 23, 2025

Sport diplomacy to forge bonds, development

by

Brian Lewis
726 days ago
20230227
Brian Lewis Things That Matter Logo NEW

Brian Lewis Things That Matter Logo NEW

Sport Diplo­ma­cy, so­cial jus­tice and hu­man rights are the top­ics, I have been in­vit­ed to speak on at the On­line Glob­al Con­fer­ence host­ed by the In­ter­na­tion­al Cen­tre for Pro­to­col and Diplo­ma­cy. The con­fer­ence start­ed on Mon­day and will end on Fri­day.

The over­all theme of the con­fer­ence is - “The role of Diplo­ma­cy in Achiev­ing the Sus­tain­able De­vel­op­ment Goals 2030 Agen­da”.

When con­tact­ed by the con­fer­ence or­gan­is­ers with an in­vi­ta­tion to speak I was sur­prised but af­ter speak­ing with Pa­tri­cia Ken­neth Di­vine, Di­rec­tor of the In­ter­na­tion­al Cen­tre for Pro­to­col and Diplo­ma­cy, I ac­cept­ed the chal­lenge.

The pro­gramme, top­ics and list of speak­ers are im­pres­sive as is the over­all con­fer­ence theme: “Diplo­ma­cy and the Sus­tain­able De­vel­op­ment Goals 2030”.

To be iden­ti­fied and recog­nised by the or­gan­is­ers for my ad­vo­ca­cy and thought lead­er­ship on so­cial jus­tice and hu­man rights in glob­al Olympic and Com­mon­wealth sport is an en­cour­age­ment, in­spi­ra­tion and mo­ti­va­tion.

No mat­ter how in­tim­i­dat­ing the chal­lenge may ap­pear, I am al­ways keen to rep­re­sent the voice of Trinidad and To­ba­go and the Caribbean on is­sues and top­ics that may fly un­der the na­tion­al and re­gion­al radar.

Diplo­ma­cy and the Sus­tain­able De­vel­op­ment Goals 2030 as a top­ic may not be a front burn­er and front-of-mind top­ic amongst Caribbean po­lit­i­cal, aca­d­e­m­ic, sport and pol­i­cy lead­ers and de­ci­sion-mak­ers. Diplo­ma­cy tra­di­tion­al­ly has been seen to be the sin­gu­lar purview of na­tion-states. Gov­ern­ments deal with diplo­ma­cy.

The main fea­tures of diplo­ma­cy are rep­re­sen­ta­tion, com­mu­ni­ca­tion and ne­go­ti­a­tion. It has not been seen or giv­en con­sid­er­a­tion to non-gov­ern­men­tal agents. Re­search on sports diplo­ma­cy will show that some aca­d­e­mics and schol­ars claim that sports diplo­ma­cy is a new term that de­scribes an old prac­tice. They al­so posit that the pow­er of sport to ad­vance for­eign pol­i­cy or aug­ment sport for de­vel­op­ment ini­tia­tives re­mains elu­sive due to the lack of a ro­bust the­o­ret­i­cal frame­work.

Ar­ti­cles can be found that at­tempt to trace the aca­d­e­m­ic lit­er­a­ture on sport diplo­ma­cy and iden­ti­fy the em­pir­i­cal, con­cep­tu­al and the­o­ret­i­cal frames used to study sport diplo­ma­cy.

Sport can be the face of a na­tion and na­tion­al iden­ti­ty for good or bad, neg­a­tive or pos­i­tive. In the Glob­al South in­clud­ing Trinidad and To­ba­go and the Caribbean, we ig­nore sport diplo­ma­cy to our own per­il. Sport diplo­ma­cy cur­rent­ly is dri­ven and con­trolled by the Glob­al North and a few high-in­come coun­tries.

Sport is a ve­hi­cle for in­ter­na­tion­al out­reach, com­pet­i­tive­ness, job cre­ation and pover­ty erad­i­ca­tion and can max­imise trade, tourism and in­vest­ment op­por­tu­ni­ties. To this end, sport plays an im­por­tant role in eco­nom­ic and pub­lic diplo­ma­cy. Sport is an un­tapped re­source that can cre­ate gen­er­a­tional change to build a safer, stronger and safer world.

Trinidad and To­ba­go and the Caribbean need to have a sport diplo­ma­cy strate­gic plan sup­port­ed by the gov­ern­ment. We need to lever­aged sport (Sport Diplo­ma­cy) to strength­en our na­tion­al brand and in­ter­na­tion­al pro­file.

In the con­text of the Glob­al Con­fer­ence - Role of Diplo­ma­cy in Achiev­ing the Sus­tain­able De­vel­op­ment Goals, it’s a huge op­por­tu­ni­ty to in­volve Trinidad and To­ba­go and the Caribbean in an im­por­tant glob­al plat­form and con­ver­sa­tion - about sport diplo­ma­cy and the sus­tain­able de­vel­op­ment goals.

Sport is a diplo­mat­ic as­set that can be used for in­ter­na­tion­al out­reach. Pow­er is a key con­cept in in­ter­na­tion­al re­la­tions–hard pow­er and soft pow­er. In the art and sci­ence of mod­ern diplo­ma­cy sport is used to es­tab­lish rep­re­sen­ta­tion, cre­ate a com­mu­ni­ca­tion chan­nel and man­age in­ter­na­tion­al re­la­tions by ne­go­ti­a­tion.

Mod­ern sport and pol­i­tics have been con­nect­ed for cen­turies. Rev­erend JC Well­don, Di­rec­tor of Har­row School once said: “It is writ­ten in the his­to­ry of the British Em­pire that Eng­land owes its sov­er­eign­ty to sports.”

George Or­well’s view was: “Sport is war with­out weapon”.

While French writer and diplo­mat Jean Gi­rau­doux be­lieved that: “Sport is Peace”.

Re­gard­less of the phi­los­o­phy, one may have about sport diplo­ma­cy. The Nel­son Man­dela school of thought po­si­tions sport as a plat­form for in­ter­na­tion­al di­a­logue. Sport Diplo­ma­cy as a strat­e­gy ought not to be ig­nored by Trinidad and To­ba­go and the Caribbean.


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