Populisms and Sports in Latin America: The Myth of the Smokescreen

Abstract

Populism describes neither recent nor emergent phenomena in Latin America;rather, it is a well-studied characterization of several deep and key processes inits political history from the beginning of the twentieth century. The historiesof both sports and politics agree on the importance of sports for existing LatinAmerican populisms, and the connection has influenced the foundation of sportsstudies across the continent. This article presents a discussion of these processesand studies, paying special attention to the fluctuations between the populisms ofthe Left—the Pink Tide in Latin America between 2000 and 2015—and theRight—a conservatism organized as an anti-populist populism or, more possibly,real fascism. After the triumph of Argentina in the 2022 World Cup and thedisorders generated by followers of former president Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil inJanuary 2023, two things remain clear: political elites think of sports as a smokescreen, and anti-populism (as opposed to populisms) is finally revealed as fascism.