I’m not much of
an athlete. My “sporting” career was something of an accident in as much as I simply
enrolled in the school karate club and persevered until the club couldn’t
maintain its numbers and ended up closing just as I was starting my A-levels.
However, whilst
I’ve never been much of an athlete, I’ve always loved watching sport and
following the drama of great sporting events. Growing up in England meant that
I ended up in the centre of great rivalries such as the annual Five Nations
(Now known as Six Nations) Rugby tournament between the home unions (let’s
remember that the United Kingdom isn’t a single country but four and this is
the chance for Wales, Scotland and Ireland to stick to England – I am young
enough to remember the 1990 Scottish Grand Slam) and France (the English and
French have been at it since 1066 when the Normans took control of England),
England versus Germany for football (The English like to remind the Germans
they won the war and Germans remind the English that they’ve won four world
cups to the solitary won for England) and England versus Australia in cricket.
These rivalries also extended to individual sports where you had Edberg versus
Becker at Wimbledon and Formula One in those days was about the late Ayrton
Senna versus Alain Prost and Nigel Mansell.
These sporting
rivalries are perhaps one of the most important developments in the last
century because they provide an important outlet for nationalistic feelings.
This is particularly true in Europe, which was in the early part of the 20th
century, the centre of rivalries that got played out in two world wars. I think
of former British Prime Minister, Sir John Major (Born in 1943) who said that whilst
his predecessor, the late Baroness Thatcher (Born in 1925), grew up in a Europe
that could not conceive of peace on the continent, he was from a generation that
could never conceive of war taking place in Europe (excluding Eastern Europe,
which was only just emerging from Soviet domination).
How did Sir
John Major’s words come about? A large part of it has to do with the creation involves
the creation of the European Union (EU) or the European Economic Community
(EEC) as it was then known. European countries started trading together and
realised that if they gained prosperity from trading together, there was no
reason to go to war. The driving force behind the EEC or EU was to ensure the
Franco-German rivalry that was at the heart of two world wars would become a
Franco-German partnership to create prosperity for each other.
Whilst
economics was important driving force in bringing former enemies together, the
importance of sports cannot be underestimated. Just as there was an idea that
trading together would disincentives war, sport got people to "play
together” and the potential for “nasty-nationalism” got channeled onto the
sporting pitch rather than onto the battlefield. In the 1930s it was all about
keeping Germany down. These days, the English and Dutch are trying to beat the
Germans on the soccer pitch.
There are
lessons for the rest of the world. Here in Asia, we have several flashpoints
like North-vs-South Korea (which could turn nuclear-nasty), India-vs-Pakistan
(also potential to nuclear-nastiness) and let’s not forget China-vs-Taiwan. With
the exception of India-vs-Pakistan, these rivalries consist of people who don’t
“play together.”
Whilst nobody
has yet to conduct a study, I would argue that cricket matches between India
and Pakistan have helped tame the tensions and potential for war between two
nuclear armed countries.
Getting people
to play together is the best way of ensuring that peace is secured. Tensions
between nations, just as tensions between people, will always be a constant.
Just exercise allows individuals to channel aggression, sporting events allow
nations to channel feelings of aggression onto the sporting pitch instead of
the battle field.
I believe that
Singapore should look into this and see how we can host events that get the
world’s rivals to duke it out in the national stadium. Sure, we’ve been good at
some grand gesture politics like getting Xi-Jinping and Ying-Jeau or Donald
Trump and Kim Jong-Un to shake hands in Singapore. However, we can do more. We have
what you call the right ingredients in as much as waring parties want to behave
when in Singapore.
Can you imagine
if we hosted an annual football tournament between Israel and the Palestinian
Authority? We share a bond of being two small non-Muslim nations between larger
Muslim nations with Israel but we also have a sizeable enough Muslim population
to make the Palestinians feel at home.
By hosting sporting
events between some of the most bitter rivals on the planet, we can really be a
powerful force for good. The diplomatic and commercial benefits are enormous.
Its something our Ministry of Foreign Affairs needs to look into.
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