Problems of the Fight Against Doping in Professional Sports

Doping became, as many experts note, not only more diverse, highly specialized, and efficient, but also dangerous for the health of athletes. One of the main factors that allows athletes to escape responsibility is corruption. The author pays particular attention to research and new technologies in the field of sports medicine, including generating new kinds of doping. The chapter also examines the practice of international standard on granting exceptions on therapeutic use of drugs. The author suggests reconstructing the existing system of criminal and administrative law to develop new enforcement mechanisms in the fight against doping to impose a ban on the testing of new drugs on professional athletes.

“Body Culture”

“Body culture,” a modern term in Western Europe, owes its philosophical content to ancient Greece and especially to Olympia. Altis turned out to be a creative place for presence and mixture of cultural elements of a set of people that through this exchange of ideas gradually conquered its first characteristics as a nation. Philosophically, the ideology that was cultivated formed the reflection of the deepest background position which the classical culture identified with coexistence of the opposites. The physical perfection of the Olympic model was reflected in art as the symmetry of Kouros, with a transcendent and spiritual dimension, idealizing the human body. The Olympic athlete reflects harmony and symmetry, the most complete form of the perfect citizen, the concept of moral beauty, as it is defined by Plato and Aristotle. But sport that is provided by the school in Greece today, instead of being an integral part of mainstream education, as it was in antiquity, represents a compressed and therefore inadequate education tool. Sport in Greek schools operates within an oppressive organization framework that is basically imposed because of competition. As a result, the final aim of sports “education” is to teach discipline and physical efficiency with the view to ultimately promoting an organized performance industry. But this obsession, about wanting to be first, in addition to being a source of personal stress, only achieves is to develop the student's personality with competition as the prevailing principle. Moreover, this pursuit of personal affirmation through sports ranking depreciates personal value and the individual as a whole, whilst breeding insecurity and the need for personal recognition through unsafe means. What's more important, instead of being the best tool for bearing social life and reducing egocentric subjectivity, it inflates egocentrism and creates human beings susceptible to individualism. In this way, a type of “one-dimensional man” is cultivated, which Marcuse describes as the most dangerous of all because it destroys society's cohesion by deconstructing man's perception of coexistence.

Physical Education and Religious Freedom

Freedom of religion has been constantly characterized as one of the foundations of a democratic society. On the other hand, the significance of physical education in the development of children's overall personality is beyond dispute. Thus, the question that arises is, What happens in a case of a conflict involving the above? The aim of this chapter is to provide an answer on the basis of the case law of the European Court of Human Rights. In particular, the fundamental cases of Dogru vs. France and Kervanci vs. France will be examined, as well as the recent case of Osmanoglu and Kocabas vs. Switzerland. Through the analysis of the cases, useful conclusions will be drawn on the possible impact of religious freedom on physical education.

The Emergence of Sports Law in Kenya

Sports law is a relatively new topic in Kenya. Once played for recreational purposes and entertainment, sports have become professionalized and commercialized. This evolution led to government intervention to prevent a conflict of interest. The government in Kenya created and regulated the infrastructure supporting these sports, as well as provided dispute resolution mechanisms for arising issues. This infrastructure included both the legal and structural frameworks of the industry. The government intervention ran through the legislature and the judiciary. Through the legislature, the government created laws to regulate the sports industry. The judiciary adjudicated issues demanding judicial treatment. Sports have grown into a highly competitive industry with global pervasiveness. This chapter will discuss regulative and structural frameworks within the sports industry by highlighting the legislation primarily providing sports law. The chapter then highlights contemporary issues as well as make recommendations on the same.

E-Sports at the Olympic Games

The chapter follows a comparison between e-sports and physical sports in terms of their formal properties as games. Through this approach, it is argued that e-sports differ essentially from physical games due to their spatiality. Specifically, it addresses how the virtual space of e-sports undergoes a different process of production from that of physical space in the sense that it does not adhere to social rules and the power of the hegemony, but rather to the code of the machine. This results to a negation of the physical body of the player, which is in dialectical antithesis to the spirit of the Olympic Games unlike any physical game.

International Sport Business and Global Sport Governance

The purpose of this chapter is to introduce some fundamental concepts and principles that are associated with modern sport business in the framework of international organization and global governance. In the opening section, a discussion on terms related to the international organization and governance of sport and sport business will be presented along with relevant issues that have emerged in the modern international sport context. Then, an overview of sport business activity in the field of global sport will take place, followed by a brief presentation of several aspects of contemporary sport business in order to demonstrate the diversity and importance of international sport business stakeholders to contemporary global sport. Topics include corporate sponsorship, media and social media, and information and communication technology. The chapter will conclude with a discussion about the impact of modern sport business on global sport governance as the main goal of this chapter is to convey the message and highlight aspects of the significant impact of international sport business activity on the global governance of sport.

Blow to the Head

Chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) is a degenerative disease that has begun to be discovered in various deceased professional athletes across sports. The pathology of CTE involves repeated traumatic blows to the head. Due to the longitudinal and cumulative aspects of this disease as well as the high financial stakes involved in professional sports, its discovery has led to many important issues that need to be investigated. This chapter explores some of the legal and ethical implications of CTE in professional sports.

Legal, Ethical, and Integrity Issues in Sports Industry

This chapter focuses on the issues of the sports industry. Since sport, in addition to its other aspects, is a fast-growing industry, the chapter considers the importance of sports industry for the sector as a whole. The chapter shows the basic elements of sports industry structure, together with the peculiarities of Russian sports industry legal support in general and in some particular directions. The authors give definitions of “sports industry,” “sports product,” “sports entertainment product,” “professional sports,” “professional athlete,” “sports ethics,” and “sports integrity.” Being a good basis for sports business development, the legislation of the Russian Federation in the sphere of legal services for business and commercial activities within the sports industry takes into account sports-specific features and its principal functions enabling professional sports sector to provide benefits to economy and society. However, there is still space for further development.

The Legal Validity of E-Sports as a Sport

The chapter aims to investigate the e-sports phenomenon and analyze its legal relevance and validity with the traditional sports world. The chapter looks to provide the current framework of the e-sports field and its potential to be a sport, followed by the legal challenges it faces towards being possibly recognized as one. The second segment of this chapter additionally looks into the regulations currently in place as well as analyzes the minimum changes required in order to ensure the growth of this field. The chapter eventually concludes by analyzing the possible future for the field and suggestions to help facilitate its development.

Sport and Antitrust Law

This chapter explores the relationship between sports and different types of competition, legal and actual possibility to apply competition, particularly antitrust, laws to sports, primarily to the sphere of professional sports and sports industry. The commercial and non-commercial components, yet linked to the interests of profit, in modern professional sports entails certain applicability of competition law to the field of sports. However, excessively strict application of antitrust laws can lead to devastating consequences for all types of sports or sports in general. Therefore, it is important to take into account specific characteristics of the sport sphere (more than any other sphere of activity). This is important when deciding on the application of competition law to this sphere or withdrawal of this sector from the application of competition law. Nature and inherent specific features of professional sports activities and sports in general have a significant impact on the application of competition law. Economic competition in the field of sport is atypical. The authors give their definitions of “sport,” “competitiveness in the sport,” “commercial competition in the field of professional sports,” “autonomy of sports,” “sports monopsony,” “sports monopoly,” and “sports oligopoly.”