Skating on Thin Ice; Let’s Talk Olympic Corporate Sponsorships
Last week Hayley Mole explored the politics of this year’s Winter Olympics and the ramifications of climate change on how the games are run and will be run in the future. Several countries have enacted diplomatic boycotts over concerns about China’s human rights violations, particularly against Uyghur Muslims in Xinjiang province. At the same time, the Chinese government has threatened to punish athletes who speak in ways that it deems offensive. Brands such as Coca-Cola, Airbnb, and Visa have paid millions to sponsor the Winter Game in Beijing. In doing so, rights groups say they are endorsing human rights violations. Large corporates — who are increasingly aware of their ethical brand image — have a very fine line to tread as they wish to access China without alienating critical consumers.
In the run-up to the Games, some companies took steps to distance themselves from the Xinjiang region in particular. In December, Olympic sponsor Intel sent a letter asking suppliers to “ensure that its supply chain does not use any labor or source goods or services from the Xinjiang region.” When the letter was made public, it sparked calls on Chinese social media to boycott the company. Intel quickly issued an apology to China, walking back from their previous statements.
Nonetheless, other companies have actually committed to increasing business in Xinjiang. US snowboard company Burton — which designed the uniforms for the US Olympic snowboard team — expects to expand existing operations in Xinjiang as China becomes one of the world’s largest winter sports destinations and domestic sporting expands.
Coca-Cola has strategically attempted to have its cake and eat it too. The company — which has sponsored every edition of the Olympics since 1928 — will only release its products such as limited-edition Olympic Coke cans in China, instead of its normal global campaign.
Corporate communication aside, the international community has watched with bated-breath as athletes use their personal platforms for advocacy. While the International Olympic Committee’s “Rule 50” — introduced into the Olympic Charter in 1975 — prohibits political “demonstration” and “propaganda” during the competition itself, it’s quite explicit that athletes have free speech in all other contexts. China has threatened that if athletes protest or speak in a way that is offensive to Chinese law and the Chinese government, there will be “certain punishment.” Of course domestic laws usually apply to international competitions (as we saw with Djokovic’s recent issues in Australia), but the threat concerned many participating nations nonetheless.
The IOC itself is supposed to remain politically neutral, but its actions have made major changes to domestic policy in the past. South Africa was banned by the international sports community, an important step in the larger anti-apartheid struggle, as Nelson Mandela himself explained.
On the corporate-side, China is not the only place where companies need to balance commercial, legal, and ethical questions related to topics like free speech. In The US, Spotify is facing a blowback from a multitude of artists and content creators on its platform due to the company’s on-going support of Joe Rogan, who has been accused of pushing mis-information. Neil Young and Joni Mitchell have left Spotify in protest. While free-speech is a political guarantee, it is not a corporate one, where companies can create policies regulating what is communicated through their platform. Whether in China, US, or online, corporates will continue to balance between legal, political, social, and commercial interests. Let us hope that they are not short-sided and privilege long term thinking that incorporates ethical branding with ethical actions.
Derek Brooks, Head of Venture
U.S. chipmaker Intel has deleted references to Xinjiang from an annual letter to suppliers after the company faced a backlash in China for asking suppliers to avoid the sanctions-hit region.
There is a massive market for monitoring the supply chain for ethical and sustainable production. New tools are making it easier for companies to monitor multiple levels of suppliers, in an effort to bring transparency. However, it’s not always the top-tier suppliers that are the main risk but often the smaller ones that are harder to trace.
If you have never tried Uyghur food and happened to be hungry in midtown Manhattan, your author can recommend Tengri Tagh.
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