OPPORTUNITIES FOR STRATEGIC GLOBAL LEADERSHIP OR VEHICLES OF DOMESTIC POLITICAL LEGITIMACY?
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Presentation given at the International Leadership Association conference in London in October 2011. Focused on leadership challenges created by the proliferation of bidding and hosting mega events
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OPPORTUNITIES FOR STRATEGIC GLOBAL LEADERSHIP OR VEHICLES OF DOMESTIC POLITICAL LEGITIMACY?
- 1. MEGA EVENTS: OPPORTUNITIES FOR STRATEGIC GLOBAL LEADERSHIP OR VEHICLES OF DOMESTIC POLITICAL LEGITIMACY? PROFESSOR MALCOLM FOLEY, DR DAVID MCGILLIVRAY AND PROFESSOR GAYLE MCPHERSON
Editor's Notes
- In order to deceive you with spectacle, we’re going to start with a series of images which provide an illustration of the wide ranging importance of events, globally in the early 21st century. In essence, we can ask ‘why study events’? These images and short commentaries provide the answers. Here we have the Beijing Olympics - China’s coming out in the international marketplace and demonstrating (through propaganda) their ‘soft power’ offensive. We also have the ‘local’ with Pamplona’s Bull Running - albeit, we could see this as increasingly globalised as it is differentiated by the safe and sanitised events of the present. Finally we have Glasgow’s Mela - local, national and globalised at the same time. The common thread to these events, which make them of interest to the book that we’re producing is that they are each open to planning and management to achieve outcomes not necessarily part of their original purpose.
- Events have always been about identity, and continue to be so. Here we see the Burning Man - a festival which encourages its participants to develop an alternative, anti-commodification identity in the face of intense commercialisation of the wider events ‘industry’. Our major sporting (and cultural) events are heavily dependent upon the support of some of the world’s most recognised brands - albeit as we’ll reflect upon later, there are some real issues around our public spaces being colonised by private capital - a feature of the urban entrepreneurial governance approaches which dominate in the local states of US, UK and Australia. In terms of national identity, we have the Brazilian samba supporters and, at the bottom we have the Scottish Highland Games and the now infamous Homecoming celebrations. Clearly these events are markers of identity - but crucially, this identity is often contested.
- As we will argue later, events have moved from being ritualistic, chaotic, unstructured and ‘meaningful’ to being increasingly planned, organised, formalised and designed to achieve external outcomes. Here we see the political and politicised nature of events - Obama’s inauguration, Hitler’s Berlin Olympics - the propaganda games, and Thaipusam - the Singaporean festival which is full of rich symbolism which remains inaccessible to the marauding western tourist tribes. As the Glasgow 1990 image suggests, events are now frequently used for regenerative purposes - as a catalyst, or step change, for destinations. We review the emergence of this set of affairs in terms of urban governance and suggest that it is a reflection of the post-industrial shift to managerialism and civic boosterism in the local state.
- Events are, as Roche (2001) argued tied into personal biographies in a way that we could never have imagine before mass media and communication. They are reflective of their times (e.g. Mexico Olympics and civil rights, Munich Olympics and terrorism) and they are written into history. They are the site for propaganda and for mass dissent and protest - albeit there are power relations at work which enable the former and limit the latter (I.e. dissent). With Gay Pride, a social cause became a movement mobilised through public parades, though some now argue that the ‘rights’ which were fought for have now been sidelined in favour of spectacle and display.
- Event are increasingly ‘tiered’ - from mega events (Olympics, soccer World Cup, Expos), through hallmark events (Calgary stampede, Rio Carnival, Mardi Gras New Orleans), to national and local/community. Cities manufacture or bid for (if they are on a circuit) events in order to achieve a place at the global table. Semi-peripheral nations wish to secure promotion to the elite group and events is a mechanism for achieving this. For example, Scandanavian countries are now actively courting major sports events as a means of generating additional profile. However, there are also limits to what cities can do - only Rio can have its Carnival, only Calgary can have the stampede - or can it?
- increasingly, as recent bid announcements confirm, the emerging BRIC nations (Brazil, Russia, India and China) and those in the Middle East (e.g. Qatar, Dubai, Bahrain) are succeeding over their western counterparts. This success can, in part, be put down to the absence of democratic processes and the presence of alternative social contracts between rulers (or leaders) and their populations, whereby resources and legitimation are far less of a problem than for the nations off the west
- the economic rationale which is dominant at present, may be changing with the surge of BRIC nations winning events. Will we see the West win a major event in the next few years. The terms of bidding has changed. It is not enough to meet just economic growth or targets of sponsors but there is a shift taking place, more than just legacy. Legacy can be an add on or worse rhetoric but the move to use events as leverage to building in social and cultural benefits that are planned from outset is gaining a pace. Misener talks about a holistic approach to embedding events, engaging communities, the end results are able to be felt long after the event has left town. Part two is more conceptually oriented, drawing upon the underpinning theoretical discourses which frame policy formations. So, we look at urban political economy, urban geography, social theory to ‘think about’ events and how they are utilised in the early 2st century. Finally, Part 3 is concerned with applying the theory into strategic case studies which illustrate theory in action. These chapters are deliberately international in focus, to illustrate that variable geographical territories and modes of governance therein, implement policy differently. So, while in the UK and Australia, the prevailing environmental agenda is framing policy choices and the social value of events is seeping into strategy, in the undemocratic state of Dubai, such agendas are sidelined in favour of events as an economic generator.