A new study in International Studies Quarterly finds that when a country’s national sports team competes internationally, that country experiences a surge in nationalist attitudes and can lead to war.
The study looked at World Cup qualifiers from 1958 to 2010: “Going to the World Cup increases state aggression by about two-fifths as much as a revolution does, and … resembles the effect of electing a leader with military experience.”
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Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.
Goddard is the owner of Goddard Media LLC.