Category Archives: Ethics & Sports

CFP: Sporting Females: past, present and future, Leeds Met Sept 4, 2014

Leeds Metropolitan University’s Research Centre for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, is pleased to announce a forthcoming conference to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the publication of Jennifer Hargreaves’ book, “Sporting Females: Critical Issues in the History and Sociology of Women’s Sport”.
In recognition of this seminal work, scholars engaged in historical, sociological, philosophical and practitioner research about sporting females and/or gender relations and sport are invited to attend this day of celebration and stimulating discussion. We seek proposals for presentations from those committed to the analysis of female and/or gendered experiences of sport past and / or present, as well as those offering critical insights into gendered sporting cultures in the future.

Proposals should be submitted in one of the following formats:
Individual abstract (c.250 words for 20 minutes presentation) OR Collective themed panel (x 3 abstracts c.250 words each for 20 minutes presentation + brief rationale identifying how the panel coheres. Documentation must be collated and submitted by a ‘lead’ panellist). Please submit your completed abstract / panel proposal as a Word document (including your name, presentation title and affiliation) by email to: Sam Armitage (Conference Administrator) at S.ArmitageATleedsmet.ac.uk, no later than 12 noon, Monday 31 March 2014.

For more information see the call for papers. If you have any queries contact Dr Carol Osborne at C.OsborneATleedsmet.ac.uk

Coming up on March 12th: Symposium of the British Philosophy of Sport Association, Cardiff Met

Places are still available for the British Philosophy of Sport Association Symposium next week to be held at Cardiff Met, Cyncoed, CF23 6XD.
12:00 – 13.15 : Andrew Edgar (Cardiff University) ‘Sport About Technology’
13.15 – 13.30 : Lunch
13.30 – 14.30 : BPSA meeting
14.30 – 15.45 : Mike McNamee (Swansea University) ‘Disability in Sport’
15.45 – 17.00 : Silvia Camporesi (Kings College London) ‘Genetic testing for talent identification: international and ethical perspectives’
 
If you wish to attend then please write to Dr Emily Ryall, BPSA Chair: eryall@glos.ac.uk .

Sponsors should be held responsible if their athletes dope

Camporesi S, & Knuckles JA  (2014). Shifting the burden of proof in doping: lessons from environmental sustainability applied to high-performance sport. Reflective Practice15(1), 106-118.

One of Lance Armstrong's former sponsors...

One of Lance Armstrong’s former sponsors…

In this paper, co-authored with James A. Knuckles, we analyse the role of incentives in high-performance sports, borrowing concepts from sustainability policies and applying them to the context of doping in sports. Professional athletes discount their future health in exchange for desired enhanced performances. In the same way, many industrialised societies discount future environmental health for short-term economic returns, jeopardising the future of the planet. We propose a solution to alter this discounting, by applying the lessons from environmental sustainability, which has long proposed shifting the burden of proof away from regulators in order to alter the practice of discounting the planet’s future health for current economic gains, to high-performance sports.

We argue that the burden of proof for doping should not rest on the athlete or the team of sports doctors, but should rest instead on the sponsors. Under this system, WADA would retain and strengthen its own testing, and impose severe penalties on the sponsors of any athlete found to be doping.

Only by making the companies accountable for the athletes they sponsor, can we de-link sponsorship money from a win-at-all-costs mentality in sports that in turn leads to doping, and subsequently to discounting the future health of the athlete.