Demystifying human rights at the World Cup in Qatar

Blog #1: Making sense of the worker deaths

Photo by Joshua Hoehne on Unsplash

The World Cup in Qatar evokes many responses, most of which contain a measure of scorn. In recent weeks, we’ve seen calls for boycotts (Norway and Denmark), trade visits cancelled (the Netherlands), protesting footballers (the Netherlands and Germany), and statements from football associations (the FA in England and the KNVB in the Netherlands). The tournament was awarded a decade ago, but the debate is more alive than ever, spurred on in part by shocking news headlines (“Revealed: 6,500 migrant workers have died in Qatar since World Cup awarded” - the Guardian).

My goal

In this blog series, I’ll be sharing insights from two and half years investigating and reporting on working conditions at those headline-worthy stadiums. I’ve been there seven times, visited most official construction sites and ‘labour camps’, and spoken to construction companies and workers.

My goal is to illuminate the vast space in-between the shocking Guardian headlines and the callous corporate denial. I hope my insight will provide new angles and add nuance. In the end, I hope we can evolve a debate that seems to be stalling.

Worker deaths

Several weeks ago, the Guardian published: “Revealed: 6,500 migrant workers have died in Qatar since World Cup awarded”. It’s a powerful, carefully-crafted, headline. It’s technically correct. But you’d be mistaken to read that and think 6,500 workers died building the World Cup infrastructure. I don’t want to speculate about the intentions behind the phrasing, but it does lend itself to easy misinterpretation, where the deaths are attributed to the World Cup, as illustrated by the following headlines (1):

• Sports Illustrated: Deaths in Qatar: 6,500 Migrant Workers Have Died Constructing 2022 World Cup Site
• MSN Sports: At least 6,500 workers have died building Qatar’s World Cup
• Yahoo Sports: Report: More than 6,500 migrant workers have died during Qatar’s World Cup prep
• NPR: Report Reveals More Than 6,500 Migrant Workers Have Died In Qatar’s World Cup Prep

These headings above are not correct and a closer reading of the Guardian article’s assumptions tells us why. There are two main assumptions the reader should understand:

1. Type of death: The 6,500 figure represents all deaths from five nationalities over a ten-year period. It includes many types of deaths that you wouldn’t immediately associate with the World Cup: road accidents, suicides, deaths of white collar workers and deaths outside the construction industry. It also includes deaths from ‘natural causes’. The article makes this leap because disaggregated data isn’t available. Indeed, the article does well to criticise this, in particular when it comes to the 69% of deaths from ‘natural causes’, which seem disproportionately high and are likely linked to heat stress.
2. Attribution to the World Cup: Much of the construction in Qatar is linked to the World Cup. For example, there’s a built-from-scratch metro network that is not officially part of the tournament’s infrastructure(2), but is clearly part of a package of city upgrades for the tournament. However, it’s a stretch to assume all migrants workers are there for the World Cup. Likewise, it’s a stretch to assume all construction, like new malls, hotels and office buildings, are also for the World Cup. The way I see it: if Qatar were not hosting the World Cup then there would still be a vast number of migrant workers and construction projects; so even if those deaths were all from construction, which they’re not, it’s not accurate to attribute all those deaths to the World Cup.

The Guardian actually amended the headline a week after publishing, making the link between the deaths and the World Cup less direct. The other headlines mentioned above (MSN, NPR etc.), were all published before the Guardian revised their headline.

Photo by Kazuo ota on Unsplash

We’ve been here before

What I find curious is that we’ve been here before. You likely first heard about high death rates in 2015 because of an infographic (see below) from the Washington Post. It showed 1,200 deaths in Qatar compared to 1–30 for other mega sporting events. This was based on an ITUC report. What you likely didn’t catch is that the Washington Post ended up amending their article, stating:

“The post [Washington Post] should have made clearer that the figures involved all migrant deaths in Qatar…Ultimately, we are unable to verify how many deaths, if any, are related to World Cup construction.”

From BBC

Conclusion

My intention is not to argue that these death figures are wrong. As the Guardian article rightly points out, there are reasons to believe the figures might be even higher, such as the exclusion of other nationalities.

Also, I can understand why the article makes assumptions. They’re used in the absence of accurate data, and the Qatari government has been dragging its feet on this. The Guardian article does a great job at highlighting how a lack of monitoring and transparency keeps a veil of mystery over an important topic.

However, I do think the shocking headline misleads the average reader and, as we’ve seen, other news outlets. Combine the 2015 and 2021 publications, and a picture is painted of an absurdly high, out of proportion, number of deaths caused by the World Cup. It’s confusing, heading in the direction of misinformation. What I find frustrating is that this is unnecessary. First, there are enough human rights violations that can both provide shock value and be evidenced. Second, the deaths don’t have to be attributed to the World Cup to be shocking and to make the point that Qatar needs to step up on human rights.

By making the deaths about the World Cup, we lose sight of other important points in the debate on human rights in Qatar. So what are those other points? More on this, next time…

Jump to blog #2 — the World Cup bubble

Notes

1. All four appeared on the first page of search results when using the terms ‘Qatar World Cup deaths’ in Google or Duck Duck Go.
2. The official tournament infrastructure projects are overseen by a dedicated and temporary government entity called the ‘Supreme Committee for Delivery & Legacy’. It’s like the London Organising Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games. They are responsible for everything related to the preparation and running of the World Cup, including construction projects. Not all city upgrade projects, like the metro system, fall under their authority.
3. These views are my own and have nothing to do with any past or present employers.