Xavier Ginesta

The Use of Football as a Country Branding Strategy. Case Study: Qatar and the Catalan Sports Press

The main objective of this article is to analyse the sport place branding strategy of Qatar, a Persian Gulf country that is using the income from the commercialisation of its gas to create an economy, which can be successful in the future without depending on this natural source. Sport, above all football, has been a key sector in which the Qatari government believes in order to promote the image of its country worldwide. One of the most interesting examples used in this article is the relationship between the Qatar Foundation and FC Barcelona. Using a qualitative methodology, this article aims to understand the key pillars of this strategy and why sport mega-events have been so important when governments want to increase their reputation in the international sphere.

What is the next step? The champions league clubs and their sponsors. From Bwin to Qatar Sports Investment

European Champions League has become one of the most important sporting competitions in the world. For this reason, many firms want to associate their brands with the organizations which take part in that competition. This article analyses which type of firms invest in European football using a sample of clubs taking part in the knockout phase of the 2010/2011 Champions League championship. This article shows how betting houses and non-profit organizations, such as UNICEF and Qatar Foundation, have become important for football business. On the one hand, online gaming found in football is a perfect sport to make its business tangible; on the other hand, non-profit organizations use football and its celebrities to make their projects visible or legitimize them.

Beyond the Votes: A European Perspective on the Use of Public Relations to Legitimize Authority in Obama’s Campaign

In political campaigns in Western society, there are many examples of public relations being behind opinion leaders in getting grassroots committed to a candidate; Obama’s campaign was one example. Grassroots communication has been a major public relations activity that has harnessed local community involvement (from nongovernmental organizations, social and cultural communities, companies, and individuals) in the United States as well as in Europe. Since the 2008 U.S. presidential campaign, third-party engagement is now considered a valid way to legitimize the authority of politicians all over the world. In this research, the authors point out that public opinion support, even outside the United States, can result in greater authority and greater acceptance of U.S. government policies.

Political Engagement Principles as the Basis for New Regional Self-Determination Processes in Europe: The Case of Catalonia

The U.S. presidential campaign in 2008 signified a change on the paradigm of how the political parties deal with local communities. This means that grassroots techniques arose as a key factor for the triumph of Barack H. Obama. After the election, European political parties—even social movements—also adapted some strategies inspired by the U.S. presidential campaigns. The main objective of this article is to analyze how these grassroots techniques have been adapted in a specific scenario: the process of self-determination of Catalonia, an Autonomous Community of Spain that claims to be an independent country after the failing of Estado de las Autonomías (state of autonomies) model. Our method is to explore the parameters that drove the Obama’s first presidential campaign and how they have been applied into the self-determination campaign of Catalonia, such as the creation of local opinion platforms, media spin doctoring, social networking, and the social involvement of foreign actors. We realized that the social commitment with the self-determination process by regional community organizations has had a stronger leadership than the political parties. As a result, we state that political spin doctors in Catalonia could neither drive nor control the framing process of the last parliamentary regional campaign.

The business of stadia: Maximizing the use of Spanish Football venues

In 2014, FC Barcelona and Real Madrid presented a project for the remodelling of their stadia. The new stadia of both clubs will be, not only a place to attend live sports events, but also somewhere fans will be able to consume both football brands permanently, every moment of the day. Currently, stadia have become commodities themselves. At a time when TV rights in Spain were thrown into crisis, sports organizations understand that sports venues allow them to create other significant income sources that could help them to increase their season’s turnover. Hospitality and events packages, for example, are part of this leisure product that professional football clubs offer in their venues. The aim of this article is to analyse how Spanish professional football clubs attempt to maximize the use of their stadiums, and how these venues are also part of a wider city branding strategy for the host cities. Data for this qualitative research are taken from the Spanish football clubs that have UEFA Category 4 stadia: FC Barcelona, Real Madrid, Atlético de Madrid, Atletic Club de Bilbao, Málaga CF, Real Sociedad, RCD Espanyol and València CF.

Peace, sports diplomacy and corporate social responsibility: a case study of Football Club Barcelona Peace Tour 2013

The aim of this article was to analyse the initiative FC Barcelona Peace Tour 2013, in Israel and Palestine. This research is based on lengthy interviews with people associated with the initiative and the use of primary sources, both institutional and journalistic. Secondary sources have also been used, such as journalistic accounts of the initiative. The article thus examines the nature of FC Barcelona Peace Tour 2013, which it defines as an exercise in sports diplomacy, inspired by civil society and articulated through the club. The article concludes that FC Barcelona has been able to act as a mediator between two opposed communities due to the universal values linked to its brand and its nature as a ‘civil religion’. This notwithstanding, the political problems that arose during the planning of the initiative highlight the geopolitical complexity of the Middle East and, by extension, the limits of sports diplomacy.

Political Engagement Principles as the Basis for New Regional Self-Determination Processes in Europe

The U.S. presidential campaign in 2008 signified a change on the paradigm of how the political parties deal with local communities. This means that grassroots techniques arose as a key factor for the triumph of Barack H. Obama. After the election, European political parties—even social movements—also adapted some strategies inspired by the U.S. presidential campaigns. The main objective of this article is to analyze how these grassroots techniques have been adapted in a specific scenario: the process of self-determination of Catalonia, an Autonomous Community of Spain that claims to be an independent country after the failing of Estado de las Autonomías (state of autonomies) model. Our method is to explore the parameters that drove the Obama’s first presidential campaign and how they have been applied into the self-determination campaign of Catalonia, such as the creation of local opinion platforms, media spin doctoring, social networking, and the social involvement of foreign actors. We realized that the social commitment with the self-determination process by regional community organizations has had a stronger leadership than the political parties. As a result, we state that political spin doctors in Catalonia could neither drive nor control the framing process of the last parliamentary regional campaign.

Chinese Investments in Spanish Football: A Case Study of RCD Espanyol New Management Trends After Rastar Purchase

The global football industry is changing clubs’ corporate identities. Historically, European football had strong local roots; sport organizations represented local values and fandom were regionally based. However, sporting competitiveness pushes clubs to search for new investors, and foreign investors in Europe are attracted by the popularity of European football. In this article, we analyse how Chinese capital and brands arrived in Barcelona, through the negotiations of a football club in 2016: the Reial Club Deportiu Espanyol (RCDE). RCDE is the club that has received the second most trophies in Catalonia, after FC Barcelona, since the beginning of the 20th century. Today, it has one of the most modern stadiums in Spain, designed using a business approach, and has become a corporate ambassador for the Chinese government’s strategy of becoming a “world football superpower” by 2050. Using a case study approach, this article analyses management and corporate identity changes in the organization due to the new Chinese owner: the Rastar Group.

Journalism, transparency and citizen participation: a methodological tool to evaluate information published on municipal websites

ABSTRACT This article analyses the transparency of the websites of Spanish municipals of more than 20,000 inhabitants in 2015 with the aim of verifying whether these sites provide the information necessary so that citizens can be informed, can hold their governments to account and can participate in the democratic process. The methodology is based on 39 indicators grouped into questions about who the political representatives are, how they manage collective resources, how they inform about the management of these resources and what instruments they provide for participation. This study presents answers to the last two questions. The results reveal that city councils are not transparent and act mainly to promote the actions of the government when communicating with the public, that they provide few mechanisms for citizen participation, and that social networks are a unidirectional communication tool little used for accountability. The methodological tool presented here has been shown to be effective and to have had an impact on the municipals analysed here – which improved their information during the various phases of evaluation – and therefore may be of use when applied to other countries and other national and international governmental websites.

Managing Content in Cross-Cultural Public Relations Campaigns: A Case Study of the Paris Terrorist Attacks:

This article studies how traditional media functions have changed due the new media growth in terms of consumption and influence and how this has affected the public relations (PR) campaigns in terms of storytelling and managing content. The starting point of this article is the media coverage of the Paris attacks on the 13th November, as well as the institutional ceremonies that the French government organized as a tribute to 120 victims. The methodology of this article is based in a sample of the mainstream media in French and English language published in Europe. The analysis indicators are the following: (a) the “message,” as the story based on organizational essentials, values and identity; (b) the publics in a media relations campaign: opinion leaders and opinion makers; (c) the social dimension and the agenda setting; (d) effectiveness versus excellence and vice versa; (e) role of the media: traditional media (or mainstream media) and new media; (f) trends and challenges for professionals. As we will see, new trends of communication are redirecting the media strategy in PR campaigns in terms of influencing other key publics that generates major engagement in institutional reputation. Hence, traditional media functions (setting agenda, transmitting values, and creating opinion) operate in a new digital context of mashup journalism where cross-cultural PR seeks to better align media agenda’s with public and political agenda’s in order to set frames of sociability and community engagement.