Editor's note: Nicholas McGeehan is co-director of human rights research and advocacy group FairSquare, which works among other things on the nexus between sport and authoritarianism. He is a former senior researcher at Human Rights Watch and holds a PhD in international law from the European University Institute in Florence.
Boycotts, divestments and sanctions are each controversial and contentious in their own right, but when combined under the right conditions, they have explosive potential. BBC football presenter Gary Lineker found this out to his cost when he retweeted a call from Palestine’s BDS movement to suspend Israel from FIFA and the International Olympic Committee (IOC) until such time the Israeli state ends what they called “the crime of genocide it is perpetrating in Gaza” and its occupation of Palestinian territory. Lineker quickly deleted his retweet but not before the UK’s most popular right-wing tabloid newspaper, The Daily Mail, spotted it and renewed their fulminating campaign against Lineker’s support for political causes that run contrary to the Mail’s editorial positions. The Daily Mail does not oppose sporting boycotts, in fact judging from an article by its football columnist, Martin Samuel, it was an ardent supporter of Russia’s ejection from European football in the aftermath of its invasion of Ukraine. “Why should Russian football get to be part of the continent in which it has murdered innocents?,” asked Samuel and in that regard he was not alone and was echoing views heard across the political divide in the west at the time.
The west continues to boycott Russia, its companies have divested from Russia, and its governments are sanctioning Russia. This includes in the sporting arena where nobody batted an eyelid when Russian football teams were excluded from FIFA and UEFA competition, and its athletes excluded from IOC competition. So it seems obvious that it is not so much BDS tactics that offend people in certain quarters, but rather their target. Russia can be BDS’d until the cows come home, but BDS’ing Israel is beyond the pale. You can see how it might be hard to explain to a child.
Through an examination of the widely divergent responses to Russia’s actions in Ukraine and Israel’s actions in Gaza, this piece argues that FIFA and the IOC have aligned themselves with the political positions of the countries of the global north. With reference to previous sporting boycotts, it demonstrates how an absence of rules has left FIFA and the IOC sailing rudderless into stormy geopolitical waters and argues that they need to institute rules to guide their responses to events of this gravity and magnitude. Dispensing once and for all with the canard that sport and politics can be kept apart would enable sport’s governing bodies to appropriately leverage their political power and not merely act as puppets of the global north. More...
On 26 and 27 October 2023, the Asser Institute in The Hague will host the 2023 edition of the International Sports Law Journal (ISLJ) Conference. The ISLJ is the leading academic journal in transnational sports law and governance and is proud to provide a platform for transnational scholarly exchanges on the state of the field. The conference will address a number of complex issues and disputes at the top of the transnational sports law agenda. In particular, we will zoom in on three main topics:
How football governance is (re)shaped by EU law
Since the Bosman ruling of the European Court of Justice (CJEU) in 1995, it has been obvious to football fans around the world that the European Union (EU) has a considerable influence on the governance and regulation of professional football. This year, 2023, provides us a striking reminder of this fact with (at least) two fundamental judgments of the Grand Chamber of the CJEU expected in the Superleague case and the UEFA’s home-grown players rule. Additionally, two further cases, which are challenging FIFA’s transfer system and its agent regulations, remain pending before the Luxembourg court. We will be looking closely at this relationship between EU law and the governance football through two panels (featuring senior and junior researchers) and a keynote lecture delivered by one of the finest observers of this encounter: Prof. Stephen Weatherill (Oxford University).
Autonomy and neutrality in the transnational governance of sports
The invasion of Ukraine by Russia has postponed (once again) the end of history and revived within the Olympic Movement fundamental debates dating back to the Cold War and South-African Apartheid. Can the Olympic Movement stay neutral in the face of a clear violation of international law by Russia and of war crimes being committed by its armed forces? What should the consequences be in terms of the participation of Russian athletes and teams in international sporting competitions? If they are allowed to participate, under what conditions should they be competing? All these questions are ultimately connected to the definition and practice of the autonomy and neutrality of sport vis-a-vis international law and politics and will be at the heart of the another set of presentations at the ISLJ conference and a digital bridge with the Symposium on Sport & Neutrality organised in Lillehammer by the Inland Norway University of Applied Sciences.
The transnational regulation of gender by sports governing bodies
Our third focus area for this year’s conference will be the regulation and governance of gender boundaries by SGBs. The recent and ground-breaking decision of the European Court of Human Rights in the Semenya case crystallises the contemporary importance of questions related to the division between genders in the context of international sports. Furthermore, the ongoing and heated debates on the participation of transgender athletes in female competitions are also highlighting the importance of the decisions taken by SGBs in this regard. We will be hosting a specific Panel tackling these issues and will be welcoming Prof. Silvia Camporesi (University of Vienna and King’s College London) for a keynote lecture connecting the legal debates with ethical and philosophical considerations.
More information and registration HERE
Download the full programme
Online participation available
Following the success of last year's webinar option, we are once again allowing online participation to the conference at an affordable price. Thus, we hope to internationalise and diversify our audience and to reach people who are not in a position to travel to The Hague.
We look forward to welcoming you in person in The Hague or digitally to this new iteration of the ISLJ conference.
Sport is often presented by Sports Governing Bodies
(SGBs), and in particular the International Olympic Committee, as
apolitical. A neutral endeavor, which ignores the whims of politics and
keeps national governments at arm’s length. In short, it is thought of as an
autonomous sphere of transnational society wishing to remain
unaffected by the political turbulences out there. In fact, many SGBs enforce strict rules banning political speech by individuals, and in the spaces, subjected to their contractual power. Moreover, FIFA, for example, regularly issues effective sanctions against states
which are perceived as threatening the autonomy of the governance of
football on their territory. Hence, this apolitical ideal of
international sports is not only a founding myth of the Olympic
Movement, it is actively pursued by SGBs through their private
regulatory powers and has hard consequences for athletes, clubs, sport
officials alike.
Yet, on 24 February, Russia decided to invade Ukraine, in what has
become the most important land war in Europe since the implosion of
ex-Yugoslavia. This invasion was quickly followed by condemnations from
the IOC and many other SGBs, leading in many cases, most prominently by
UEFA and FIFA, to the exclusion of Russian teams and athletes from
international sporting competitions. This reaction is difficult to
square with the neutrality and autonomy of sport so vigorously defended
by the international SGBs until recently. It raises also many questions
of double standards: why did this illegal invasion lead to sporting
consequences and not others? Furthermore, the Court of Arbitration of
Sport recently released two orders (available here and here)
concerning UEFA and FIFA’s decisions to exclude Russian national teams
and clubs from their football competitions, which outline the legal
strategies pursued by the SGBs to reconcile the public urge to exclude
Russia(ns) from international sporting competitions, and their
commitments to political neutrality.
We are very happy to welcome three outstanding scholars to discuss
these issues with us from different methodological perspectives.
Speakers:
- Prof. Carmen Pérez (Universidad Carlos III de Madrid), who wrote a blog on the reactions of SGBs to Russia’s invasion
- Dr. Daniela Heerdt (Asser Institute and Centre for Sports and Human Rights), who is the co-author of a blog mapping the reactions of SGBs to Russia’s invasion
- Carole Gomez
(University of Lausanne and Institut de Relations Internationales et
Strategiques), who has been interviewed numerous times by international media on the
issue (see here and here)
Moderators:
Register for free HERE!
Call for papers
ISLJ Conference
on International Sports Law
Asser
Institute, The Hague
25 and 26
October 2022
The Editors of the International Sports Law Journal
(ISLJ) invite you to submit abstracts for the ISLJ Conference on International
Sports Law, which will take place on 25 and 26 October 2022 at the Asser
Institute in The Hague. The ISLJ, published by Springer and TMC Asser Press, is
the leading academic publication in the field of international sports law. The
conference is a unique occasion to discuss the main legal issues affecting
international sports and its governance with renowned academic experts.
We are delighted to announce the following confirmed
keynote speakers:
- Jonathan Grix (Professor of Sport Policy and Politics at Manchester
Metropolitan University), and
- Mary Harvey (CEO
at the Centre for Sport and Human Rights),
- Ben Van Rompuy (Assistant Professor at Leiden University).
We welcome abstracts from academics and practitioners
on all issues related to international sports law and governance. We also welcome
panel proposals (including a minimum of three presenters) on a specific issue.
For this year’s edition, we specifically invite submissions on the following themes
and subthemes:
- International sports law and governance in times of conflict:
- The emergence of the idea(l) of political neutrality of
SGBs and its translation in legal/governance practice
- The intersection between public international law and
international sports law and governance in the context of international
conflicts
- The role of sports diplomacy/conditionality in the
context of international conflicts
- International sports law and the Russian invasion of
Ukraine
- Human rights and mega sporting events (MSEs)
- The adverse or positive impact of MSEs on (specific) human
rights
- The influence of human rights commitments on the
organisation of MSEs
- The effects of MSEs on human rights in organising
countries
- The responsibilities and strategies of SGBs to ensure
respect of human rights at MSEs
- The role and responsibilities of states in ensuring
respect of human rights in the context of MSEs
- Competition law and challenges to the governance monopoly of SGBs
- The impact of competition law on SGBs and their
governance
- The limits of competition law on effecting change in the
governance of sport
- The specific modalities of application of competition
law to sports governance
- The legitimacy of competition authorities in
challenging SGBs
Please send your abstract of 300 words and CV no later
than 1 July 2022 to a.duval@asser.nl. Selected speakers will be informed by 15 July.
The selected participants will be expected to submit a
draft paper by 10 October 2022. Papers accepted and presented at the conference
are eligible for publication in a special issue of the ISLJ subject to
peer-review. Submissions after this date will be considered for
publication in later editions of the Journal.
The
Asser Institute will cover one night accommodation for the speakers and may
provide a limited amount of travel grants (max. 250€). If you wish to be considered for a
grant, please indicate it in your submission.
Editor's note:
Daniela is a researcher at the Asser Institute in the field of sport and human rights. She has a
background in public international law and human rights law and defended
her PhD project entitled “Blurred Lines of Responsibility and
Accountability – Human Rights Abuses at Mega-Sporting Events” in April
2021 at Tilburg University. She also works as independent consultant in the field of sport and human rights for the Centre for Sport and Human Rights, or the European Parliament among other clients from the sports ecosystem
As Head of Policy and Outreach, Guido is in charge of the Centre for Sport & Human Rights engagement with governments, international and intergovernmental organisations and sports organisations. He represents the Centre at conferences, events and bilateral dialogues to reach new audiences and partners and raise public awareness and understanding of the Centre’s work .
On February 24,
2022, the Russian military invaded Ukrainian territory. What followed was an
escalation of the war, day by day, causing thousands of victims and forcing
millions of people to flee. On March 2, the UN General Assembly overwhelmingly adopted a resolution deploring "in the strongest possible terms" Russia's
aggression against Ukraine by a vote of 141 to 5, with 35 abstentions. On March
29, Russian and Ukrainian representatives met in Istanbul for another round of
negotiations. No ceasefire has been agreed and hostilities continue.
Many states,
international organizations and corporations quickly took measures in response
to this invasion. Hundreds of companies decided to withdraw
from Russia. Some countries decided to strengthen economic
sanctions against Russia and Belarus and to provide military and economic help
to Ukraine. Many civil society actors mobilised to organize and provide humanitarian
support for Ukraine. Interestingly, international sports organisations like the
International Olympic Committee (IOC), the Fédération Internationale de Football
Association (FIFA), World Athletics and many other international federations, issued
statements condemning the invasion and imposed bans and sanctions on Russian
and Belarussian sports bodies and athletes.
This blog post provides
an overview of the measures adopted by a number of international sports
federations (IFs) that are part of the Olympic Movement since
the beginning of the war and analyses how they relate to the statements issued
by the IOC and other sanctions and measures taken by international sports organisations
in reaction to (geo)political tensions and conflict.
More...