Introduction
The securitisation of mega-events, or the process through which different institutions and actors, cohere around a framing of events as a referent point which demands unique measures of protection, works through a shared idea of exceptionality. Bernhard and Martin (2011:39) argue that
governments, sporting bodies, the private security industry and transnational policing and military networks share a mind-set which holds that mega-events require policing measures which far exceed normal ‘exigencies of protection’. For Boyle (2011) the exceptionality of mega-events is further consolidated through a paradigm of ‘security legacies’ translated between the public and private actors which constitute mega-event ‘knowledge networks’. The security templates which govern mega-events ‘travel easier’ because they support domestic political objectives while also servicing the commercial interests underlying mega-events (350). For example, legacy presents an opportunity for the state to capitalise on the expenses which accompany mega-events, while sporting bodies promote legacies as a public spin off from their private projects (351). Legacies also cohere with the
developmental discourse of domestic governments and transnational bodies as security measures can be justified as a form of long-term capacity and institution building.
As a result security budgets for mega-events have an inherent tendency to inflate due to ‘exceptional’
circumstances (Samatas, 2007, Bernhard and Martin, 2011:54). Firstly, mega-event security
assemblages become part of a ‘self-conscious’ (Boyle and Haggerty, 2009) display of security which aims to highlight a host city or countries ability to respond to any number of contingencies, regardless of their likelihood. Secondly, Bernhard and Martin (2011) suggest that mega-events are as much about elite psychologies of power as about sustainable security legacies. While mega-events are used by host states to pursue economic goals, such as attracting capital, they also function as a form of
‘elite affirmation’, a psychological goal which defies explanation in terms of an economic calculus of direct financial benefit and loss. As mega-events serve to demonstrate a host state’s competency, merit and capability, national political elites may be prepared to forgo direct economic or
developmental interests for the sake of short term prestige. Furthermore, the international nature of mega-events entails that hosting arrangements are marked by a crucible between national and international anxieties (Murakami Wood and Abe, 2011) providing an interface which gives momentum to efforts to ensure total security (Bennett and Haggerty, 2011).
However, Klauser argues that an exclusive focus on the projection of state power (2007) underplays the role of business and more specifically within the context of the World Cup, FIFA, in security
120 politics. Such an omission can neglect the relationships between massive state security efforts and the association’s business interests which are mediated through their ownership of the World Cup brand.
Along with Klauser (2007, 2011), Eick (2010) and Gaffney (2010) have also explored the role of corporate ownership in structuring the securitisation of mega-events. Their discussions propose conceptual models which range from the ‘wedding’ of security and commercialism (Eick, 2010), the idea of ‘interpretative flexibility’ between the state and private actors (Klauser,2011) and
comparisons between mega-events and the application of neoliberal ‘shock therapy’ (Gaffney, 2010).
Eick (2010) argues that the mega-event governance represents the ‘wedding’ of security and commercialism. While measures can provide opportunities for participating security services to replenish their arsenals and experiment with new procedures, the terms and usage of mega-event governance are defined and controlled by private stakeholders. Indeed for a period, public security policy is explicitly managed to benefit these actors. Eick suggests that this is characteristic of the neoliberal ‘turn’ as the role of state security forces has increasingly been informed by attempts to
‘steer’ or manage urban space for business interests. But rather than opening spaces for transnational capital, the World Cup is marked by efforts to restrict free competition for the exclusive benefit of FIFA and its corporate partners. Within this dominant framework, host governments affix themselves to a ‘contractual relationship’ (294) hierarchically managed by FIFA.
While Klauser (2007) agrees that mega-events may enforce the idea that business interests determine the form of security measures he argues that this is successful because its contours into the specific agendas and projects of local security authorities (2011:3). It is suggested (11) that mega-event security models maintain an interpretive flexibility which is highly responsive to the aspirations of a range of actors. The intersection between commercial branding, place marketing and crowd control entails a shared interest in creating security measures which can maintain the ‘carefully constructed marketing image of an enjoyable, safe and secure World Cup’ (2007:3). For example, from a security perspective, the creation of commercial fan zones not only serves as a site for advertising but becomes a security feature in its own right (Klauser, 2011) as it provides an opportunity to focus policing measures in high density public areas. As a result, while security measures may be externally governed their form is locally adopted.
However, Gaffney (2011) argues that the relationship between the private sector and state forces is more intimate in that they share comparable, reinforcing security objectives. He argues that mega- events are characterised by the scale and density of state interventions and depicts mega-events as
‘lengthy disciplinary processes’ (8) which combine economic extraction and the enforcement of domestic social control. Working within a dominant governance framework dictated by sporting
121 organisations the state use security measures to ‘fix’ urban space, in which public funds are directed into expansive projects that attract transnational capital, tourists and local elites. While this may be a project initiated by domestic governments it functions to remake cities into an image which is desirable to the interests of transnational capital. The size, expense and multi-scalar levels of the changes which ‘produce and result from mega-event processes’(ibid) overlap with efforts to
restructure economies, political systems and urban space in the wake of political and economic crisis (Klein, 2007).
In particular, Gaffney (27) suggests that sporting associations, working through organising
committees, ensure that the host state establishes ‘temporary, extra-legal forms of governance’ which are issued ‘blank checks’ for event spending comparable with the creation of similar structures in war zones and disaster areas. This is accompanied by the deployment of a developmental discourse which keeps the ‘forms and requirements of hosting deliberately vague’ in order to legitimate (or to disguise) extraordinary security measures which simulate private enterprise at the expense of public spending (23). In turn, the invocation of nationalist benefit and shared opportunity is used to side-line potential criticism. But rather than fear being used to enforce political and economic power relations, through the implicit threat of coercive action or punishment, (Robin, 2004) this project relies on invocations of socio-economic development. Hagemann (2010) argues that this rhetoric becomes an autonomous force in its own right, which can be used to justify a range of interventions, from sweeping concessions to franchise owners to extensions in the power of security forces which would be less permissible under ‘normal’ conditions.
Despite identifying different hierarchies, all these accounts cohere on the idea that exceptionality (Agamben, 2005) is central to the security governance of mega-events. At the same time the impact on spatial and scalar relations reflects broader processes which have realigned the nature of urban security. From the work listed above we can identify such issues as the relationship between commercialism and security and the linkages between spectacular cities and the policing measures adopted to secure the urban ‘brand’. This is indicative of broader debates within critical urban theory and criminology. For instance while some argue (Eick, 2010) that governments have become the administrators of global capital who manage urban space for the upwards benefit of economic elites, others (Boyle, 2011) identify a convergence on policy models between the ‘security state’ and commercial partners. For Smith (2011) the security operations for various Olympiads reveal the outline of an authoritarian, neoliberal state form in which efforts to regulate consumerism are accompanied by the roll out of police and military interventions.
These debates indicate a broader question about the power relations within security governance which will be addressed in the next chapter. Following Klauser (2011) this current chapter aims to unpack
122 and identify the various ‘meanings’ of security for the implicated state and private actors. As a result, this chapter will argue that a combined discourse of exceptionality and legacy was used to legitimate an elite project of securitisation in the lead-up to the 2010 World Cup. Rather than an ‘apolitical’
(Boyle, 2011:330) response to risk it will be argued that the security measures were adopted because they serviced a series of intersecting political and economic goals. More specifically, the declaration of exceptionality allowed these political and economic goals to become security issues.
FIFA, the South African government and other security actors cohered their institutional projects around the deployment of ‘no expenses spared’ and ‘no holds barred’ security measures. Instead of exclusively revolving around tropes of insecurity, this was projected as an opportunity for socio- economic development. In particular this chapter will propose that the 2010 World Cup can be understood as a ‘national security spending spree’ organised and subsidised by the South African government. While this was litigated with reference to the concept of security ‘legacy’, this chapter will propose that there is little evidence to suggest this was in fact an outcome of the 2010 World Cup.
Instead, it will suggest that legacy can be understood as a form of public relations used to justify massive public expenditures on a costly, one-off project.
Chapter Structure
The first section will begin by assessing how the security measures, and more specifically there key role in governing the 2010 World Cup were discursively framed by the government. The World Cup was defined as both a national security event and as a transcendent national goal. This was deployed through an open-ended developmental discourse which promised to respond to public aspirations for improved security and policing. At the same time, the fluidity of these justifications was also used to pre-empt criticism and to frame political grievances against the government as a potential security risk.
But while the government utilised an expansive rhetoric, FIFA had a far more narrow understanding of security. Along with the protection of the World Cup brand, FIFA defined commercial violations of its brand as security threats. Furthermore, it will be argued that from an institutional perspective FIFA regards the protection of itself and its corporate partners from liability and risk as a ‘security’ issue.
While the association deployed developmental tropes to frame its aspirations for the 2010 World Cup, this chapter will argue that this public stance is incompatible with its organisational practice.
Foreign security agencies also used their participation in World Cup planning to advance their institutional agendas within South Africa. This involvement was accompanied by various tiers of the global security industry. But while some bodies worked to align their interests with the exceptional
123 measures of the World Cup, others attempted to capitalise on fears about the government’s perceived inability to enforce these measures.
At the national and local scale, the proximity of the 2010 World Cup was used to pursue a variety of projects under the banner of preparations. For example, some security institutions used it as an opportunity to circumvent tensions within their ranks. Urban authorities also used the World Cup as an opportunity to fast track long-standing infrastructural projects and to replenish security arsenals.
However, despite the developmental discourse, host city preparations may have actively capitalised on existing socio-spatial inequalities.
Finally, this chapter will suggest that while this worked to secure the World Cup, the often bombastic security rhetoric sharply contrasts sharply with the far more limited immediate legacy of the event.
State Branding
The World Cup as exception
The security preparations for the 2010 World Cup were integrated into a political narrative which presented the tournament as an unparalleled opportunity to showcase South Africa. For example, Commissioner Cele said that for the duration of the tournament ‘the rest of the world will almost cease to exist – South Africa will be the world’ (NATJOINTS, 2010a). While technically remaining a FIFA-owned event, the government defined the tournament as a national security issue. Cabinet declared the World Cup as a ‘major event’ as ‘the success of the event is of international interest’ and required exceptional levels of interdepartmental cooperation (Kempen, 2010). More specifically the SAPS (SAPS Strategic Management, 2005:37) listed the World Cup (and the securing of major events in general) as an issue of ‘national intervention’. Under its National Crime Combating Strategy this was listed as a situation which required coordinated national deployment as part of a continuum of special circumstances including violent civil disorder, ‘high crime areas’ and disaster management (ibid).
The figuring of the World Cup as an exceptional event was aided by a party political consensus about the necessity of ensuring the conditions for a successful tournament. ANC MP B Komphela
(PMG,2010b) said that ‘security is ready in this country… and I want to say this today as we close this chapter, that there was never a dissenting view, from the opposition, for it being right that that the tournament was given to South Africa because it was judged and adjudicated on a fair basis’. This was accompanied by a wider elite consensus about the importance of hosting a world class event
124 which entailed substantial support from domestic business. Anglo-American, SAB Miller and
Vodacom were official supporters and suppliers of the hosting bid (SAFA, 2003a: 6.8). These companies were joined by the local subsidiaries of Adidas and Phillips, which are both FIFA commercial partners and who provided sponsorship for the hosting campaign (6.5). The privately owned broadcasters Supersport and the publically funded SABC were also enrolled as official media partners (ibid). Notably, the LOC also included media mogul Koos Bekker on its board of directors.
Bekker is the CEO of Naspers, a major South African based multinational media company, which owns seven of the country’s major daily newspapers and Media24, the largest online and print publisher in Africa.
The substantial support of major corporate players projected the image of the World Cup as an unprecedented and indeed exceptional societal mobilisation. One DA Member (PMG, 2010b) of parliament explicitly compared the World Cup to the national mobilisations which accompany war:
Now, however, comes the biggest spectacle and biggest opportunity to achieve a common national identity. As South Africans, we are destined to achieve great things and that togetherness must be forged in the burning excitement which is the World Cup. Never mind the costs that we will have to carry, we as South Africans can use sport to achieve what other nations have done through war.
This presents a paradigm of conflict as an opportunity for social cohesion and vaguely defined ‘great things’: a functionally open definition which could presumably include socio-economic development.
Rather than an appeal to a sense of national endangerment or of crisis, security measures were presented as aiding a project of national construction and reconstruction, prestige and future benefit (Neocelous, 2011:197). In turn such projection revolved around a ‘touchy feely’ (Ibid), affective sense of national cohesion.
Legacies
Explicitly this framed issues of budgets as unimportant when contrasted with the opportunity for national renewal. Indeed, this same argument was utilised when the SAPS had to take over stadiums.
According to Cele, under such an ‘emergency’ the priority of the SAPS was to ‘first do the work, and then discuss how do we deal with those matters [of payment].... The money issues, we are discussing them... For now, allow us to serve and protect’ (Sapa, 2010a).
Furthermore, these expenditures were presented as part of a wider developmental project in which the World Cup would leave a tangible legacy of improved policing and equipment upgrades. SAPS management adopted a wide ranging definition of legacy and claimed that while 2010 was
exceptional it was planned in accordance with an on-going strategy of combatting crime. For instance, during parliamentary questions the police minister described the equipment drive for the tournament
125 as pertaining to an almost inexhaustible range of improvements in technical, operational and human capital (SAPS Journal Online, 2010c). This extended from an increase in available officers to crowd control and surveillance equipment. It also included less visible procurements such as headlight units, cartridges and ammunition ‘to mention but a few’ (ibid).
International rebranding
Security operations were also packaged into the pursuit of a range of interlinked domestic and international objectives. Most prominently, preparations were utilised to signal the safety of South African cities to the international community. In the short term security measures were intended to create the organisational conditions for an incident free World Cup, while it also aimed at installing a lasting positive impression for potential tourists and corporate investors. For example, President Zuma used his official state visits abroad to reiterate the official message that government had proactively worked to implement a comprehensive security plan, which would ensure that the World Cup would
‘come and go without any bad event’ (Gibson, 2010). The security services promised to maintain an exceptionally high standard of policing with Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa claiming that ‘South Africa will host the safest and most secure FIFA World Cup.... That is the message we shared with South Africans over the past year and that we will be articulating to our 2010 visitors. Police will be everywhere, ready to respond to any eventuality’ (Shaw, 2010).
Security was thus linked into a wider communicative effort in which the authorities aimed at being seen to visibly manage both the country’s crime situation and ‘wild cards’ such as terrorism or hooliganism. The ability to prepare for prospective internal and external threats was viewed as an opportunity to reframe the lingering international perception of South Africa as a dangerous country for tourists and investment. In particular this was packaged as a ‘total security’ (Bennett and
Haggerty, 2011:2) effort which was prepared for all eventualities, including those which may have had a low probability of occurring. A comprehensive planning approach was offered as the best means of defeating scepticism in the international arena about the state’s ability to manage the complex security requirements of the World Cup.
This also offered a chance for the state security apparatus to recalibrate its international standing. The high visibility of the tournament provided a media platform for the SAPS, as the primary operational locus of World Cup security, to highlight its ability to implement first rate procedures for a mega- event. Furthermore, government spending provided an opportunity for the state to restock the weapons and technologies available to the national security services. The exceptional circumstances of the event facilitated procurement for equipment which would be harder to purchase under other conditions, by leveraging funding which went above government’s routine security budget. The