FIFA Reform Has Begun, But It May Take Decades

Our familiarity with FIFA's inner workings wouldn't allow us to believe what was obviously about to happen when Sepp Blatter took the podium on Tuesday evening in Zurich, Switzerland to address reporters and millions of online and television viewers.

Blatter began the historic press conference by reminiscing about his 40-plus years at FIFA, a rare sentimental moment for a man who thus far had defiantly refused to reflect on the current situation. His emotions were a clue as to what he would say next.

Blatter had never previously admitted that FIFA had a problem. His denials have ranged in tone from aloof grampa—"What is a crisis? Football is not in a crisis"— to submerging his head in the sand ("There is no systematic corruption in Fifa. That is nonsense. We are financially clean and clear.") Just 24 hours before Blatter's press conference, I spoke with Gareth Sweeney, Chief Editor of the Global Corruption Report at Transparency International and editor of the Corruption in Sport Initiative, about what FIFA needed to do in the wake of recent corruption charges. His first two suggestions: acknowledge it has a problem, and a change of leadership.

With both items checked off, the harder solutions remain unanswered. Up until now, FIFA reform was mentioned with the same wistful air as a little girl speaking of unicorns. But both Blatter and the Chairman of FIFA's Audit and Compliance Committee, Domenico Scala, urged actual reform, with Scala saying "nothing is off the table." FIFA is fortunate that they don't actually have to reinvent the wheel.

In the late 1990s, The International Olympic Committee (IOC) was caught in a bribes-for-vote scandal resulting from its successful bid to host the 2002 Salt Lake City Winter Olympics. This, too, was a structural, widespread, and fundamental problem in the IOC.

"In those days, every member of the IOC was entitled to visit every bid city with their families and extended families," Helen Lenskyj, University of Toronto Professor and author of Inside The Olympic Industry, told me. "They all got showered with gifts. So organizing a bid cost a whole lot of money. Not just doing a technical proposals but all the gifts and in-kind benefits for the IOC members."

The IOC is proud of the reforms it enacted in the wake of the scandal—setting up an Independent Ethics Commission—and the actions it took afterward, which included sanctioning seven IOC members, expelling six others.

But change was not swift. It took four years for the IOC to implement rules of conduct for city bidding processes, and it wasn't until last year, some 15 years after the scandal, that a wide-ranging set of reforms were finally put into practice with Olympic Agenda 2020. Even still, some observers like Lenskyj don't think the reforms have been particularly effective.

"Their ethical oversight has huge gaps in it," she said.

For instance, John Furlong, who chaired Vancouver's winning bid for the 2010 Winter Olympics, made a deal with Moscow's mayor to swing votes in exchange for bidding materials so Russia could make a successful bid for the 2014 games in Sochi. Furlong was so confident he didn't break any IOC rules that he wrote about the deal in his autobiography. Indeed, the IOC Ethics Commission cleared him of any wrongdoing.

Still, the IOC admirably committed to transparency, publishing an unprecedented amount of material on its website in the late 90s, which allowed Lenskyj and other researchers access to material for their investigations.

This, more than anything else, seems to be FIFA's challenge. While transparency doesn't instantly fix everything, FIFA is one of the most observed organizations in the world, yet we see so very little. In 2011, Transparency International published a report titled "Safe Hands" which outlined recommended changes for FIFA. Some were kindergarten-esque—clear policies and punishments—but others align with FIFA's Domenico Scala's comments after Blatter's speech:

• term limits for the president, financial and executive committee members
• transparent elections
• external officials in the executive committee
• Financial transparency, including published overviews of how much money is paid to each confederation and member confederation
• published audit reports
• All of FIFA's member organizations would have to implement accounting processes to make all disbursements transparent, and establish a monitoring and evaluation system to "follow the money"

These are solid, if fairly obvious, recommendations. The trick is mustering the internal political will to enact these changes, which is far from guaranteed even with Blatter's resignation.

External pressure doesn't always create internal reform, as Lenskyj made clear, but it is a necessary step. She characterized the IOC being dragged to reform "kicking and screaming." This applies to FIFA as well.

Shortly after Blatter's resignation speech, I received an email from Sweeney, who has been waiting years for such news. The previous day, he had characterized his hope for reform as cautiously optimistic. Now, he seemed borderline jubilant. "It seems like optimism has the upper hand now!"

An earlier version of this article stated that FIFA Secretary General Jerome Valcke spoke after Blatter's remarks. It was the Chairman of FIFA's Audit and Compliance Committee, Domenico Scala. We regret the error.