Keyword – human rights

Varga, Tibor Szabolcs:

(E)sportswashing

It is an emerging practice in sports that states directly buy up clubs, event organisers, media companies and international championships. They transform their control over these into political, cultural and economic capital so that they can achieve their goals of nation branding and economic diversification. The press calls this practice ‘sportswashing’: which expression is a pejorative label for non-Western sportsbased geopolitical activities in countries with a record of human rights violations. However, research on sportswashing remains problematic until it can be put into the context of the known political frameworks and be thus separated from judgments based on Western values. Hence the use of the term ‘politicalcultural funding,’ as opposed to the one burdened by value judgment, may bring useful insights in the analysis of Saudi Arabia’s expansion in the e-sports industry, which began in 2020.

Keywords: e-sports, Saudi Arabia, sportswashing, human rights

Dariia, Opryshko:

‘Soft Power’ in the Twisted Mirror of Disinformation and Propaganda

This paper investigates the role and importance of “soft power” elements in the dissemination of disinformation and propaganda. It highlights the differing approaches adopted by democratic countries and authoritarian regimes towards the concept of soft power. The analysis focuses on the instrumentalisation of soft power elements such as the media, culture, religion, education, and science in the spreading of disinformation and propaganda, illustrated through the example of Russia and the Russkiy Mir concept. The paper concludes that strategies designed to counter disinformation and propaganda should extend beyond fact-checking and the improvement of media literacy, adopting instead a more comprehensive and holistic framework. Such strategies should also encompass the safeguarding of the values targeted by information attacks. Finally, the author proposes a series of measures that states may implement to counter Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference (FIMI).

Keywords: soft power, disinformation, propaganda, Russkiy Mir, human rights