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ZAKARIA: THE GEOPOLITICS OF THE EUROVISION SONG CONTEST
By Fareed Zakaria
CNN
http://globalpublicsquare.blogs.cnn.com/2012/03/19/zakaria-the-geopolitics-of-the-eurovision-song-contest/
March 19 2012
What caught my eye this week was a dispute between two members of a
grand old European alliance. The alliance isn't NATO; it's not the
Arctic Council nor the Euro Zone, nor the EU. I'm talking about the
annual Eurovision Song Contest.
It's camp; it's cheesy; but it's a huge hit across the pond. Every
year, dozens of countries send their top performers to an American
Idol-style music competition. More than a 100 million viewers tune
in to vote for their favorites. The one rule: you can't vote for your
own country.
And so the tradition has continued since the 1950s.
Abba won for "Waterloo" in 1974. Celine Dion made a splash in 1988
representing Switzerland. But somewhere along the way the contest
became known less for big names, and more for kitsch: Sequined
costumes, outlandish productions, the works.
Now, despite its name, Eurovision is not just a European competition.
Algeria participates and so does Israel. This year's host is
Azerbaijan. And that's why Eurovision is in the news this week.
First some background: Azerbaijan has long clashed with Armenia. In
1994, the two countries ended a years-long war over the separatist
region of Nagorno-Karabakh. But tensions flared up again recently
when an Armenian soldier was shot to death at the border.
So with Azerbaijan as the host, Armenia is pulling out of the
Eurovision party. The intrusion of politics into these kinds of
events is not new. Music competitions, like big sporting events,
are often proxies for larger disputes or trends. When Moscow hosted
Eurovision in 2009, Georgia was reluctant to take part because it
had just fought a war with Russia.
But music can unify, too. That same year, Israel's entry featured a
duet with an Arab and Israeli Jew.
For me, the fascinating thing about Eurovision is not the performances
or the music. It's the politics and public psychology. Here at GPS,
we plotted the capital cities of the winning countries from the past
two decades on a longitudinal graph - yeah, that's the kind of thing we
do in our spare time. We found that in the 1990s, the winners tended
to be from Western Europe - Dublin or London. But by the late 2000s,
the winners mostly came from the East - Moscow and Kiev. Europe's
center of gravity is clearly moving East.
And these voters have interesting tendencies. In 2003, Britain got
exactly zero votes - that was the year the Blair government supported
the war in Iraq. Votes aren't always conscious political choices. But
we saw trends. Greeks always vote for Cypriots. The Cypriots return
the favor. Viewers from former Warsaw-Pact countries often vote as
a bloc. So do members of the former Yugoslavia. In 2007, Serbia won
after picking up maximum points from Bosnia-Herzigovina, Croatia,
Macedona, Montenegro, and Slovenia. All in all, this is an interesting
window into Europe.
So it got me thinking. We have American Idol here in the U.S.,
and we have "The Voice". But perhaps what we really need is our own
Eurovision - an "Americavision".
Will people from red states strategically vote for each other? Will
the two coasts create an alliance? Will there be a North-South divide?
I hope a TV executive somewhere is watching. Remember to credit us
with the idea - and maybe send a few royalties our way.
From: Baghdasarian
By Fareed Zakaria
CNN
http://globalpublicsquare.blogs.cnn.com/2012/03/19/zakaria-the-geopolitics-of-the-eurovision-song-contest/
March 19 2012
What caught my eye this week was a dispute between two members of a
grand old European alliance. The alliance isn't NATO; it's not the
Arctic Council nor the Euro Zone, nor the EU. I'm talking about the
annual Eurovision Song Contest.
It's camp; it's cheesy; but it's a huge hit across the pond. Every
year, dozens of countries send their top performers to an American
Idol-style music competition. More than a 100 million viewers tune
in to vote for their favorites. The one rule: you can't vote for your
own country.
And so the tradition has continued since the 1950s.
Abba won for "Waterloo" in 1974. Celine Dion made a splash in 1988
representing Switzerland. But somewhere along the way the contest
became known less for big names, and more for kitsch: Sequined
costumes, outlandish productions, the works.
Now, despite its name, Eurovision is not just a European competition.
Algeria participates and so does Israel. This year's host is
Azerbaijan. And that's why Eurovision is in the news this week.
First some background: Azerbaijan has long clashed with Armenia. In
1994, the two countries ended a years-long war over the separatist
region of Nagorno-Karabakh. But tensions flared up again recently
when an Armenian soldier was shot to death at the border.
So with Azerbaijan as the host, Armenia is pulling out of the
Eurovision party. The intrusion of politics into these kinds of
events is not new. Music competitions, like big sporting events,
are often proxies for larger disputes or trends. When Moscow hosted
Eurovision in 2009, Georgia was reluctant to take part because it
had just fought a war with Russia.
But music can unify, too. That same year, Israel's entry featured a
duet with an Arab and Israeli Jew.
For me, the fascinating thing about Eurovision is not the performances
or the music. It's the politics and public psychology. Here at GPS,
we plotted the capital cities of the winning countries from the past
two decades on a longitudinal graph - yeah, that's the kind of thing we
do in our spare time. We found that in the 1990s, the winners tended
to be from Western Europe - Dublin or London. But by the late 2000s,
the winners mostly came from the East - Moscow and Kiev. Europe's
center of gravity is clearly moving East.
And these voters have interesting tendencies. In 2003, Britain got
exactly zero votes - that was the year the Blair government supported
the war in Iraq. Votes aren't always conscious political choices. But
we saw trends. Greeks always vote for Cypriots. The Cypriots return
the favor. Viewers from former Warsaw-Pact countries often vote as
a bloc. So do members of the former Yugoslavia. In 2007, Serbia won
after picking up maximum points from Bosnia-Herzigovina, Croatia,
Macedona, Montenegro, and Slovenia. All in all, this is an interesting
window into Europe.
So it got me thinking. We have American Idol here in the U.S.,
and we have "The Voice". But perhaps what we really need is our own
Eurovision - an "Americavision".
Will people from red states strategically vote for each other? Will
the two coasts create an alliance? Will there be a North-South divide?
I hope a TV executive somewhere is watching. Remember to credit us
with the idea - and maybe send a few royalties our way.
From: Baghdasarian