The growing influence of sport has created a unique opportunity to build international relationships for a number of purposes, including cultural, economic, shared humanitarian, and increasingly, political diplomacy. This book explores the influence and effectiveness of sport diplomacy in improving long-term relations between nations by opening a dialogue with international leaders, raising awareness of host countries and to bridging cultural differences, and in building international relationships through ambassadors that could increase trade and legislative agreements, and even bring peace to nations in conflict. Authored by talented scholars from all over the world, many of whom served as sport diplomats, their unique perspective in each case sheds light on the ways in which sport diplomacy can succeed or falter in achieving strategic objectives between influential -- and in some cases historically adversarial -- countries. A thoroughly intriguing look at sport diplomacys past and ongoing efforts to improve relations with countries such as Brazil, Russia, Iran and China, this book brings to the forefront an area in which sport has been able to open up and increase opportunities to build relationships between people, communities, governments and countries.

About the Author

Craig Esherick is an associate professor of sport management at George Mason University in Fairfax, VA. He is the associate director of the Center for Sport Management at Mason and he also works with the U.S. Department of State and their Sports United section on grants that use sport for diplomacy and community building. Esherick is the Mid Atlantic Sports Networks (MASN) prime color commentator for college basketball. In the summer of 2014, he started a three year term as an editor for the Journal of Issues in Intercollegiate Athletics (JIIA). Eshericks life in the sports industry started as a college basketball player and then basketball coach. He was a scholarship member of the Georgetown Hoyas from 1974-78; he received a business degree in finance with a minor concentration in Theology from Georgetown University. Craig also holds a law degree from Georgetown (1982) and has been a member of the DC Bar since 1982. Dr. Robert Baker is a professor and director of the Center for Sport Management and Division of Sport Recre-ation and Tourism at George Mason University. He earned his doctorate from the College of William & Mary, and his M.S. and B.S. from Penn State University. He has served as presi-dent of the North American Society for Sport Management, as a founding commissioner of the Commission on Sport Man-agement Accreditation and a founding board member of the World Association of Sport Management. Dr. Baker received NASSMs 2010 Distinguished Sport Management Educator Award and NASPEs 2011 Out-standing Achievement in Sport Management Award. In addition to numerous books and articles, Dr. Baker has served as principal investigator on over $6 million in grants support-ing sport diplomacy projects. Steve Jackson is a professor at the University of Otago, New Zealand. He obtained a BA (Honors) degree from Western University (Ontario, Canada) and his MSc and PhD from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. In addition to his post at Otago Steve has served as a visiting professor at Charles University (Czech Republic), the University of Jyvaskyla (Finland), the University of British Columbia (Canada), the National Taiwan Normal University and the University of Johannesburg (South Africa). Steves publications include: The Other Sport Mega-Event: Rugby World Cup 2011 (Routledge); The Contested Terrain of the New Zealand All Blacks: Rugby, Commerce, and Cultural Politics in the Age of Globalisation (Peter Lang); Sport, Beer, and Gender: Promotional Culture and Contemporary Social Life (Peter Lang); and Sport and Foreign Policy in a Globalising World (Routledge). Steve is a past-president of the International Sociology of Sport Association (ISSA) and a former New Zealand national ice hockey team player and coach. Michael Sam is a senior lecturer in the School of Physical Edu-cation, Sport and Exercise Sciences at the University of Otago (New Zealand). His research encompasses policy, politics and governance as they relate to the public administration and management of sport. Dr. Sam has published widely in both sport studies and parent dis-cipline journals and has co-edited two books: Sport in the City: Cultural Connections (2011) and Sport Policy in Small States (2016). Mike serves on the editorial board of the International Journal of Sport Policy and Politics and is the general secretary of the International Sociology of Sport Association (ISSA).