Institutionalizing human rights in sports mega events: a case study of the United 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup

The North American 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup (FWC) is the first tournament in which human rights policies and plans have been in place for the awarding body and host nation from the bid stage. This paper examines the FWC human rights governance arrangements, through an analysis of strategic documents, observations of three host cities and semi-structured interviews with key stakeholders. Drawing on institutional theory, we argue that human rights institutional logic formation, via stakeholder engagement and isomorphic pressures, influences FIFA. However, we also demonstrate that this influence is limited due to the primacy of business agendas at the executive level. We conclude that while positive steps have been made, with human rights structures, policies and processes now in place at FIFA, host nation(s) and host cities; issues of implementation remain throughout each level of the FWC institutional field.