Carlos Pulleiro Méndez's research while affiliated with Tongji University and other places

This chapter analyzes the main characteristics and foreign policy of core states according to their national power and geostructural position. Firstly, the world powers are the states better positioned in the geostructure in the last decades; however, since the 1990s, these states have started to lose, in relative terms, their international preponderance. Nevertheless, they are central states that possess the greatest economic-military, socio-institutional, and communicative-cultural power. Regarding international governance, world powers are members of the G-7, some of them are permanent members of the UN Security Council, and members of the most important international organizations such as IMF, World Bank, WTO, NATO, etc. In the end, world powers can be considered the directors of the international system. Middle powers are central states that have very high levels of socio-institutional power, but unlike world powers, middle powers possess a relatively smaller economic-military and communicative-cultural power. These countries traditionally promote international cooperation and peace, making them valuable allies to world powers in managing international governance. Unlike the declining world powers, middle powers are stagnant in their geostructural positioning, which means a relative loss of primacy compared to other emerging countries. Finally, semicore states are countries with significant levels of development and well-being, but they do not stand out for their economic-military or communicative-cultural power. Although they are developed states, they have never been labeled as "powers" except for a few exceptions. They are also strategic partners for international governance, distinguishing among two different types: states that have recently surpassed the semiperiphery to be incorporated into the core due to their geographical, political, or economic proximity to core powers; or they were middle powers but declined during a long period until occupying a more marginal place within the core of the international system.

Eileen Gu received a widespread public attention as an American-born snowboarder that won 3 medals in the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics representing China. Building on the conceptual and historical frame�works of sports and nation-building, and taking Eileen Gu as a case�study, this article analyzes through critical discourse analysis how Chinese mainstream media portrayed Eileen Gu’s image and her Chinese identity. The results show that during the 2022 Beijing Olympics, Chinese media constructed Eileen Gu’s Chinese identity through a plu�ralistic approach: her success is connected with national pride, Chinese food, family relations and kinship, friendship, excellence in study and Chinese totems. We conclude that in the context of sport being an important vehicle for China’s nation-building, this country is expanding the boundaries of Chinese/China through sports storytelling and the naturalization of athletes, linking sporting success to the ‘rejuvenation of China’.

This research focuses on the Spanish strategy to balance its political non-recognition of Kosovo and the respect to the Balkan country’s full membership in FIFA and UEFA. Considering the relevance of naming as a political tool in cases of sporting diplomatic conflict, our driving research questions are: How relevant is the name of Kosovo for Spain in its use of sport to perform this state non-recognition? More specifically, how and to what extent did the official name of Kosovo become a key diplomatic element for Spain during the Qatar 2022 World Cup qualifiers? Methodologically, we have applied a content analysis of the Spanish Football Federation, the Spanish public broadcasting corporation and three main private media outlets. The conclusion is that the stronger diplomatic mobilization of Kosovo forced Spain to accept all of its national symbology at the protocol level. Therefore, there was a deliberate attempt not only to avoid the use of the names ‘Kosovo’ or ‘Republic of Kosovo’ by the Spanish establishment, but also using lower cases when no other alternative was possible. However, its application was inconsistent among the executing actors due to the lack of internalization of the naming policy, thus making it ineffective.

Under the leadership of president Xi Jinping, the revitalisation of football has become a key strategic goal for China. His three wishes are to qualify regularly, host and win the FIFA World Cup by 2050. Considering the statehood of the international sports system and the Chinese political motivation to achieve such ambitious goals, this paper is going to apply an analysis of football from an International Relations perspective. In this regard, three basic premises are identified for the analysis of football: 1. The national interest in sport is winning titles. 2. The national interest is not as relevant as the state’s ability and capacity to win. 3. More resources and investments may guarantee a better performance, but not necessarily winning titles. In conclusion, although football in China is having a considerable development along this decade, if we consider that the conversion of resources into titles is not the same for every country, China might face a power paradox, being incapable to take advantage of its extraordinary capacities to win titles and become a global football power.

This paper will evaluate the political stance of sport analysing the case of FC Barcelona (Barça) during the sovereignty process of Catalonia. The main objective is to clarify Barça’s commitment with the sporting values between the 2012 Diada and the unilateral declaration of independence of October 2017, and to do that, we perform a critical discourse analysis through the methodological triangulation. We analyse the official statements, public declarations and interviews of the club members to comprehend the involvement of Barça in the political events that occurred in Catalonia. The theoretical framework rejects the use of politicization as a valid concept to understand the political implications of sports institutions, since it is an oversimplification of the complex relationship between sport and politics. The conclusion is that Barça has defended the political values of sport – dialogue, mutual respect and democracy – looking for a peaceful solution to the political conflict in Catalonia.

"All fixed, fast-frozen relations, with their train of ancient and venerable prejudices and opinions, are swept away, all new-formed ones become antiquated before they can ossify. All that is solid melts into air, all that is holy is profaned, and man is at last compelled to face with sober senses his real conditions of life, and his relations with his kind". Manifesto of the Communist Party (1848) Contextualization: After a year of COVID-19 pandemic, there are currently many questions and deep discussions about its impact on international relations. Objective: To proceed in its study it is necessary to start by differentiating two concepts that are generally interchangeable for academics, but that are refered to processes of different nature: mondialisation and globalization. Method: The article is structured according to the famous quote of "all that is solid melts into air…" from the Manifesto of the Communist Party, which served as inspiration for the book of the same title by Marshall Berman, where it is studied the effects in globalization of incipient socio-economic sectors: cryptocurrencies, e-learning, eSports and entertainment. Results: COVID-19 has had a significant impact on globalization, “melting” its material bases, thus resulting in an uncontainable, accelerated and quite possibly irreversible transition towards a new digital era of globalization. Conclusion: Due to COVID-19, different sectors attached to the digital world are experiencing a rapid grown, “profaning” the current basis and concepts of finance, education, sport and culture, and “compelling” these socio-economic sectors to face its current “conditions” in order to adapt better to the new digital era of globalization.

El año 2020 representa un año de cambios paradigmáticos en nuestra historia reciente debido a la pandemia de SARS-CoV-2 o COVID-19. En este contexto, cabe preguntar, ¿de qué manera ha impactado el COVID-19 en el desarrollo de la sociedad del conocimiento? ¿Cómo han gestionado las organizaciones internacionales esta crisis? Aquí sostenemos que el Gran Confinamiento generado por la amenaza del COVID-19 se ha convertido en un catalizador determinante para la consolidación de la sociedad del conocimiento, en un contexto en el que las organizaciones internacionales han desempeñado un papel de gran relevancia. Las cuatro dimensiones sociales que sirven para nuestro análisis son: 1) Salud: COVID-19 ha sido la pandemia de mayor alcance en las redes sociales en cuanto a riesgos de muerte, en ello, la OMS ha jugado un papel clave en la socialización del conocimiento para enfrentar el reto; 2) Empleo: el Gran Confinamiento orilló a la humanidad a recurrir al teletrabajo para que la producción siguiera su curso, planteando nuevos desafíos a la normatividad emanada de la OIT; 3) Educación: la suspensión de las actividades educativas presenciales en todo el mundo obligó a docentes y estudiantes a trasladar abruptamente su trabajo a las plataformas digitales, con el acompañamiento de la UNESCO; 4) Deporte: encontramos que, además del apoyo del COI y la FIFA a las campañas mediáticas de la OMS, debido a la suspensión de eventos, las instituciones deportivas recurrieron al entorno digital, y los e-sports emergieron como alternativa. Elegimos estudiar el papel de las organizaciones internacionales clave en el manejo de la pandemia por su impacto en la emergencia de la sociedad del conocimiento. En conclusión, encontramos que la emergencia de la sociedad del conocimiento derivada de la crisis sanitaria proveniente del COVID-19 sustituye una gama de actividades productivas tradicionales que, por su propia dinámica, quedan condenadas a desaparecer en el mediano plazo.

After a decade of political and economic shared interests in the organization of sports mega-events between semi-peripheral states and international sports federations, the case of Brazil with the organization of the FIFA World Cup in 2014 and the Rio Olympics of 2016 has changed the dynamic of this relationship. On the one hand, semi-peripheral states have verified the associated risks with the organization of sports mega-events regarding the political, economic and social destabilization of the country. On the other hand, the inability of sports mega-events to generate positive legacies as promised during the bid phase has questioned the role of sports organizations and their championships as development tools.