Governing Esports: Public Policy, Regulation and the Law

Abstract

Esport is an enigma -at once a sport; technological innovation; and profit maximizing business. As a sport, it has much in common with traditional sports. It has leagues and franchises, teams and skilled players, competitions, sponsors, broadcasters and, at the elite level, significant prize money and all the risks that come with it. As a technological innovation, it has created new markets and value networks outside the control of sports' traditional hegemony. And while many sports today generate significant revenues, esports differ because of the primacy of its profit motive. Unlike traditional sports, it does not see itself as the custodian of artefacts of great socio-cultural importance. This gives rise to a plethora of governance, policy, regulatory and legal issues. This article examines these issues through the lens of regulatory scholarship. Regulatory scholarship provides a valuable framework for examining why governments regulate in the form in which they regulate. Regulatory theory looks behind governments' stated public interest purposes to examine the impact private interests, institutional parameters, and ideational currents have on the regulatory endeavour. Regulatory scholarship enables us to look beyond traditional doctrinal law to debate the many complex issues and multiple perspectives inherent in the phenomena that is esports.

Role of the government in certain circumstances

“…32 Regulation of public authorities is important for stabilization and relatively predictability of economic relations on the market. 33 For financial credibility of the state, a transparent view of consolidated incomes and outcomes of the state is important, which also include implementations of tools for maintaining fiscal balance and regulatory mechanisms for the prevention of potential deviation which undermines the position, reputation and credibility of public financial institutions. On the other hand, common solidarity in the EU can potentially assure a security net for member states in situations of unexpected financial and economic hardships which can cause macroeconomic imbalances.…”

Value Driven Regulation and the role of inspections. Commentary to: Hovlid E, Husabø G, Teig IL, Halvorsen K, Frich JC. Contextual factors of external inspections and mechanisms for improvement in healthcare organizations: A realist evaluation. Soc Sci Med 2022 Apr;298:114872

“…First, there is a societal value for which behavior by individuals and organizations must be influenced and (structurally) monitored (Black, 2002;Selznick, 1985;Walshe and Boyd, 2007). Second, there are standards reflecting what needs to be done to achieve the desired societal value (Black, 2002;Windholz, 2017). Third, there are one or more addressees that have influence on the societal value and can be influenced by a regulator (Selznick, 1985;Black, 2002;Windholz, 2017).…”

The Value of Systems Thinking for and in Regulatory Governance: An Evidence Synthesis

“…It is likely that, at some point in the systems thinking process, a decision must be made to give more weight to some worldviews and forms of knowledge than to others. Yet, doing so gives more power to some in the regulatory system while taking it away from others (Ramage & Shipp, 2009; Windholz, 2018). The second set of ethical challenges considers related choices.…”

“…The consensus among systems thinkers is that there is little point in just changing one element of a system (Meadows, 2008). The change of a single element in one part of the system will likely trigger an unanticipated change elsewhere (Windholz, 2018). Likewise, a lack of knowledge or data from the system as a whole easily results in unnecessarily forceful or hasty changes and may result in undesired outcomes or oscillation within the system (Senge, 2006;Stroh, 2015).…”