Clifford Chance, FIFA, and “Sportswashing”
Today, FIFA handed their inaugural “Peace Prize” to Donald Trump. It was a fitting move: the organization has long collaborated with fossil fuel corporations, and the industry and Trump are closely aligned—to the tune of tens of millions of donations to the Trump campaign in exchange for a promise to fulfill their agenda, on which he is making good. Several organizations have drawn attention to the role of sports and other cultural institutions in propping up the industry; Fossil Free Football, for instance, gave a parody award called the “Football Climate Impact Prize” to FIFA President Gianni Infantino today for his “crowning achievement” in the “sale of the world’s biggest platform, the FIFA World Cup, to the world’s biggest polluter, Saudi state oil company Aramco.”
But just like the fossil fuel transactions, lobbying and litigation we rank in our annual Scorecard, lawyers are heavily involved in the fossil fuel industry’s attempts to capture the culture. Alongside President Infantino, law firm Clifford Chance deserves special recognition for their role in the selection of Saudi Arabia to host the 2034 FIFA World Cup.
Overview of Saudi Arabia and Sportswashing
Sportswashing is a tactic used by states and companies to reshape their global reputation. The goal of affiliating themselves with sporting events is to distract people from their ongoing human rights abuses and environmental issues. Sport, an incredibly potent form of “soft power,” has become a key instrument for countries and corporations seeking to sanitize their images. A 2021 report by the New Weather Institute identified 250 advertising and sponsorship deals between fossil fuel corporations and prominent sports organizations worldwide.
Sportswashing has become a key component of Saudi Arabia's image management strategy. The oil state has emerged as one of the most aggressive practitioners of sportswashing, having invested an estimated $6.3 billion in sports-related ventures since 2021, more than quadrupling its expenditure over the previous six years. Football has been the nation’s preferred vehicle, with major deals such as a partnership between FIFA and Saudi Aramco (Saudi Arabia’s state-owned oil company), despite widespread criticism from women’s football players and human rights advocates, and now, the FIFA World Cup.
Clifford Chance’s assessment of human rights issues
In order to host the World Cup, Countries had to submit a human rights assessment. Lawyers at Clifford Chance wrote Saudi Arabia’s assessment, playing a crucial role in ensuring the Kingdom’s human rights record did not stand in the way of hosting.
In August 2024, Amnesty International analysed Saudi Arabia’s “Bid Book”. Clifford Chance was tasked with producing an overview of the Kingdom’s alignment with 22 human and labour rights topics in an “Independent Context Assessment.” In their analysis of this assessment, Amnesty International concluded that Saudi Arabia failed to meet FIFA’s own human rights requirements for the 2034 men’s World Cup. Steve Cockburn (Amnesty International’s Head of Labour Rights and Sport) concluded, “It is highly likely that the 2034 World Cup will be blighted by forced labour, repression and discrimination”.
Clifford Chance has received backlash for their role in the bid. In October 2024, 11 organisations sent a memorandum to the firm. They raised serious doubts about the firm's assessment of Saudi Arabia’s human rights record. Their criticism included the firm overlooking the prohibition of trade unions, LGBTQ+ discrimination, and freedom of expression. Clifford Chance’s assessment also omitted critical judgments, citing only selective findings favouring Saudi Arabia and excluding all UN Special Rapporteurs' reports.
Furthermore, there is no evidence that the firm consulted external experts who could have given an independent perspective on the country's human rights and climate profile. Consulting specialists could have helped bring to light facts such as the killings of hundreds of Ethiopian migrants by Saudi forces, which Human Rights Watch claims might amount to ‘crimes against humanity’. Overall, these omissions amount to a gross ignorance of human rights abuses that is disappointing on a human level and from a firm that claims to promote human rights.
Clifford Chance’s handling of climate issues
Human rights washing is one aspect of sportswashing. Increasingly, the practice has become entwined with promoting climate deception and repairing the reputations of polluters. Saudi Aramco, the world’s largest oil producer, has invested over $1 billion in sports sponsorships, including a recent partnership with FIFA. This trend, involving fossil fuel companies like Aramco and Shell investing more than $4 bn in sports sponsorships, reflects the fossil fuel industry's attempt to divert attention from their role in fueling the climate crisis.
Clifford Chance’s assessment paid superficial regard to climate issues. It briefly mentioned worker exposure to extreme heat - an increasingly deadly consequence of climate change - but failed to address its root cause: the fossil fuel industry’s role. Saudi Aramco is “the world’s biggest oil giant“ and roughly 1,300 people died due to a heatwave in Saudi Arabia in June 2024. Furthermore, ClimaMeter’s analysis suggests the heatwave would have been 2.5°C cooler without the influence of human-caused climate change. The link between climate change, workers' rights and human rights violations is inextricable, and yet Clifford Chance’s assessment did not connect the dots.
Although Clifford Chance acknowledges the existence of measures to protect certain outdoor workers from extreme heat, it fails to address its enforcement issues. The protections afforded by existing measures are limited because they protect citizens but fall short of protecting migrants who make up a significant portion of the outdoor workforce and suffer greatly under the kafala system. Furthermore, despite these measures, many workers still became ill due to extreme heat.
Why might Clifford Chance be tapped to facilitate greenwashing?
Our data shows that Clifford Chance facilitated 95.584 billion dollars in fossil fuel transactions between 2020 and 2024 and worked on several significant deals for Saudi Aramco. For example, Clifford Chance advised on two of the “largest ever transactions in the oil & gas sector in the Middle East involving Saudi Aramco Oil Pipelines and Saudi Aramco Gas Pipelines”. One of these deals has been valued at roughly $25.3 billion US dollars. Saudi Aramco is just one of many of Clifford Chance's fossil fuel clients; Shell also benefited from their legal services in its appeal against a Dutch climate ruling.
Sportswashing has become a go-to tactic for oil-rich states and companies to gloss over their climate impact and curry public favour, and Clifford Chance has aided Saudi Arabia in this effort by downplaying significant human rights abuses. As a founding member of the Net Zero Lawyers Alliance, Clifford Chance’s commitment to net-zero ambitions seems paradoxical while they are involved with oil-state sportswashing and fossil fuel expansion—actions that have gone unaddressed by the firm thus far.
