The Editors of the International Sports Law Journal (ISLJ) invite you to submit abstracts for the next edition of the ISLJ Conference on International Sports Law, which will take place on 24 and 25 October 2024 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 and the conference is a unique occasion to discuss the main legal issues affecting international sports and its governance with renowned academic experts.
We welcome abstracts from academics and practitioners on all issues related to international and transnational sports law and their impact on the governance of sport. We also welcome panel proposals (including a minimum of three presenters) on specific issues of interest to the Journal and its readers. For this year’s edition, we specifically invite submissions on the following themes and subthemes:
Reformism in transnational sports governance: Drivers and impacts
- Legal and social drivers of reforms in transnational sports governance
- The role of strategic litigation (before the EU/ECtHR/National courts) as a driver of reform;
- The role of public/fan pressure groups on clubs, competition organisers and governments as a driver of change.
- The impact of internal reforms in transnational sports governance: Cosmetic or real change? (e.g. IOC Agenda 2020+5, FIFA governance reforms, CAS post-Pechstein changes, WADA sfter the Russian doping scandal)
- Emerging alternatives to private sports governance – the UK’s Independent Football Regulator.
The organization and regulation of mega sporting events: Current and future challenges
- Mega-sporting events as legalized sites of digital surveillance
- Greening mega-sporting events (e.g. carbon neutral pledges, environmental footprints of events, the impact of multiple hosting sites)
- Mega-sporting events and the protection of human rights and labour rights (e.g. Paris 2024 Social Charter, Euro 2024 human rights commitments)
- The Olympic Games and athletes’ economic rights (remuneration/advertisement)
- Reviews of the legal issues raised at Euro 2024 in Germany and the Paris 2024 Olympic Games
- Previews of the legal issues likely to have an impact on the FIFA 2026 World Cup and the Milano-Cortina 2026 Winter Olympic Games
Please send your abstract of 300 words and CV no later than 15 July 2024 to a.duval@asser.nl. Selected speakers will be informed by 30 July.
The selected participants will be expected to submit a draft of their paper by 1 October 2024. Papers accepted and presented at the conference are eligible for publication in a special issue of the ISLJ, subject to peer-review.
The Asser Institute will provide a limited number of travel & accommodation grants (max. 300€). If you wish to be considered for a grant, please explain why in your submission.
Season 2 of #FootballLeaks is now underway
since more than a week and already a significant number of episodes (all the articles published can be found on the European Investigative Collaborations’ website) covering various aspect of the (lack of)
transnational regulation of football have been released (a short German documentary sums up pretty much the state of play). For
me, as a legal scholar, this new series of revelations is an exciting
opportunity to discuss in much more detail than usual various questions related
to the operation of the transnational private regulations of football imposed by
FIFA and UEFA (as we already did during the initial football leaks with our series of blogs on TPO in 2015/2016). Much of what
has been unveiled was known or suspected by many, but the scope and precision
of the documents published makes a difference. At last, the general public, as
well as academics, can have certainty about the nature of various shady practices
in the world of football. One key characteristic that explains the lack of
information usually available is that football, like many international sports,
is actually governed by private administrations (formally Swiss associations),
which are not subject to the similar obligations in terms of transparency than
public ones (e.g. access to document rules, systematic publication of decisions,
etc.). In other words, it’s a total black box! The football leaks are offering
a rare sneak peak into that box.
Based on what I have read so far
(this blog was written on Friday 9 November), there are three main aspects I
find worthy of discussion:
- The (lack of) enforcement of UEFA’s
Financial Fair Play (FFP) Regulations
- The European Super League project and
EU competition law
- The
(lack of) separation of powers inside FIFA and UEFA More...
Editor's note: Prof. Thomas Kruessmann is key expert in the EU Technical Assistant Project "Strengthening Teaching and Research Capacity at ADA University" in Baku (Azerbaijan). At the same time, he is co-ordinator of the Jean-Monnet Network "Developing European Studies in the Caucasus" with Skytte Institute of Political Studies at the University of Tartu (Estonia).
The notion that “fish
rots from the head down” is known to many cultures and serves as a practical
reminder on what is at stake in the current wave of anti-corruption / integrity
and good governance initiatives. The purpose of this blog post is to provide a
short update on the recent founding of the International Partnership against
Corruption in Sport (IPACS), intermittently known as the International Sports
Integrity Partnership (IPAS), and to propose some critical perspectives from a
legal scholar’s point of view.
During the past couple
of years, the sports world has seen a never-ending wave of corruption
allegations, often followed by revelations, incriminations and new allegation.
There are ongoing investigations, most notably in the United States where the
U.S. Department of Justice has just recently intensified its probe
into corruption at the major sports governing bodies (SGBs). By all accounts,
we are witnessing only the tip of the iceberg. And after ten years of debate
and half-hearted reforms, there is the widespread notion, as expressed by the
Council of Europe’s (CoE’s) Parliamentary Assembly (PACE) Resolution
2199/2018 that “the sports movement cannot be left to resolve its failures
alone”. More...
Editor's Note: Ryan Gauthier is Assistant Professor at Thompson Rivers University in Canada. Ryan’s research addresses the governance of sports organisations, with a particular focus on international sports organisations. His PhD research examined the accountability of the International Olympic Committee for human rights violations caused by the organisation of the Olympic Games.
Publicly Financing a Stadium – Back in the Saddle(dome)
Calgary, Canada, held their municipal elections on October 16, 2017, re-electing Naheed Nenshi for a third term as mayor. What makes this local election an interesting issue for sports, and sports law, is the domination of the early days of the campaign by one issue – public funding for a new arena for the Calgary Flames. The Flames are Calgary’s National Hockey League (NHL) team, and they play in the Scotiabank Saddledome. More...
Close to 100 participants from 37 different countries attended the first ISLJ Annual International Sports Law Conference that took place on 26-27 October 2017 in The Hague. The two-day programme featured panels on the FIFA transfer system, the labour rights and relations in sport, the protection of human rights in sport, EU law and sport, the Court of Arbitration for Sport, and the world anti-doping system. On top of that, a number of keynote speakers presented their views on contemporary topics and challenges in international sports law. This report provides a brief summary of the conference for both those who could not come and those who participated and would like to relive their time spent at the T.M.C. Asser Institute.More...