Reforming Global Sport: Hybridity and the Challenges of Pursuing Transparency

• Published date: 01 October 2015
• Date: 01 October 2015
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/lapo.12044

Reforming Global Sport: Hybridity and the

Challenges of Pursuing Transparency

KATHRYN HENNE

In light of recent controversies in global sport, this article surveys the challenges

of pursuing transparency in this particular domain of governance. Although cor-

ruption in sport is attracting more scholarly attention, there remains little

sociolegal research that reflects critically on corporate governance in sport and its

implications. This article outlines current calls for greater transparency in global

sport and considers how capitalistic underpinnings and distinct hybrid arrange-

ments complicate the task of transparency. It concludes by reflecting on how

insights from studies of regulatory capitalism can inform alternative approaches

to transparency and accountability in global sport.

INTRODUCTION

The May 2015 indictment of senior Fédération Internationale de Football

Association (FIFA) officials on forty-seven charges related to an alleged

bribery and kickback scheme involving 150 million US dollars seemed

to confirm long-standing suspicions of systemic corruption within the

organization. It also prompted global scrutiny of international football1

governance. Within two months following their arrest, the US Senate Sub-

committee on Consumer Protection, Product Safety, Insurance, and Data

Security held an inquiry, which focused on the integrity of the world govern-

ing body.2Subcommittee members acknowledged concerns that the growth

of commercial interests, such as gambling, had made an ill-equipped FIFA

into big business, prompting difficulties in its ability to self-regulate. They

nonetheless articulated a number of areas in need of reform: the full removal

This article draws on research supported by grants from the National Science Foundation

(Award #SES-0851536), International Olympic Committee, Research School of Asia and the

Pacific at the Australian National University, and World Anti-Doping Agency. John

Braithwaite, Valerie Braithwaite, Peter Grabosky, Fiona Haines, Natasha Tusikov, and Kyla

Tienhaara, two anonymous reviewers, and Nancy Reichman provided incredibly helpful com-

ments and suggestions.

Address correspondence to: Kathryn Henne, The Australian National University—

Regulatory Institutions Network, HC Coombs Extension Fellows Road, Acton, Australian

Capital Territory 2601 Australia. Telephone: +61 02 6125 1255; E-mail: kathryn.henne@anu.

edu.au.

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LAW & POLICY, Vol. 37, No 4, October 2015 ISSN 0265–8240

© 2015 The Author

Law & Policy © 2015 The University of Denver/Colorado Seminary

doi: 10.1111/lapo.12044

and sanctioning of FIFA President Sepp Blatter, greater financial transpar-

ency, protocols for elections of executive members, leadership term limits,

revised World Cup bidding processes, and equitable compensation of pro-

fessional female athletes. The take-home message was that if international

football was a big business, it needed to take responsibility and implement

better and more transparent governance practices.

Global sport is indeed a big business. Estimates indicate that 2015

sports revenues are set to surpass 145 billion US dollars worldwide

(PricewaterhouseCoopers 2011). The FIFA scandal exemplifies the increased

awareness of corporate misconduct in sport. Allegations entail money laun-

dering; bribery; abusive employment practices; companies and governments

receiving preferential treatment in bidding for contracts related to sport

events; and match-fixing, which is the practice of predetermining the out-

comes of games, usually for financial gain. Some observers, including David

Howman, director general of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), go

so far as to allege that organized crime controls over 25 percent of world

sport (Rumsby 2014). Calls for greater transparency in global sport gover-

nance thus appear timely and important.

Despite recognizing the difficulties in regulating a powerful global sport

organization such as FIFA, the presiding members of the US Senate Sub-

committee on Consumer Protection, Product Safety, Insurance, and Data

Security did not call for governments to intervene. Instead, they emphasized

the need for better regulation to come from within sport, instructing US

Soccer representatives to take a leadership role in those efforts. Prior to the

US Senate inquiry, Transparency International (2009, 2014) had made a

number of recommendations: antibribery codes, campaigns to raise aware-

ness of sport-related corruption, mandates for ethics education, the intro-

duction of anticorruption guidelines alongside clear, enforceable rules, and

“open, competitive bidding processes” for cities to host sport mega events.

There were other proposals that called for the establishment of specialized

integrity units to police unethical and illegal activities in sport.

This article surveys the challenges of pursuing transparency in global

sport, with the aim of illuminating how transnational governance arrange-

ments inform them. Although corruption in sport is attracting more schol-

arly attention (Maennig 2005), there remains little empirical work that

reflects critically on corporate governance in sport and its implications

(Levermore 2013). Following Roger Levermore (2013, 53), corporate gover-

nance is understood here as the “Western governance framework” applied to

organizations and industries in order to “set a balance between economic and

social goals” with “a level of accountability” that operates “within acceptable

legal obligations.” Although this article is a conceptual piece, it relies on

insight gleaned through eight years of ethnographic and archival research,

which I have discussed in more depth elsewhere (Henne 2010, 2015).3Like

other qualitative studies of sport governance, my research scrutinizes the

“often naturalized, idealized, and taken-for-granted allegiances between

Henne REFORMING GLOBAL SPORT 325

© 2015 The Author

Law & Policy © 2015 The University of Denver/Colorado Seminary