Citation:
Date Presented:
10 February 2012Abstract:
In 2016, Brazil will become the first ever South American nation to host the Olympic Games. This event will be preceded in 2014 when Brazil will host the FIFA World Cup. Amidst the positive attributes inherent to these mega-sporting events, a puzzle exists wherein expected revenue rarely translates to tangible benefits for poor people within the host nation. While it is without a doubt that the beautiful skyline of Copacabana Beach will become an imprinted memory of Brazil’s hosting endeavors, what will not be as readily available are the images of poverty that afflict the city, and the impact that the preparation of these events has on the urban poor of Brazil’s major cities. In order to fulfill its promises to FIFA and the International Olympic Committee (IOC), it is forecasted that more than 3,500 families in six slums in both western and northern areas of Rio de Janeiro will be removed. Brazil represents an important case study of housing rights protection during the preparation for major sporting-events because it is a developing democracy, because it will host both the World Cup and the Olympics consecutively, and because it will become the first South American nation to ever host the Olympics Games. Through comparing the strategies of intervention undertaken by social movements during the 2010 South African World Cup and the 2010 Indian Commonwealth Games, this thesis will attempt to generate a theory of best-practice that can be employed in Brazil and other developing democracies prior to hosting mega-sporting events.