How the US Uses Sports Diplomacy in Foreign Policy

Have you ever heard of “soft power”? It is a term that I heard many times throughout my four years as an undergraduate in international relations. In theory, it is a concept to make any aspiring diplomat passionate about their future profession — the possibility of exercising power without using brute force, military power, the capacity for destruction.

In practice, I only came to understand the reality of how it actually worked about three years ago, already inside the world of sports, during a professional experience in the United States. The tool through which I saw the famous soft power being applied is another term that has become part of all my research since then: “sports diplomacy.”

I grew up believing that Americans were a selfish and domineering people. I did a six-month exchange in Ohio during high school, and I returned with the certainty that they had absolutely no interest in genuinely learning about other cultures and people beyond their borders. But, 15 years later, the American government invited me to return — this time, it was no longer me paying to learn the language and their customs; it was the United States who paid for me to develop my project here in Brazil. But why did it pay for this?

The invitation came from the field of sports diplomacy, a governmental program responsible for several sports exchange programs that seek to strengthen the country’s ties with other nations. It positions sports as an important foreign policy strategy capable of increasing dialogue and cultural empathy and, consequently, contributes to the building of a more stable and secure international community.

As soon as I began my journey in the Global Sports Mentoring Program, I responded to a questionnaire that sought my opinion about the United States — about the government, its global foreign policy and its bilateral relationship with Brazil. This same questionnaire was presented again at the end of the program. Can you imagine the difference in my responses? I was impressed with how my opinion had changed in such a short time. I had been directly impacted by soft power, and I was quite satisfied with this.

During the five-week program, I got to know another facet of the American population. They purposely made me believe that, from then on, I should always consider the U.S. as my first option for bilateral cooperation, or for investing in professional specialization. At each meeting with businesswomen, entrepreneurs or government workers, I gained more appreciation and admiration for the people and the country’s institutions; in a short time, I saw myself becoming a spokesman for a foreign country.

Does Brazil have the capacity to promote something similar? The sports envoy program is a highly replicable example — the government sends athletes and coaches to run clinics for young people in other countries, always in partnership with local consulates and embassies. How many of our athletes and coaches would have the potential to carry out this same activity? Many, I am sure.

Another good example is the Sports Visitor Program, which receives groups of foreign young people and coaches for short but intense cultural sports exchange experiences. In partnership with nongovernmental organizations and local universities, the government enables interaction between different people, always making Americans the reference for learning, while at the same time teaching its population about tolerance and respect for diversity. How many young people and coaches from around the world wouldn’t love to come to Brazil for a two-week immersion of activities, games and conversations? What is the potential for these same young people to return to their countries where they could treat Brazil as an ideal partner in their future plans?

Here is my challenge to the Brazilian sports ecosystem to look for ways to include sports in the agenda of our foreign policy and enhance our ability to be admired and seen by the international community, inside and outside the four corners of the field.

As Joseph S. Nye of Harvard said, “The basic concept of power is the ability to influence others to get them to do what you want. There are three major ways to do that: one is to threaten them with sticks; the second is to pay them with carrots; the third is to attract them or co-opt them so that they want what you want. If you can get others to be attracted, to want what you want, it costs you much less in carrots and sticks.”

Júlia Vergueiro is the owner and president of Pelado Real Futebol Clube, founder of Nossa Arena. She writes monthly for Máquina de Esporte.