As the Russian invasion of Ukraine continues, international federations and sports bodies react in cascade by taking positions that contrast with their usual promotion of an apolitical sport. Lukas Aubin, sport geopolitical scientist at the Institute of International and Strategic Relations and author of Sportokratura under Vladimir Putin: a geopolitics of Russian sport (Bréal, 2021), believes that the sporting sanctions against Russia could become tougher, but that they alone will not slow down the Russian president.
Many sporting events in which Russian teams are to participate are now canceled or postponed. Is there, in the long term, a risk of exclusion of Russian teams from competitions such as the qualifications for the Football World Cup, the Euroleague or the Paralympic Games?
This is a question to which we do not yet have a precise answer. The European Union of Football Associations, UEFA, quickly took an important decision by relocating the Champions League final from Saint Petersburg to the Stade de France, Formula 1 canceled its Grand Prix in Sochi and the Committee Olympic International (IOC) has called on international federations to boycott events in Russia. All this put together suggests that it is possible that Russia’s sporting sidelining goes as far as the exclusion of its national teams. This could concern competitions such as the Paralympic Games (March 4-13) or qualifying for the FIFA World Cup.
Several nations, like Poland, are defiant and do not want to confront Russia. This will raise other questions, to the International Football Federation (FIFA) in this case: are we excluding Poland or Russia? Until now, the sporting consequences of cases involving Russia, including those for doping, were not up to the faults committed, but this time we have the feeling that we have crossed a threshold and that t will be difficult for many instances to go back.
The IOC and UEFA, which usually advocate depoliticized sport, have this time taken a stand. Are some cases more defensible than others for these instances?
Until very recently, the big authorities refused to mix sport and politics and defended an apolitical nature of sport, but everyone knew that it was a dead end. Many analysts have demonstrated that sport is a fundamentally political element, that it is a weapon of influence used by nations. And, finally, with the exception so far of FIFA, these bodies are taking responsibility for the exceptional nature of the situation.
The International Volleyball Federation has confirmed its desire to maintain its World Cup in Russia (August 26-September 11), while F1 has canceled its Grand Prix in Sochi (September 25). Can some federations afford, more than others, to turn their backs on Russia?
The richest federations, those who are the most financially comfortable, will in my opinion find it easier to do without sponsors or to cancel events. UEFA is thinking of parting with sponsor Gazprom for a while, but we can imagine that the International Volleyball Federation is more fragile. When we don’t have the same funds, we don’t have the same leeway. Afterwards, there will also be political choices, with trade-offs to be made.
Renowned Russian athletes, such as footballer Fedor Smolov or tennis player Andrey Rublev, took a stand against the war. What are they risking?
It all depends on the athlete’s situation, whether he is active or not, whether he plays in Russia or abroad. Most Russian professional soccer teams, for example, are controlled and funded by oligarchs close to President Vladimir Putin. And as soon as an element does not follow the line of power, it is repressed.
We can also remember the example of Russian hockey player Artemi Panarine, who plays with the New York Rangers. At the beginning of 2021, he called on social networks for the release of opponent Alexeï Navalny. In response, he had undergone what is called the compromat [la publication d’informations compromettantes]. A close friend of Vladimir Putin had intervened on television to affirm that the hockey player was not someone to be seen since he had attacked a woman in a bar in Riga, Latvia, a decade earlier, without any proof. .
And if he was reinstated by his club, which judged that it was a set-up on the part of the Russian authorities, he however never again wore the jersey of the Russian selection when he was there, before this episode, an indisputable holder. This is one of the possible consequences of speaking out against power when you are a Russian athlete. This is what could happen to Fedor Smolov.
It’s a rare phenomenon in Russia today, a working professional athlete is taking a stand against the regime… https://t.co/POCjLCDTEU
Can these chain reactions weigh to roll back Vladimir Putin?
I think it’s a bit presumptuous to think that can set him back. That would be giving too much importance to sport. But let’s say that a balance of power is being established between Vladimir Putin and his competitors and that if sport alone cannot tip the scales, all these sanctions in different areas can potentially affect the Russian president and his regime.
These reactions are all the same embarrassing, because sport is a weapon of “soft power” which President Putin regularly uses to improve his image and that of his power. But we note that since the first conflict in Crimea, in 2014, then the doping cases, this “soft power” sportsman has already turned against him a little. Sport has finally become an element of its power on an internal scale and no longer on an external scale. It was supposed to improve Russia’s image, but today when you think of Russia and sport, you think of doping, not of performances by Russian athletes. This is a signal of a failure of his strategy.
Interview by Hortense Leblanc