Dispute Resolution in Sport

Sport exceptionalism and the Court of Arbitration for Sport

“…Although it serves IOC and CAS interests to promote Olympic mystique and sport exceptionalism – athletes as “peace ambassadors” and members of one big “Olympic family”– athletes are, in fact, workers and the sporting arena is their workplace (see e.g. McArdle, 2015, Chapter 10; Sack and Staurowsky, 1998).…”

“…More critical of the process, Straubel (2005) identified inconsistencies in CAS’s functioning, most notably, whether it worked as a private settlement body with informal, confidential proceedings, or a public settlement body that creates precedents and operates like a regular court (p. 1211). Ten years later, McArdle (2015) observed: “[…] a cynic might argue that CAS Panels use precedent when doing so reinforces the judgment they wish to reach and ignore it when the precedents are adverse […]” (p. 33).…”

“…As Valloni (2012) explained, CAS provides “the only system capable of international applicability and consistency for international sport.” Foster (2005) took a more critical view, noting that CAS rarely overturned IF decisions, and operated primarily as a “standards council,” with IFs signing on to a private and “sacrosanct” system of governance that demanded immunity from interventions by national and domestic legal systems (p. 2). This left athletes unprotected in a context where so-called “global sport law” was merely “a cloak for self-regulation” (McArdle, 2015, pp. 24-5).…”