The 2030 World Cup symbolizes the culmination of the ambition that transformed football into a national project in Morocco. Co-host of the tournament, alongside Portugal and Spain, the African country is carrying out a comprehensive infrastructure plan for the mega-event, estimated at around 14 billion euros (R$92 billion), according to candidacy documents presented to FIFA (International Football Federation).
Before that, however, the country’s national team focuses on the 2022 World Cup. The team will be Brazil’s first opponent in the group stage, taking the model that combines state investment, international ambition and recent sporting results to the North American tournament.
Part of the Moroccan population, however, is not excited about the chance of meeting the Brazilian team at the World Cup or even hosting the tournament in four years. For this portion, spending is a reversal of priorities. Since September last year, protests led by young people in different cities, such as Rabat, Casablanca and Fez, have criticized the billion-dollar investment in the tournament, with slogans such as “we want hospitals, not stadiums”, and demanded more resources for health and employment.
In 2023, according to a BBC report, it was estimated that there would be 7.8 doctors for every 10,000 Moroccans, a number much lower than the WHO (World Health Organization) recommendation, which is 23 doctors for every 10,000 inhabitants.
The internal reaction — which bears some similarity to what happened in Brazil in 2014 — contrasts with the Moroccan government’s strategy of transforming the World Cup into an instrument of international projection, using football to reposition the country’s image abroad.
“Access to elite football is strongly concentrated in large urban centers, where the infrastructure, coaches and observation networks are,” he told Sheet Dirk Witteveen, sociologist and social policy researcher at the University of Oxford. “This creates a clear geographic inequality: players and citizens from peripheral or rural regions face many more barriers to entering the economic system.”
The diagnosis helps explain why the growth of football is not spreading across the country. According to data from the World Bank, the richest 20% account for more than half of the income in Morocco, while unemployment among young people exceeds 20%, according to the ILO (International Labor Organization).
Although the country has invested in the modernization of training centers and the professionalization of its sports structure, access to the main opportunities remains concentrated.
The country included six stadiums in its plan to host the World Cup, and all are in the urban regions of the country’s main cities. Five of them already exist: Prince Moulay Abdellah Stadium (Rabat), Grand Stade de Tanger (Tangier), Fez Stadium (Fez), Agadir Stadium (Agadir) and Marrakech Stadium (Marrakech).
The sixth stage, the Hassan 2nd Stadium, is under construction, designed to be the “largest stadium in the world”, with a capacity for 115,000 spectators.
The arena will be located in the city of Benslimane, approximately 38 kilometers from Casablanca. And it is Morocco’s trump card to try to take the 2030 World Cup final away from the Santiago Bernabéu, home of Real Madrid, in Spain.
Researchers point out, however, that the expansion of infrastructure occurs in a context of pressure on basic resources. The country faces severe water stress, according to the World Bank, in a scenario in which around 80% of available water is destined for agriculture, according to the FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations).
At the same time, investment in football responds to objectives that go beyond the field. “The use of football as a tool for international projection and image building is central for countries like Morocco,” said Briton Simon Chadwick, a specialist in sports economics. “The country uses sport as a basis to assert itself as a geopolitical leader on the African continent.”
This type of strategy is nothing new. “For more than a century, countries have used major sporting events to elevate their international status, project an image to the world and reinforce nation-building,” said Kristina Spohr, professor of international history at the London School of Economics.
But the scope of this projection has limits. “Sports events produce windows of attention, but their effects on the international image tend to be ephemeral and selective”, said Vitória Baldin, communications researcher at the University of São Paulo.
In practice, this means that sporting success can coexist with internal tensions without necessarily resolving them, as sociologist David Giulianotti states: “International success can coexist with deep structural inequalities within countries.”
Although Morocco has recorded economic growth in recent years, gains remain concentrated, while part of the population faces difficulties in accessing employment, healthcare and education. This unequal distribution is at the heart of recent criticism.
The 2030 World Cup tends to expose this contrast in the Moroccan case, between the country that presents itself to the world and the one that still faces internal challenges to distribute the benefits of its own development in a more balanced way.
