Does the World Cup put a stop to war? It is undeniable that football has the power to unite - but its power to divide should not be underestimated, Daniel W Drezner writes in a Washington Post article where he quotes a 1973 article by Richard Sipes in the journal American Anthropologist. Sipes distilled the debate into two arguments: One is that combative sports and war are substitutes for aggressive behaviour. The other is that sports induce a warlike attitude. Sipes tentatively concluded that sports foster aggression.
Drezner discusses several interesting examples from the history of football and concludes:
The problem is that historically, football has been just as likely to be the trigger for war as the trigger for peace. Football will never bring about peace on its own. The flip side is also true-by itself, Football cannot start a war. The World Cup, like the Olympics, suffers from a case of overblown rhetoric.
>> Danel D. Rezbers own blog post about his article inkl comments
PS: It might be interesting to find out under which conditions football may trigger either war - or which conditions may trigger peace
UPDATE
“It might be interesting to find out under which conditions football may trigger (…) war..”
A war on the streets may happen when a bicultural outfit is worn with the wrong combination chosen: http://www.spiegel.de/panorama/0,1518,420657,00.html