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The increasing commercialisation of sport raises important questions concerning regulation. The development of the European Union (EU) and the internationalization of sporting competition have added an international dimension to this debate. Yet sport is not only a business, it is a social and cultural activity. Can regulation at the EU level reconcile this tension? Adopting a distinctive legal and political analysis, this book argues that the EU is receptive to the claim of sport for special treatment before the law. It investigates the birth of EU sports law and policy by examining the impact of the Bosman ruling and other important European Court of Justice decisions, the relationship between sport and EU competition law, focusing particularly on the broadcasting of sport, the organization of sport and the international transfer system, and the relationship between sport and the EU Treaty, focusing in particular on the impact of the Amsterdam and Nice declarations on sport and the significance of the Helsinki report on sport. This text raises questions concerning the appropriate theoretical tools for analysing European integration.
, required a proper stadium so that the Parisian public could attend sporting competitions worthy of international renown.45 Yet critics of the stadium saw a 100,000-seat stadium as a wasteful and unnecessary diversion of resources that were needed elsewhere to rejuvenate France.46 Socialist André Weil-Curiel (who had criticised the ageing Vél’ d’Hiv’ back in 1959) contended that the stade would only demonstrate the kind of grandeur found in ancient ruins, as it would surely fall into disuse. In rhetoric that might well have been lifted straight from the debates over
world stage, in ways that predominantly reinforced a sense of French inadequacy and decline throughout 130 130 The stadium century the interwar period, if not necessarily after the Second World War. At the same time, however, the comparisons with the wider world testified to the global character of sport itself in the first half of the twentieth century, as a mass media complex that included newspapers, specialised periodicals and radio in Western Europe and North America publicised and promoted sporting competitions that helped create transnational communities of
In 1919, Afghanistan won its independence from British suzerainty. In each subsequent year, the state celebrated the event by staging military parades and organising cultural programmes – and sporting competitions. This chapter considers the independence games from the perspective of British diplomats in Afghanistan who also took part in the contests. In particular, the chapter studies the reports written by British diplomats on the games and explores how notions of fair play and athleticism were projected on the independent state of Afghanistan. The chapter asks if these reports are indicative of larger political and/or colonial ambitions. Complicating conventional assumptions on the primacy of the political in diplomatic relations, this chapter suggests that the physical encounter constituted a central feature in British–Afghan relations.
In many sports, referees, umpires or judges are placed under immense pressure to make accurate split-second decisions that determine or contribute to the outcome of the sporting competition. In some sports, such as figure skating or gymnastics, the judges are responsible for the entire score. In other sports the referee or umpire has the ability to make field-of-play decisions that significantly contribute to, or in some cases may determine, the outcome. In order to function effectively such decision
in Indonesia. The location of the protests, Bandung, the site of the seminal non-aligned conference a generation before, fittingly symbolised Indonesia’s renewed interest in challenging a global superpower. Similar demonstrations occurred in Jakarta, despite an official ban on public protests.10 In 1980, Indonesia once again used international sporting competition to take a stand in international politics. Indonesia – under scrutiny in Western media for atrocities in East Timor – used the Olympic boycott to change the subject while reclaiming status in the non
advanced parts of Europe – Italy, the Low Countries and Germany – where, as we have noted, traditional games were already more organised and structured. In this context, new printed rulebooks and manuals appeared, often written for rulers; sports grounds and halls were constructed – commissioned by princes, cities and confraternities; local sporting competitions proliferated, patronised again by rulers (several French kings and German princes appear to have been avid sports enthusiasts). Fashionable sporting events attracted large crowds of spectators. Other
of politics by other means.11 Sport is part of the discussion: for example interest in and competition over medals tallies illustrate the importance of sport beyond the track or arena. It is no little surprise to say that sporting competition is prime territory for political exploitation, with the sanction of a boycott a much-vaunted tool. Nonetheless, the conceptual underpinnings of boycotts are not always well understood. This chapter outlines the discourse on boycotts, their parameters and examples from both the Cold War and post-Cold War, while posing the
, medical experiments and sporting competition are value-free pretexts, then we might be inclined to say yes. Or is it rather an appeal for the return of the Father , one of these reactionary themes modernist critics often accuse postmodernism of harbouring? If Jacques put his Weltschmerz down to the Vatersehnsucht , surely he would not commit suicide when hearing that Johana is pregnant, since this
’ are particularly rigorous when Hanoi plays host to an international event, such as political summits or sporting competitions (Jensen & Peppard 2007 , 232–3). At other times, arrangements may possibly be made with local administrators, although their tolerance does not guarantee that of a higher-level authority (Koh 2006 , 12). The street can be taken as a metaphor for the fluidity of Vietnam’s state–society relations