Gender and mega-events – a multifaceted phenomenon

Sepandarmaz Mashreghi
Department of Sport Sciences, Malmö University

Sport, Gender and Mega-Events is an edited volume by Katherine Dashper with contributions from well-known gender and sport scholars. The book was published in 2022 by Emerald publishing. Dashper starts the book with an introductory chapter in which she positions sport in relation to gender. She argues that sport (and sport mega-events), as a central feature of the contemporary societies, is a “highly ritualised, highly commercialised practice that is focused on the body [and] [as] such, it is a prime site for the production and reproduction of gendered identities” (p. 1). Dashper further maintains that sport mega-events have become an integral part of today’s world that engage many of the world’s population, institutions and governments in various ways. In essence, the periodic and temporal occurrence of these events mark the passing of time and provide a “rhythm to the global sporting and media calendars” (p.1).

Such events have also given rise to various multinational corporations, such as FIFA and IOC, that hold enormous wealth and regulating power that dictate the directions and understandings of sport and competitions globally. Dashper contends that such mega-events are phenomena on their own that demand further examinations of “ways in which gender is done, redone and potentially undone” (p. 2) in relation to sports. The aim of the book, therefore, is to highlight the paradoxical nature of sport mega-events in relation to gender. On the one hand, such events highlight, and favour, hegemonic masculinity ideals of bravery, aggression, toughness and dominance, while reproducing the “feminine other” which is inherently inferior. On the other hand, sport mega-events are also highly visible sites for challenging and shifting the same gendered discourses.

Yet, the book as a whole invites us to view issue of gender and mega-events as a multifaceted phenomenon that can be studied from multiple perspectives and theories, and as such is useful for both scholars and students of sport studies and critical event studies.

The book has thirteen chapters organised in four sections. Section 1, “Problematising Gendered Bodies and Behaviours”, highlights the different ways in which sport mega-events remain mechanisms for regulating and defining sex, gender and gender performances in ways that marginalise and exclude those who differ from the masculine ideals. Section 2, Masculinity, Sport and Mega-Events” focuses on the discourse of hegemonic masculinity and how such a notion is both reproduced and challenged in mega-events. Section 3, “Gender, Disruption and Transformation at Mega-Events”, turns the attention to how mega-events can become sites of disruptions and transformation of gender relations. The final section of the book, “Gender, Sport and Mega-Events: Moving towards Equality?”, considers how sport mega-events can become sites of institutional change in terms of representation, participation and media coverage.

The two sections that I was most eager to read were sections 3 and 4 in which mega-events were discussed in their potential to be sites of disruption and institutional transformation in relation to gender and sports. Yet, reading these chapters, I am not convinced that it is necessarily the mega-events that contribute to such disruptions. As an example, chapter 8 written by Jorge Knijnik, Rohini Balram and Yoko Kanemasu discusses the activism of Baianas (Bahia state native women who are descendent of African enslaved people) in their struggle to keep the rights to sell their traditional street food, acarajé, in the stadiums controlled by FIFA and their sponsors. The authors utilise the theoretical framework of everyday resistance to demonstrate that historically, making and selling acarajé has provided Baianas with a “medium of resistance against racial and class oppressions that had confined them to neo-colonial servitude in white households” (p. 158). During the 2014 FIFA World Cup in Brazil, the women had to face FIFA regulations that controlled all aspects of the game (including the sale of food) in the stadiums and tried to block them from making their living. The victory of the women against FIFA highlights the fact that hegemonic hierarchies and power are never unchallenged, but I am not sure if it posits mega-events as a facilitator of transformation. The Baianas have continuously struggled against various intersectional oppressions in order to make a living and practice their culture. The arrival of the 2014 FIFA (men’s) world cup yet added another layer to their everyday struggles. With the arrival of FIFA to town, the women faced the possibility of not being able to make their living and if it was up to the governing body of this mega-event, the women would not have. Despite the fact the women were able to gain international attention and win against FIFA, it was not this particular mega-event that facilitated this win, rather it was the tenacity and commitment of the Baianas themselves that lead to this victory.

This theme also continues in the next chapter where Katarzyna Raduszynska analyses yet another FIFA (men’s) World Cup in Russia 2018. As she discusses how the fans “separated from society …are allowed to re-establish, transform, transcend …and turn their world upside down” (p. 176), I am left, yet again, with the feeling that such transformation says much more about people and their tenacity to live, than the mega-events, as powerful and regulating institutions, and their potential for change. The author brings examples of the unabashed public celebration of Iranian female fans in the 2018 World Cup. This is in the context that, women in Iran, despite being enthusiastic football fans, still have very limited access to the football stadiums, and in 2018 their entrance was fully banned. In Russia, however, away from the regulations of the regime ruling their homeland, they could freely and publicly express their fandom. In Iran, however, FIFA has not been so successful in transforming the regime’s law in relation to women, yet the governing regime in Iran, supported by various sporting regulating bodies, continues to utilise various mega-events for propaganda purposes in order to present a false understanding of the actual lived realities of the people of Iran.

Raduszynska, discusses a similar issue in relation to Russia as she argues that the regulating bodies of mega-events, such as IOC and FIFA, have continuously supported Russia’s efforts to host such events despite outright human rights violations and armed invasions enacted by the Russian authorities. She argues that mega-events are able to offer publicity and a veneer of respectability that could cover such outright violations. This resonated with me deeply, not least because I am acutely aware of the Iranian peoples’ struggles, but for the fact that I was working for the IOC during the 2010 winter Olympic games in Vancouver and witnessed, first-hand, the struggle of Indigenous peoples in Canada in relation to unceded lands that were to be developed and profited from by the Canadian government and the IOC. Beautifully written, this chapter yet again, highlights the determination of people to live despite the limiting regulations set by sporting conglomerates, and the violence of the many host countries that they support, not because of them.

However, in my opinion, the chapters fail in positioning mega-events on their own as facilitators of lasting institutional changes in relation to gender.

The chapters of the book are quite diverse, but, with a few exceptions, the focus of analyses has remained in the Global North and there is stark lack of information regarding mega-events taking place elsewhere, i.e., Asian Games, AFCON etc. Although this issue is not unique to this volume and it can be explained by different factors, the paucity of analysis from elsewhere has created a blind spot in relation to issues concerning gender and sport from a global point of view. Yet, the book as a whole invites us to view the issue of gender and mega-events as a multifaceted phenomenon that can be studied from multiple perspectives and theories, and as such is useful for both scholars and students of sport studies and critical event studies. However, in my opinion, the chapters fail in positioning mega-events on their own as facilitators of lasting institutional changes in relation to gender. As the last section of the book argues, such events can, at most, bring about more gender equal participations, but I am not sure that this participation can translate into the transformation of the sporting arena and its ideals in relation to gender.

A vivid example is the case of Women’s football in Spain as argued by Celia Valiente in chapter 10. She argues that despite lower wages and unfavourable working conditions in women’s football, an increase in large scale women’s football events in Spain have brought about more participation of women and girls in the sport. Yet, as the blatant sexist events that took place following the Spanish women’s win in the world cup in the summer 2023 demonstrate, sport mega-events continue to reinforce and often exacerbate gendered (as well as racial and colonial) ideals. What change or transformation that occurs in such events happens because of specific individuals and communities’ commitment to challenge and disrupt such ideals and the international regulating bodies that upkeep them. Nonetheless, this edited volume raises the important issue of sport mega-events and gender as a phenomenon that requires more attention and intersectional analysis.

Copyright © Sepandarmaz Mashreghi 2023