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The Future of International Sports Law

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Lex Sportiva: What is Sports Law?

Part of the book series: ASSER International Sports Law Series ((ASSER))

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Abstract

In response to present trends and related issues, international sports law will continue to grow along the lines of customary practice and interpretation. A particularly important development is the role of the CAS and the emerging lex sportiva based on its decisions. Although CAS decisions, as arbitral awards, are technically lex specialis, many of them have generated precedent-setting opinions and, in the aggregate, have crystallized specific rules of decision. The lex sportiva has had broader influence as well. For example, CAS decisions in doping cases shaped the rules of the World Anti-Doping Code, which, in turn, forms the core of the UNESCO Convention. The lex sportiva has also provided an authoritative framework for decisions on athlete eligibility and nationality requirements.

Previously published in: 42 Willamette Law Review (2006), pp. 861–876.

Thomas B. Stoel Professor of Law and Director of International Programs, Willamette University College of Law. Professor Nafziger is President of the International Association of Sports Law.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    The media’s burgeoning interest in the globalization of sports is apparent. In just the month preceding the author’s presentation on which this article is based, the printed media carried several noteworthy items in addition to extensive coverage of the 2006 Winter Olympics. For example, the Wilson Quarterly celebrated its first 30 years of publication by asking ten well-respected thinkers to speculate on what the next 30 years might bring. The second paragraph of the symposium invited readers to [t]hink of Barry Bonds, the baseball slugger implicated in the steroid scandal. We are already debating whether he should go into the record books as the same sort of human as the people whose records he broke. Now move out a few years. What happens if the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games feature genetically enhanced athletes dramatically different from their competitors, as some bioengineers matter-of-factly predict? Garreau 2006, at 32. Another article, in Atlantic Monthly, forecasts the possibility of rather dire politics in the run-up to the Beijing Olympics. Lind 2006, at 38. A third article examined the globalization of baseball. Powell and Schwarz 2006, at 28.

  2. 2.

    The term “international sports law” refers to the process that engages more or less distinctive rules, principles, procedures, and institutions which govern important consequences of transnational sports activity. See generally, Nafziger 2004a; Siekmann and Soek 1998.

  3. 3.

    See, e.g., Jenkins L et al. 2004, § 8, at 1.

  4. 4.

    See Powell and Schwarz 2006. Although past United States political or military influence generally explains this peculiar roster of national converts to the sport, it is obvious from the roster that politics no longer is relevant.

  5. 5.

    See Editorial 2006, at A24. For a general summary of the World Baseball Classic, see Marquand 2006, at 1.

  6. 6.

    See Enc. Brit. 2005 Book of the Year 298 (noting that Curacao had won the Little League World Series); 2004 book of the Year 293 (noting that a Japanese team had won the Little League World Series for the third time in five years).

  7. 7.

    See Gould 2006, at C17.

  8. 8.

    Id.

  9. 9.

    See Vecsey 2005, at D2.

  10. 10.

    See Zinser 2005b, at D1. Softball also was dropped from the Olympic roster, partly because of its association with baseball despite their gender-related and other differences. European support saved the pentathlon from the IOC dustbin. The last sport to be withdrawn from the Olympic Games was polo in 1936.

  11. 11.

    See, e.g., Curry 2005, at A1; Jenkins L et al. 2004; Klobuchar 2006, at 12; Sokolove 2006, at 24.

  12. 12.

    World Anti-Doping Agency 2003. For a summary, see Vieweg 2004.

  13. 13.

    United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), International Convention Against Doping in Sport, adopted Oct. 19, 2005, ED/2005/CONVDOP rev. 2, [hereinafter UNESCO Convention], available at http://unesdoc.unesco.org (last visited May 10, 2006).

  14. 14.

    Theodoulou 2005, at 7.

  15. 15.

    USA Today, Aug. 4, 2004, at 11C.

  16. 16.

    Kilborn and Atkins 2005, at 20 (It is ironic that the White House designated these countries as two of the three forming an Axis of Evil (the third was Saddam Hussein’s Iraq), only to witness their nationals fighting each other in the soccer stadium).

  17. 17.

    See Fin. Times, Aug.13–14, 2005, at 5.

  18. 18.

    N.Y. Times, Nov. 20, 2005, § 8, at 6.

  19. 19.

    See Nafziger 2004a, at 14 for a more complete list of discarded sports.

  20. 20.

    The Ted Stevens Olympic and Amateur Sports Act [popularly known and hereinafter cited as the Amateur Sports Law], 36 U.S.C. §§ 220501-220529 (2001). Despite its name, the Amateur Sports Act not only extends to professional athletes in open international competition, but otherwise influences developments and dispute resolution in purely professional competition. Indeed, few truly amateur athletes remain in major competition if one considers the creeping professionalization of sport by athletic scholarships, tree training facilities, travel funding, product endorsements, and prize money for heavy medalists.

  21. 21.

    See Nafziger 2004a, at 186.

  22. 22.

    In one sample, public and private funding for gold medalists in the 2006 Winter Olympics ranged from $8,000 (Australia) to 157,000 (Italy). In the United States a gold medal is worth $25,000 in bonuses. Canada does not provide monetary bonuses to its athletes. Enemark and Montgomery 2006, at 20.

  23. 23.

    Stone v. FCT, (2003) F.C.A.F.C. 145. See also Betten 2004 (focusing on a decision of the Netherlands Court of Appeal).

  24. 24.

    Immigration and Nationality Act, 8 U.S.C. § 1153(b)(1)(A) (2001).

  25. 25.

    Id. at § 1153(b)(1)(B).

  26. 26.

    Id. at § 110 l(a)(15)(O).

  27. 27.

    Id. at § 110 l(a)(15)(P).

  28. 28.

    See Broida 2006, at 4; Rosewater 2006, at D5; Zinser 2005a, at D6 (explaining that this particular legislation conveniently accelerated citizenship for permanent resident applicants of “extraordinary ability” who had begun their naturalization process before July 2002).

  29. 29.

    See Ramsamy 2005.

  30. 30.

    Chass 2006, at C21.

  31. 31.

    Case C-415/93 (1995) 1 C.E.C. 381, 78-83, 86-87. For a thorough analysis of pertinent European Union law, see van den Bogaert 2005. For subsequent judicial and other Developments in European Union regulation of sports, see Martins 2004.

  32. 32.

    See Nafziger 2004a, at 95 et seq.

  33. 33.

    See Sumo Quota 2005.

  34. 34.

    See Vecsey 2006, § 8, at 1.

  35. 35.

    See Curry 2006, at Dl.

  36. 36.

    Kirk 2005, at 5; Koreans Uniting on the Sports Field 2005.

  37. 37.

    See Goodwin 2004. For a summary of Skategate, see Nafziger 2004a, at 113.

  38. 38.

    See Macur 2004, § 8, at 1; Pells 2004, at 5D.

  39. 39.

    Sappenfield 2004, at 2.

  40. 40.

    See Sappenfield 2006, at 11. On the growing use of cameras and computers in the sports arena, see Nafziger 2004a, at 116.

  41. 41.

    CAS 2004/A/704.

  42. 42.

    See Hughes 2005, at 19.

  43. 43.

    See Goodwin 2004, at 17.

  44. 44.

    See Enc. Brit. 2004 Book of the Year 315.

  45. 45.

    See Tzortzis 2005, at 12.

  46. 46.

    See Olatawura 2006; Cassidy 2006, at 47.

  47. 47.

    See Cassidy 2006, at 49.

  48. 48.

    See Nafziger 2004a, at 172; Davis 1996.

  49. 49.

    See supra text accompanying notes 12-13.

  50. 50.

    See Le mensonge Armstrong 2005 ; Abt 2004, at 6.

  51. 51.

    On the Bay Area Laboratory Co-operative (BALCO) scandal involving the manufacture and sale to athletes of difficult-to-detect and nondetectable drugs, see Nafziger 2005.

  52. 52.

    Canseco 2005, 53.

  53. 53.

    Fainaru-Wada and Williams 2006.

  54. 54.

    See Kornblut 2005, § 8, at 8.

  55. 55.

    Enemark and Montgomery 2006.

  56. 56.

    See Marcur 2006, at C15.

  57. 57.

    Id.; Fisher 2006, at B17.

  58. 58.

    UNESCO Convention, supra note 13.

  59. 59.

    See Zinser 2005c, at C20 (estimating that 90% of athletes use supplements).

  60. 60.

    Id.

  61. 61.

    See Erbsen 2004, at 6.

  62. 62.

    See Zinser 2006, at Dl. The raid was authorized under an ltalian anti-doping penallaw, enacted in 2000, that criminalized the use of prohibited agents by athletes, coaches, and sports officials.

  63. 63.

    See Nafziger 2005, at 47, 54-56.

  64. 64.

    See Silance 2005. See also Nafziger 2004b; Panagiotopoulos 2004.

  65. 65.

    UNESCO Convention, supra note 13.

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  1.  , Salem, OR, USA

    James A. R. Nafziger

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  1. , ASSER International Sports Law Centre, T.M.C. Asser Institute, The Hague, 2500 GL, Netherlands

    Robert C.R. Siekmann

  2. , ASSER International Sports Law Centre, T.M.C. Asser Institute, The Hague, 2500 GL, Netherlands

    Janwillem Soek

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Nafziger, J.A. (2012). The Future of International Sports Law. In: Siekmann, R., Soek, J. (eds) Lex Sportiva: What is Sports Law?. ASSER International Sports Law Series. T.M.C. Asser Press. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-6704-829-3_6

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