Book review of the day: The Ideals of Global Sport: From Peace to Human Rights

John Soares. Review of Keys, Barbara J., ed., The Ideals of Global Sport: From Peace to Human Rights. H-Diplo, H-Net Reviews. October, 2019.
URL: http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=54282

 Quote from the review's conclusion:

In their conclusion, Keys and Burke argue that “as commercialism, doping, corruption, and gigantism spread an ever larger pall over sport mega-events, the need for a countervailing set of moral claims that can justify and excuse the excesses grows in tandem” (p. 223). Significantly, they point out, “the paucity of evidence” that these moral “claims are grounded in fact have almost never acted as a brake on the impetus to make such claims.” They write, convincingly, that “our craving for meaning and moral value guarantees that we will continue to invest our most grandiose events with a capacity to do good that they have yet to earn.” And yet, despite many disappointments, that moral veneer “has also, fitfully and sometimes unwittingly, helped reduce some of those wrongs” (p. 224). This clear and judicious conclusion is a fitting cap to a collection of essays that so commendably describes and explains the fraught connections between “mega” sport, moral improvement, and human rights. It deserves a wide readership among historians of international relations, sport, and the impact of nongovernmental agencies.