Tag: The More You Know

Sportswashing: The Expensive Image Laundering Conspiracy Sullying Sport and Foreign Relations

Presenter: Christian Sardar – Business Administration

Faculty Mentor(s): Corbett Upton

Session: (In-Person) Oral Panel—The More You Know (in depth looks and prevention)

Sportswashing refers to a sovereign entity such as a nation buying a sports team in another country and using it to improve their image. In my research paper I posit that sportswashing, specifically that done by the countries of the Persian Gulf, is not only damaging from a foreign policy perspective but also from a sporting perspective. Most of the teams being bought as soccer teams from Western European nations and their governments seem ambivalent towards the situation. By looking at the exact level of investment by countries such as Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE I found a whole lot of money being poured into teams which yielded little to no money for the nations that bought them. It also took next to no research in order to discover the vast number of heinous human rights violations being committed in these wealthy countries, yet they are able through sportswashing to redirect public opinion off of themselves. Simultaneously, their name remains untouched or in many cases elevated. Manchester City is right now one of the best soccer teams ever seen and its name is nearly synonymous with the emirate of Abu Dhabi. Similarly the upcoming World Cup is taking place in Qatar in stadiums mostly built by migrant workers living in conditions akin to slavery. This issue is immensely pressing for our current sporting climate and world as this topic really speaks to how nations are trying to spread their soft power across the globe. This research assesses the damage done so far.

Stopping Gun Violence Starts With Analyzing the Link Between Victims and Perpetrators

Presenter: Emmi Morton – Marine Biology

Faculty Mentor(s): Corbett Upton

Session: (In-Person) Oral Panel—The More You Know (in depth looks and prevention)

In this paper, I analyze how different childhood traumas will affect children as they grow older, and how this can affect their relationship with guns and the community around them. After secondary exposure to the trauma that gun violence can have, I became curious as to how it will affect those who did experience it firsthand. Throughout this essay, I explore how traumatic events(specifically those relating to gun violence) in childhood during the formative years of one’s psyche, affect the way that they interact with society as they age and gain independence. I decided to go even deeper, to explore how whether being a victim of violence firsthand or just exposed to it, impacted the chances for these people to become either a victim or a perpetrator when it comes to violent crimes such as gun violence. In a world with increasing gun violence and rapidly declining mental health, the risk for tragedies of this nature is higher than ever.

Research done by C.S. Widom in 1989 regarding the cycle of violence was absolutely crucial and remains a central root in the research that I’ve conducted. This cycle of violence reveals the keys to at least implementing some sort of intervention or crisis outreach programs to really make a difference. In this paper I argue that gun violence, which is usually done by mentally disturbed individuals with relations to childhood trauma, passes it on to the next generation of children which in turn creates a loop of violence that must be stopped.

Queering the Way: Investigating the Relationship between U.S. LGBT+ Advocacy and Policy Advancement

Presenter: Matthew Hampton − Planning, Public Policy and Management, Political Science

Faculty Mentor(s): Dyana Mason, Alison Gash

Session: (In-Person) Oral Panel—The More You Know (in depth looks and prevention)

The modern LGBT+ rights movement in the United States has pushed political and social advancement since the mid-twentieth century, continuing the fight for equal treatment even as hundreds of anti- LGBT+ bills are being proposed and passed in states across the country. This study analyzes the specific tactics used by LGBT activists and nonprofits from the mid-twentieth century to present day, framing them using Political Opportunity Theory to try to explain how they make campaigns or movements successful. The study will be conducted using interviews of LGBT+ activists and aligned policy makers, either archived or original. Ultimately the study seeks to answer the question: In the LGBT+ rights movement (specifically the fight for equal employment), what advocacy strategies have worked to create political and social change, and how can their success be replicated for current and future rights battles? Do political and social change require both grassroots and policymaker support? Using theories, previous scholarly literature, and activist interviews, many factors were found to contribute to the overall success of an advocacy campaign: access to resources, ability to mobilize populations, clear goals and strategy, and strong relationships between outsider activists and political insiders. The goal of this report is to increase knowledge for creating effective policy and social change both inside and outside of policy arenas to further promote LGBT+ equality and understanding.