Latin American structure and Pan-Am Games: analysing the medal table from International Relations

Abstract

This paper studies Latin American sport from an International Relations perspective. Considering that systemic imperatives are overlooked in most sports studies and that power is not conceived as a comprehensive element that drives state action, the focus here is to study the relationship between the international power structure and sports performance, analysing the correlation between the World Power Index (WPI) and the medal table of the Pan-American Games from the edition of Mexico City 1975 to Lima 2019. The results show that there is a positive and strong correlation in the different periods of time evaluated, but even with that, we do not defend that there is an automatic conversion of national power into the medal tables at the Pan-American Games. In conclusion, this article argues that from International Relations, the International Structure configures the medal plans of countries, namely, where they want to be positioned in the final rankings, which in the end, shapes the medal table of sports competitions.

Keywords:

• Sports diplomacy
• Pan-American Games
• international structure
• World Power Index
• Latin America
• inter-American system

Acknowledgments

Special acknowledgment to Garrett Thompson (Sun Yat-sen University, [email protected]) for his professional support in the language proofreading of this work.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 In 1991, the national power of Brazil was 0.708, Mexico 0.671 and Colombia 0.533; while in 2019 Brazil had a value at the WPI of 0.750, Mexico 0.703 and Colombia 0.609.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Carlos Pulleiro Méndez

Carlos Pulleiro Méndez obtained his PhD in International Studies at the University of the Basque Country (Spain) in 2016. Between 2018 and 2021, he was a research fellow at the European Research Centre of the Sun Yat-sen University (China). In 2022, he was hired as a lecturer at the Physical Activity and Sport Sciences Degree of the EUNEIZ University (Spain). Currently, he is an associate researcher at the International College of Football of Tongji University (China).

Daniel Morales Ruvalcaba

Daniel Morales Ruvalcaba has a PhD in Social Sciences (Universidad de Guadalajara). He has worked as a lecturer at universities in Mexico, Spain, Poland and China and was a researcher at the Centre for Strategic Development Studies (CEED) at the University of Guadalajara. He is currently an associate professor at the School of International Studies at Sun Yat-sen University (China), a member of the National System of Researchers (Mexico) and a member of the Editorial Committee of several academic journals on International Relations.