In the past couple of years, the Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) made remarkable steps towards embedding human rights into their practices and policies. These developments have been discussed at length and in detail in this blog and elsewhere, but a short overview at this point is necessary to set the scene. Arguably, most changes were sparked by John Ruggie’s report from 2016, in which he articulated a set of concrete recommendations for FIFA “on what it means for FIFA to embed respect for human rights across its global operations”, using the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs) as authoritative standard.[i] As a result, in May 2017, FIFA published a human rights policy, in which it commits to respecting human rights in accordance with the UNGPs, identifies its salient human rights risks, and acknowledges the potential adverse impacts it can have on human rights in general and human rights of people belonging to specific groups. In October 2017, it adopted new bidding regulations requiring bidders to develop a human rights strategy and conduct an independent human rights risk assessment as part of their bid. In March 2017, FIFA also created a Human Rights Advisory Board, which regularly evaluated FIFA’s human rights progress and made recommendations on how FIFA should address human rights issues linked to its activities. The mandate of the Advisory Board expired at the end of last year and the future of this body is unknown at this point.

While some of these steps can be directly connected to the recommendations in the Ruggie report, other recommendations have largely been ignored. One example of the latter and focus of this blog post is the issue of embedding human rights at the level of national football associations. It outlines recent steps taken by the German football association “Deutscher Fussball-Bund” (DFB) and the Dutch football association “Koninklijke Nederlandse Voetbalbond” (KNVB) in relation to human rights, and explores to what extent these steps can be regarded as proactive moves by those associations or rather spillover effects from FIFA’s human rights efforts.

The DFB

Since 2017, DFB runs a working group on the association’s human rights concept. This was triggered by DFB’s application to host the EURO 2024 and the social programs around the 2018 World Cup. In particular, the required human rights strategy for the EURO 2024 application led DFB to adopt a statutory commitment to human rights in 2019. Paragraph 2 of DFB’s Statutes read as follows:

“The DFB takes responsibility for respecting all internationally-recognized human rights and promotes the respect for these rights. It strictly opposes unconstitutional behaviour as well as any form of discriminatory or inhuman attitudes and behaviours. This applies to every form of violence, irrespective of it being of physical or mental nature. The DFB commits in particular to the protection of children and youth from sexual abuse”.[ii]

The human rights strategy for the 2024 tournament has been developed through engaging a variety of stakeholders, including the German Human Rights Institute, the German Olympic Committee and a range of civil society organizations representing the rights of children or fans amongst others. According to the DFB and some of these stakeholders, the strategy builds on and streamlines existing initiatives regarding corporate social responsibility and youth work. The DFB claims that human rights have been part of the DFB’s national and international activities for years, although not framed within recognized human rights standards. Since 2010, its Ethics Code enshrines values such as respect, diversity, integrity, transparency and solidarity in football. Moreover, it promotes projects on participation, integration, fair play, diverse fan cultures, and the prevention of violence and promotion of equality both at grass-roots and elite level sports. This certainly provides a good vantage point for DFB’s human rights efforts. Currently, the DFB is finalizing its human rights policy, and in the meantime, a number of smaller initiative were taken, such as the organization of hearings on the issue of political statements of players in 2020.

The KNVB

Last month, the KNVB announced its support for the adoption of a sport and human rights covenant, similar to the existing agreements on international responsible business conduct. In its announcement, it acknowledges the unique position of sports to promote human rights and highlights the need to use this power also in the context of international tournaments. According to the KNVB, such a covenant would advance collaboration with governments in host countries and help to address issues, promote dialogue and investigation, facilitate the exchange of knowledge and information, and create a level-playing field. Moreover, the KNVB claims that it can help to foster sustainable positive change regarding the human rights situation in host countries and provide players and associations with a responsible manner to participate in international tournaments.

KNVB’s call for a covenant has not been without criticism. Amnesty Netherlands explicitly voiced their concerns regarding the initiative on twitter, welcoming the efforts of KNVB to look at the human rights situation in Qatar in more detail, but opposing the creation of a covenant, for the reason that it would not provide any remedy to migrant workers in Qatar. The hazardous and inhuman working conditions on World Cup-related construction sites have been documented extensively, including in a recent study conducted by Amnesty Netherlands. These reports show that despite legislative changes to Qatar’s labour law, changes on the ground are lacking and additional human rights issues related to the 2022 World Cup, such as the protection of LGBTQI fans remain largely unaddressed. While the KNVB published its point of views on a World Cup in Qatar together with a list of initiatives regarding the tournament, these points and measures are rather broad and do not explicitly address existing human rights risks. An exception is an event planned for this year on human rights and sport events hosted together with the Dutch House of Representatives.

In addition to KNVB’s recent decision to adopt a sport and human rights covenant, a number of existing KNVB initiatives are worth highlighting from a human rights perspective. For instance, the KNVB was one of the football associations pushing FIFA to integrate human rights requirements into bidding regulations for international tournaments. Other examples relate more to the day-to-day business of football, rather than events, such as KNVB’s efforts on promoting diversity and countering racism and other forms of discrimination within the world of Dutch football. While these efforts are clearly linked to human rights standards, they are not framed in a human rights language, nor streamlined under a commitment to human rights.

FIFA’s ‘trickle down effect’ or civil society pressure?

On a global scale, the DFB and KNVB might be the pioneers of national football associations starting concrete efforts to embed human rights into their policies and practices. Clearly, the DFB is a couple of steps ahead of the KNVB, but both associations are committed to in particular addressing human rights issues in host countries of football tournaments. Furthermore, both draw inspiration from the broader business and human rights movement and explicitly reference the respective National Action Plans on business and human rights, which are policy documents adopted by the governments to implement the UNGPs. However, it becomes clear that through focusing on human rights risks related to host countries of international tournaments, the KNVB only reacts to a fraction of the actual human rights risks involved in the world of football.

Nevertheless, both associations are making a start and in order to find ways for encouraging other national football associations to follow suit, it is essential to understand what triggered these recent initiatives and changes. Arguably, there are two possible explanations. The first is that FIFA’s human rights efforts begin to have a trickle down-effect. The need for this has been stressed by Ruggie in his 2016 report. He recommends FIFA to adopt a human rights policy that applies to its relationships with its member associations (Recommendation 1.1) and advises FIFA to use its annual member associations’ conferences to raise awareness on human rights responsibilities of national football associations (Recommendation 4.5). Moreover, he recommends that “FIFA should ensure that the human rights commitment in Article 3 of the FIFA Statutes is mirrored in the requirements of the Standard Statutes for member associations, and is also extended to the requirements for confederations’ statutes at the earliest opportunity” (Recommendation 1.3). While FIFA has not yet adapted the Standard Statutes for member associations, DFB nevertheless decided to mirror FIFA’s statutory human rights commitment in its own Statutes. In fact, when presenting its human rights efforts on its website, the DFB explicitly refers to FIFA’s human rights policy and human rights-related regulations of UEFA.

The second explanation concerns the increasing pressure from civil society in both countries, due to the 2022 World Cup coming closer, but also due to the rise of reports on cases of abuse in the world of football in the past years. In particular the cases of mental, physical, and sexual abuse of female football players on the national team of Afghanistan & Haiti made international headlines, as well as the recent revelations of cases of sexual abuse of young football players in clubs in the United Kingdom in the 1970s. While these types of abuses where not explicitly addressed in Ruggie’s report, it does identify gender discrimination as “endemic human rights challenge” for the world of association football.[iii] Pressure on national football associations arguably also increased through national and regional regulation. Both associations seem to acknowledge the parallels to the broader business and human rights movement, which currently sees a trend of mandatory due diligence laws on national and regional levels. The fact that football is big business, both on a day-to-day basis and when big tournaments are happening is uncontested. Therefore, there is no doubt that the UNGPs’ corporate responsibility to respect human rights applies to national football associations and that the UNGPs provide a good starting point and framework for national football associations to understand and implement their human rights responsibilities.

Conclusion

Obviously, these two explanations are not mutually exclusive and FIFA’s human rights journey plays an important role in the efforts taken by the DFB and the KNVB. Moreover, the importance of Ruggie’s report in 2016 cannot be underestimated. Nevertheless, it seems like some of these recent human rights efforts by national football associations are rather reactive than proactive, following FIFA’s lead and the pressure by civil society on the world of sports more generally. As long as the result would be the same, it should not matter much. That, however, is questionable when it comes to sport and human rights. Reacting to specific issues when they arise can result in a piece-meal approach that might not only be more labour intensive but more importantly is likely to overlook a range of human rights risks related to the world of football and sports more generally. Therefore, a comprehensive approach is key to understanding the human rights risks involved and identifying ways to address these risks.[iv]

The hope is that DFB’s and KNVB’s efforts will develop further and eventually ensure that human rights are fully embedded and respected in the world of (national) football. Very concretely, these efforts can have great potential for the joint bid of these two countries together with Belgium for the 2027 Women’s World Cup, which provides a good opportunity for knowledge exchange between those associations on their human rights efforts.

[i] John G Ruggie, ‘“For the Game. For the World.” - FIFA and Human Rights’ (2016) 4

[ii] Translated by the author. See original source here.

[iii] John G Ruggie, ‘“For the Game. For the World.” - FIFA and Human Rights’ (2016) 24

[iv] Sally Engle Merry, The Seductions of Quantification: Measuring Human Rights, Gender Violence, and Sex Trafficking (The University of Chicago Press 2016) 46; Daniela Heerdt & Nadia Bernaz, Football and Women’s Rights: the Case for Indicators for FIFA’s Feminist Transformation (2020) 34, Jean Monnet Working Paper 5/20.

Editor's note: This report compiles the most relevant legal news, events and materials on International and European Sports Law based on the daily coverage provided on our twitter feed @Sportslaw_asser. 

The Headlines

International Sports Law Journal (ISLJ) Conference 2019

The T.M.C. Asser Institute and the Asser International Sports Law Centre held the third International Sports Law Journal (ISLJ) Conference on October 24-25. The Conference created a forum for academics and practitioners to discuss, debate and share knowledge on the latest developments of sports law. It featured six uniquely themed panels, which included topics such as ‘Transfer systems in international sports’ and ‘Revisiting the (in)dependence and transparency of the CAS’ to ‘The future of sports: sports law of the future’. The ISLJ Conference was also honored to have two exceptional keynote speakers: Moya Dodd and Ulrich Haas. To kick off the conference, Moya Dodd shared her experiences from an athlete’s perspective in the various boardrooms of FIFA. The second day was then launched by Ulrich Haas, who gave an incredibly thorough and insightful lecture on the importance, function and legal basis of association tribunals in international sport. For a detailed overview of this year’s ISLJ Conference, click here for the official conference report.

The Asser International Sports Law Centre was delighted to have been able to host another great edition of the ISLJ Conference and is thankful to all the participants and speakers who made this edition such a success.

Moving towards greater transparency: Launch of FIFA’s Legal Portal

On October 31, FIFA announced that it was introducing a new legal portal on its website that will give greater access to numerous documents that previously were kept private. FIFA explains that this is in order to help increase its transparency, which was one of the key ‘Guiding Principles’ highlighted in FIFA 2.0: The Vision for the Future released in 2016. This development comes as many sport governing bodies face increasing criticism for the opacity of its judicial bodies’ decisions, which can have tremendous economic and societal impacts. The newly available documents will include: ‘decisions rendered on the merits by the FIFA Disciplinary Committee and the FIFA Appeal Committee (notified as of 1 January 2019); decisions rendered on the merits by the FIFA Ethics Committee (notified since 1 January 2019); decisions rendered on the merits by the FIFA Players’ Status Committee and the FIFA Dispute Resolution Chamber; non-confidential CAS awards in proceedings to which FIFA is a party (notified since 1 January 2019); list of CAS arbitrators proposed by FIFA for appointment by ICAS, and the number of times they have been nominated in CAS proceedings’. The list of decisions from all the aforementioned bodies are updated every four months, according to their respective webpages. However, time will ultimately tell how consistently decisions are published. Nevertheless, this move is a major milestone in FIFA’s journey towards increasing its transparency.

Hong Kong Protests, Human Rights and (e)Sports Law: The Blizzard and NBA controversies

Both Blizzard, a major video game developer, and the NBA received a flurry of criticism for their responses to persons expressing support for the Hong Kong protests over the past month. On October 8, Blizzard sanctioned Blitzchung, a professional Hearthstone player who expressed support of the Hong Kong protest during a post-match interview, by eliminating the prize money he had won and suspending him for one year from any Hearthstone tournament. Additionally, Blizzard will cease to work with the casters who conducted the interview. With mounting disapproval over the sanctions,  J. Allen Brack, the president of Blizzard, restored the prize money and reduced the period of ineligibility to 6 months.

The NBA controversy started when Daryl Morey, the general manager of the Houston Rockets, tweeted his support for the protests in Hong Kong. The tweet garnered much attention, especially in China where it received a lot of backlash, including an announcement from CCTV, the official state broadcaster in China, that it was suspending all broadcasts of the NBA preseason games. In attempts to appease its Chinese audience, which is a highly profitable market for the NBA, Morey deleted the tweet and posted an apology, and the NBA responded by saying that the initial tweet was ‘regrettable’. Many scolded these actions and accused the NBA of censorship to which the NBA Commissioner, Adam Silver, responded that the NBA remains committed to freedom of expression.

Both cases highlighted how (e)sport organizations may be faced with competing interests to either guarantee greater protection of human rights or to pursue interests that perhaps have certain financial motivations.

Major International Sports Law Decisions

• Bundeskartellamt - Decision pursuant to Section 32b GWB (English version)

Official Documents and Press Releases

CAS

• CAS – The CAS expands
• CAS - The hearing in the CAS arbitration procedure between WADA, Sun Yang and FINA to be held in public on 15 November 2019
• CAS - IBU joins CAS Anti-Doping Division

FIFA

• FIFA - FIFA announces latest disciplinary sanctions for incidents during FIFA World Cup™ qualifying
• FIFA - FIFA Council meeting agenda now available
• FIFA - FIFA Council unanimously appoints China PR as hosts of new Club World Cup in 2021
• FIFA - FIFA launches new legal portal

IAAF

• IAAF – New IAAF Athletes' Commission members announced

IOC

• IOC - IOC to Propose Long-term Storage of Samples to Supplement the Pre-games Anti-doping Testing Programme for Tokyo 2020
• IOC - IOC Adapts to a Changing Landscape and Streamlines Its Operations
• IOC – Solidarity and Political Neutrality Vital to the Universality of the Olympic Games, President Bach Tells ANOC General Assembly
• IOC – United Against Manipulation of Competitions: IOC Welcomes a String of New Measures at the International Forum for Sports Integrity

UEFA

• UEFA - UEFA Emergency Panel decision on Kosovo/Russia

WADA

• WADA - WADA suspends accreditation of Athens Laboratory
• WADA - WADA publishes three new Technical Letters
• WADA - WADA update regarding RUSADA Code Compliance
• WADA - WADA declares the International Taekwon-Do Federation non-compliant with World Anti-Doping Code
•  WADA - WADA shares outcomes from National Anti-Doping Organization Advisory Group Meeting
• WADA - WADA publishes proposed drafts of the 2021 World Anti-Doping Code and International Standards
• WADA - WADA publishes Independent Observer Team Report from 2019 European Games
• WADA - WADA publishes amended Technical Document for Sport Specific Analysis
• WADA – WADA removes Mauritius National Anti-Doping Organization from non-compliance list
• WADA - WADA Compliance Review Committee update
• WADA - WADA update regarding RUSADA Code Compliance
• WADA - WADA and Fonds de Recherche du Québec to fund three projects researching the use of artificial intelligence for anti-doping

Other

• AthletesCAN - Open Letter to IOC President Thomas Bach
• Human Rights Watch - Marathoners Wilt in Qatar’s Oppressive Heat
• Human Rights Watch - Iran: Stadium Seating Cap Endangers Women
• Human Rights Watch – For NBA's Quandary over China, Stand with Human Rights
• International Judo Federation - Final Suspension for Iran Judo Federation
• International Shooting Sport Federation - CAS confirm seven International Federations have signed up to Anti-Doping Division
•  International Shooting Sport Federation - Decisions of the ISSF Executive Committee
•  International Table Tennis Federation - World Table Tennis, Governance and Sustainability key topics at recent ITTF Executive Committee meeting.
• Team GB - BOA and Athletes' Commission publishes Tokyo 2020 Rule 40 Guidelines
• TIU (Tennis Integrity Unit) - CAS Upholds Sanction in the Case of Patricio Heras
• UCI (Union Cycliste Internationale) - UCI Statement on Kristijan Koren and Borut Bozic
• UCI (Union Cycliste Internationale) – The UCI explores new avenues in bid to step up fight against doping in cycling
• US Olympic Committee - U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee Updates Domestic Athlete Marketing Guidance For Olympic And Paralympic Games Tokyo 2020
• World Archery Federation - Communication of Sanctions: Jonathan Giocondi of France

In the News

Football

• Tariq Panja - Iranian Women Allowed to Attend Soccer Game for First Time Since 1981
• Maryam Shojaei - FIFA Must Pressure Iran to Let Women Attend Soccer Matches
• Keith Bradsher and Tariq Panja - In China, FIFA’s Focus Is Soccer, Not Human Rights

Doping

• Tariq Panja - Russian Doping Chief Says Thousands of Drug Tests Were Manipulated
• Nicole Perlroth and Tariq Panja - Microsoft Says Russians Hacked Antidoping Agency Computers
• Sara Germano and Joshua Robinson - Nike CEO Mark Parker Was Briefed by Banned Coach on Doping Efforts
• Barney Ronay - Sebastian Coe’s stance on Salazar displays a very British hypocrisy

Other

• Stephen Farrand - Velon starts legal battle with UCI via European Commission anti-trust complaint
• Annie Kelly, Niamh McIntyre and Pete Pattisson - Revealed: hundreds of migrant workers dying of heat stress in Qatar each year
• Steve Menary - Mega-events and human rights: Where do we draw the line?
• John Branch  - N.B.A.-China Spat Shows Sports Isn’t (and Shouldn’t Be) Just About Games
• Daniel Victor - Blizzard Sets Off Backlash for Penalizing Hearthstone Gamer in Hong Kong

Academic Materials

International Sports Law Journal

• Marjolaine Viret - Using interdisciplinary tools to improve anti-doping: Utopia or necessity?

SSRN

• Johan Lindholm - The Court of Arbitration for Sport and the Nordics
• Gina Warren - Mega Sports Events Have Mega Environmental and Social Consequences

Blog

Law in Sport

• Ashley Cukier - How did Liverpool FC escape league cup expulsion for fielding an ineligible player?
• Tiran Gunawardena and Rustam Sethna - An overview of FIFA’s ‘Phase 2’ reforms – agents, loans and clearing house
• Guo Cai - Why understanding diplomacy is the No.1 rule for navigating the Chinese sports market (a Chinese perspective on the Rockets/NBA fallout)
• Philip Hutchinson - Meat contamination and what it means for athletes: A review of Badminton World Federation v Ratchanok Intanon
• Julian Moore - Protecting exclusivity in sports data rights: are courtsiding spotters a step too far for UK football fans?

Upcoming Events

• 22 November - Centre for Sports Law Research and Policing Research Unit - Policing Football Event, Ormskirk, UK
• 26 November - Seminar on EU Sport Diplomacy: Perspectives of Cooperation with International Organisations, Strasbourg, France
•  28 November - CIArb Kenya Annual Lecture - Promoting Sports Arbitration in Africa, Nairobi, Kenya
• 26-27 March 2020 – 14^th Conference of the PSA Sport & Politics Group, Etihad Stadium, Manchester, UK
• 18-19 June 2020 – Sport & EU 2020 Annual Conference

On 21 January 2015, the Court of arbitration for sport (CAS) rendered its award in the latest avatar of the Mutu case, aka THE sports law case that keeps on giving (this decision might still be appealed to the Swiss Federal tribunal and a complaint by Mutu is still pending in front of the European Court of Human Right). The decision was finally published on the CAS website on Tuesday. Basically, the core question focuses on the interpretation of Article 14. 3 of the FIFA Regulations on the Status and Transfer of Players in its 2001 version. More precisely, whether, in case of a dismissal of a player (Mutu) due to a breach of the contract without just cause by the player, the new club (Juventus and/or Livorno) bears the duty to pay the compensation due by the player to his former club (Chelsea). Despite winning maybe the most high profile case in the history of the CAS, Chelsea has been desperately hunting for its money since the rendering of the award (as far as the US), but it is a daunting task. Thus, the English football club had the idea to turn against Mutu’s first employers after his dismissal in 2005, Juventus and Livorno, with success in front of the FIFA Dispute Resolution Chamber (DRC), but as we will see the CAS decided otherwise[1].

      I.         Facts and Procedure of the Mutu Case

The Mutu saga is probably one of the most well known sagas in the sports law world (with the unavoidable Bosman case and the up and coming Pechstein one). It cumulates the glamour drama of a star’s downfall due to a positive cocaine test and many important legal developments.

The saga started in July 2004 with a private drug test conducted by Chelsea on Mutu that turned out to be positive to cocaine. The club issued a fine and a warning. But, in October 2004, Mutu was again tested positive to cocaine, this time by the English FA. Upon this finding, and Mutu’s admission of having ingested cocaine, Chelsea decided to terminate his contract on 28 October 2004. On 29 January 2005 the player was registered at Livorno, before being transferred two days later to Juventus. Juventus had reached its quota of non-EU players it could recruit from outside Italy and used this strategy to circumvent the Italian rules applicable at that time.

Meanwhile, Mutu had challenged in front of the FA’s Appeals Committee (FAPLAC) the decision of Chelsea to terminate his employment contract. In April 2005, the FAPLAC decided that Mutu had committed a breach of his employment contract without just cause. Mutu appealed this decision to the CAS without success (CAS 2005/A/876). In May 2006, Chelsea launched a complaint before the DRC to obtain compensation against the player on the basis of the contractual breach without just cause. The DRC in its decision from 26 October 2006 (available here) held that it could not pronounce itself on the matter and that Chelsea had to turn to FAPLAC. Chelsea appealed the decision to the CAS, which enjoined the DRC to decide on the matter (CAS 2006/A/1192). Consequently, the DRC decided on 7 May 2008 to award €17, 173 990 in damages to Chelsea. Unsurprisingly, Mutu decided to appeal the decision to the CAS, he was especially contesting the amount of compensation awarded, which on 31 July 2009 endorsed the decision of the DRC (CAS 2008/A/1644). It even held that the damage claims of Chelsea were higher, but decided it could not go ultra petita and award a higher sum to the club. Mutu, which had unsuccessfully challenged the independence and impartiality of one of the arbitrators due to his previous participation in the first Mutu case (CAS 2005/A/876), went on to contest the validity of the award in front of the Swiss Federal Tribunal (SFT) mainly on this basis. In its decision (4A_458/2009), the SFT rejected Mutu’s claims regarding the lack of independence of the arbitrator, a decision that has attracted widespread criticisms in the literature.[2] Moreover, it also held that the amount of compensation awarded was not a restriction to free movement in the sense of the Bosman ruling and could not amount to an infringement of Mutu’s personality rights. Thereafter, Mutu decided to continue his fight in yet another forum: the European Court of Human Rights (40575/10).

Chelsea had the final award giving it the right to damages, but still needed to get hold on the money. To do so, it even asked (and obtained) for the recognition and the enforcement of the award in the US (see here), where Mutu was expected to have some property. Nevertheless, Mutu went on to play for smaller and smaller teams, thus earning less and less, and Chelsea’s hope of getting paid in full faded away. However, on 15 July 2010, five years after Mutu’s move to Italy’s Serie A in the first place, Chelsea decided to submit a petition to the FIFA DRC against Juventus and Livorno, asking the DRC to find them jointly liable for the awarded compensation. The claim was based on Article 14.3. of the RSTP 2001, stating that: "If a player is registered for a new club and has not paid a sum of compensation within the one month time limit referred to above, the new club shall be deemed jointly responsible for payment of the amount of compensation." The DRC, in an unpublished decision dated 25 April 2013 (see here and here), followed the interpretation of Article 14.3. RSTP suggested by Chelsea and found that “under the clear wording of Article 14.3, the Player's New Club was automatically jointly responsible for the payment of the Awarded Compensation due by the Player, should the latter fail to fulfil his obligations within a month of notification of the relevant decision”.[3] This provision would make “no distinction between the termination of the contract by a player without just cause and the termination of a contract by a club with just cause”.[4] It also held that "the registrations of the player with both [Appellants] were so closely connected that, given the exceptional circumstances of this specific matter, both Juventus and Livorno should be considered the player's new club in the sense of art. 14 of the Application Regulations”.[5]

Both Juventus and Livorno decided to appeal this decision to the CAS, which in its award decided to reject the DRC’s reasoning.

    II.         The Meaning of Article 14.3 FIFA RSTP

The whole case focuses on the interpretation of the wording of Article 14.3 of the RSTP 2001. Does it mean that every club, whatever the circumstances, must pay compensation when it hires a player that bears the responsibility of the breach of his contract? Or, does it restrict this duty to the cases where the breach can be reasonably imputed to the will of the player to leave his former club?

A. Contractual or statutory interpretation?

In order to determine the interpretative tools to be used to identify the meaning of article 14.3 RSTP, the Panel must first clarify the nature of Article 14.3 under Swiss law.[6] Basically, is the provision of a contractual or quasi-statutory nature? The Panel “does not consider that there is a contractual relationship between the Appellants and Chelsea”.[7] Indeed, “[i]f there is no contractual relationship between an indirect member (i.e. any of the Parties) and a sport federation (i.e. FIFA), the conclusion should be the same as regards the relationship between two indirect members of the same federation”.[8] Furthermore, the “[a]cceptance of general rules (such as FIFA Regulations) does not necessarily entail subjection to specific obligations when their scope must be determinable on the basis of minimum criteria”.[9] Thus, the question raised implies only the interpretation of the bylaw of a Swiss legal entity, FIFA.

The Panel highlights four methods of interpretation under Swiss law:

-  the literal interpretation ("interprétation littérale");

-  the systematic interpretation ("interprétation systématique");

-  the principle of purposive interpretation ("interprétation téléologique");

-  the principle of so-called "compliant interpretation" ("interprétation conforme").[10]

The “starting point” [11] is always the wording of the text. The Swiss Federal Tribunal recognizes that “[t]here is no reason to depart from the plain text, unless there are objective reasons to think that it does not reflect the core meaning of the provision under review”.[12] Moreover, when asked to interpret a law, the SFT “adopts a pragmatic approach and follows a plurality of methods, without assigning any priority to the various means of interpretation”.[13] However, the question is whether those interpretative methods should also apply to the (private) bylaws of a private association. The Panel notes that “[a]s regards the statutes of larger entities, it may be more appropriate to have recourse to the method of interpretation applicable to the law, whereas in the presence of smaller enterprises, the statutes may more legitimately be interpreted by reference to good faith”.[14] It finds that “FIFA's regulations have effects which are felt worldwide, and should therefore be subject to the more objective interpretation principles” applicable to Swiss laws.[15]

In short, the Panel is of the opinion that FIFA regulations, bylaws of an association under Swiss law, are to be interpreted analogously to national laws.

B. EU law as THE decisive contextual element to interpret the RSTP

The Panel first tries to interpret Article 14.3 on the basis of its wording. However, it is of the opinion that the wording is ambiguous and therefore “it is necessary to look beyond the wording of this provision”[16] and adopts what it calls a “contextual approach”.

In short, “the context surrounding the implementation of the RSTP 2001 is of crucial importance in interpreting Article 14.3”.[17] In the view of the Panel (and the appellants), this context is constituted by the application of EU law to sport and especially the Bosman case of the Court of Justice of the EU. Indeed, it is “[a]s part of the reform of the FIFA and UEFA rules following the Bosman decision, [that] FIFA adopted the RSTP 2001”.[18] Thus, the requirements set by the CJEU’s jurisprudence in sports matters are decisive to define the reach of the provisions included in the RSTP. Moreover, the rejection decision of the Commission regarding the complaint submitted against FIFA’s transfer regulations is also important.[19] Specifically, the Panel deduces from the Commission’s decision that it recognizes the need to sanction unilateral termination of contracts.[20]

In the present case, it is precisely the “contractual stability [that] is at the centre of the debate”.[21] In a nutshell, does the paramount objective of contractual stability justify that Juventus and Livorno be considered jointly liable for the breach of contract of Mutu leading to the termination by Chelsea of his contract?

In this regard, Chelsea considers that Article 14.3 “is designed to protect contractual stability by means of a deterrent, namely by ensuring that the parties who benefit from the player's breach – the player himself and his New Club – are not allowed to enjoy that benefit without paying compensation to the player's former club”.[22] While, Juventus and Livorno consider that “Article 14.3 – and FIFA regulations in general – are not meant to protect a club's bad investment”.[23] Which one of this two interpretations is EU law supporting? That is the question.

For the Panel “the Player was the author of his misfortune, but the Club was not required to terminate his employment if they still valued his services and preferred to hold him to his contract”. Indeed, “[t]he Club was entitled, not obliged, to dismiss him” and it “makes all the difference in terms of assessing the position of his subsequent employer(s) under the FIFA regulations, read in light of their object and purpose”.[24] As “Chelsea put an end to the Player's Employment Contract, no issue of contract stability, whose purpose was to safeguard the functioning and regularity of sporting competition, was at stake”.[25] Thus, “it strains logic for the club now to contend that the Appellants somehow enriched themselves by acquiring an asset (the player) which it chose to discard”.[26] Moreover, “the Panel finds it hard to understand how, in the name of contract stability, Chelsea's claim of € 17,173,990 against the Player is to be borne jointly and severally by the New Club, which has never expressed a specific agreement in this regard, had nothing to do with the Player's contractual breach, and was not even called to participate in the proceedings, which established the Awarded Compensation”.[27] Additionally, it seems “incongruous for Chelsea to try to seek an advantage from the fact that the New Club benefits from the Player’s services, whereas Chelsea was no longer interested in his service”.[28] Hence, “Chelsea's conduct appears to have had no other purpose than to increase its chances for greater financial compensation” and the Panel “does not see the connection between the damage being claimed and the interest of protecting legitimate contractual expectations”.[29] In other words, the interpretation of Article 14.3 RSTP supported by Chelsea does not fit the fundamental objective of this provision, as highlighted by its legislative context (mainly the Lethonen case of the CJEU and the Commission’s rejection decision in the competition law complaint against the FIFA transfer system) and cannot be followed.

Interestingly, the Panel also recognized that “[t]here must be a balance between the players’ fundamental right to free movement and the principle of stability of contracts, as supported by the legitimate objective of safeguarding the integrity of the sport and the stability of championships”.[30] In the present case, “[i]f the New Club had to pay compensation even if it is established that it bears no responsibility whatsoever in the breach of the Employment Contract, the player would be hindered from finding a new employer”.[31] Indeed, “it is not difficult to perceive that no New Club would be prepared to pay a multi-million compensation (or transfer fee), in particular for a player who was fired for gross misconduct, was banned for several months, and suffered drug problems”.[32] In short, “Chelsea's interpretation of Article 14.3 would bring the matter back into pre-Bosman times, when transfer fees obstructed the players' freedom of movement”.[33] This is unacceptable for the Panel. Had Chelsea’s interpretation been tolerated “the balance sought by the 2001 RSTP between the players' rights and an efficient transfer system, which responds to the specific needs of football and preserves the regularity and proper functioning of sporting competition would be upset”.[34] Consequently, this interpretation is deemed “incompatible with the fundamental principle of freedom to exercise a professional activity and is disproportionate to the protection of the old club's legitimate interests”.[35] Thus, the Panel concludes “that Article 14.3 does not apply in cases where it was the employer's decision to dismiss with immediate effect a player who, in turn, had no intention to leave the club in order to sign with another club and where the New Club has not committed any fault and/or was not involved in the termination of the employment relationship between the old club and the Player”.[36]

Conclusion

This award is of great interest, not so much for its solution - it is difficult to understand how the FIFA DRC could construct Article 14.3 RSTP as imposing a joint liability on Juventus and Livorno - as for the method used to reach it. The CAS had already in the past based its interpretation of the RSTP on its legislative history and especially on it being the result of a negotiation with the EU Commission in the aftermath of the Bosman ruling.[37] It is the first time, however, that it does so in such length and depth. This contextual reading of Article 14.3 tipped decisively the balance in favor of the appellants. Furthermore, it is a timely reminder for other CAS Panels that FIFA’s RSTP must be interpreted in conformity with EU law and especially the case law of the CJEU on the free movement of workers. If not, CAS awards will face problems at the enforcement stage, as highlighted by the recent SV Wilhelmshaven ruling of the OLG Bremen (see our comment here on the EU law dimension)[38]. This implies that the restrictions it imposes on the free movement of players must be justified by a legitimate objective recognized by the CJEU and be proportionate to attain this objective. In the present case, the interpretation of 14.3 promoted by the DRC runs counter to this requirement as it is not truly aimed at an acceptable legitimate objective and certainly not a proportionate mean to attain contractual stability. Nonetheless, this reasoning could also put into question previous interpretations of the FIFA RSTP. This is especially true for the case-law on the implementation of Article 17 RSTP. The Panel, conscious of the potential implication of the analysis used, is adamant that this case-law is compatible with an EU law conform interpretation. Yet, EU law scholars strongly oppose this view and it can be reasonably argued that the way damages are calculated in case of a breach of a contract under Article 17 is not compatible with the letter and spirit of EU law as applied to the transfer system in Bosman and after[39].

This case will set a resounding precedent for future CAS awards. Lawyers dealing with disputes involving the FIFA RSTP in front of the FIFA DRC and the CAS should take note of this development and introduce wider references to EU law in their briefs.

[1] For this article I have much profited from the outstanding research assistance of Thalia Diathesopoulou.

[2]G. Von Segesser, ‘Equality of Information and Impartiality of Arbitrators’, in P. Wautelet, T. Kruger, G. Coppens (eds), The Practice of Arbitration: Essays in Honour of Hans van Houtte

Hart, 2012, pp.45-51 and L. Beffa, ‘Challenge of International Arbitration Awards in Switzerland for Lack of Independence and/or Impartiality of an Arbitrator – Is it Time to Change the Approach?’ (2011) ASA Bulletin 598 et seq.

[3] CAS 2013/A/3365 & 3366, para 39.

[4] Ibid.

[5] Ibid

[6]Ibid, para. 121-136

[7] Ibid, para. 131

[8] Ibid, para. 131

[9] Ibid, para. 131

[10] Ibid, para.137

[11] Ibid, para.138

[12] Ibid, para.139

[13]Ibid,  para.139

[14]Ibid, para.139

[15]Ibid, para.140

[16]Ibid, para.148

[17]Ibid, para.149

[18]Ibid, para.151

[19]Ibid, para.156

[20]Ibid, para.157

[21]Ibid, para.158

[22]Ibid, para.159

[23]Ibid, para.160

[24]Ibid, para. 161

[25]Ibid, para. 163

[26]Ibid, para. 163

[27]Ibid, para. 165

[28]Ibid, para. 166

[29]Ibid, para. 168

[30]Ibid, para. 169

[31]Ibid, para. 172

[32] Ibid

[33] Ibid, para.174

[34]Ibid, para.174

[35]Ibid, para.174

[36]Ibid,  para.177

[37] ‘It must be remembered that the FIFA Regulations have been issued to regulate the legal and economic aspects of the transfer of players in accordance with the principle of free movement of workers as established by the EC treaty and substantiated by the European Court of Justice in its ruling of 15 December 1995 (case C-415/93), thereby taking the specific needs of professional football into account. In this context, any provisions in the FIFA regulations affecting the player’s freedom of movement should be interpreted narrowly.’ CAS 2004/A/691 FC Barcelona SAD v. Manchester United FC, para. 38; ‘However, the principle behind Art. 5 para. 5 of the Application Regulations is clear: the free movement of workers within the EU/EEA must not be restricted by the imposition of a requirement for the payment of sums by way of compensation for training and education in respect of a player to whom the training club does not offer a contract. In such a case, the failure to offer a contract is an important factor in the assessment of compensation. The compensation payable should not be of such an amount as would impede the player’s ability to move to a new club.’ CAS 2006/A/1125 Hertha BSC Berlin v. Stade Lavallois Mayenne FC, award of 1 December 2006, para. 25; ‘Finally, because of the potentially high amounts of compensation involved, giving clubs a regulatory right to the market value of players and allowing lost profits to be claimed in such manner would in effect bring the system partially back to the pre-Bosman days when players’ freedom of movement was unduly hindered by transfer fees and their careers and well-being could be seriously affected by them becoming pawns in the hands of their clubs and a vector through which clubs could reap considerable benefits without sharing the profit or taking corresponding risks. In view of the text and the history of article 17 par. 1 of the FIFA Status Regulations, allowing any form of compensation that could have such an effect would clearly be anachronistic and legally unsound.’ CAS 2007/A/1298 Wigan Athletic FC v/ Heart of Midlothian & CAS 2007/A/1299 Heart of Midlothian v/ Webster & Wigan Athletic FC & CAS 2007/A/1300 Webster v/ Heart of Midlothian, para. 81.

[38] A. Duval, ‘The Court of Arbitration for Sport  and EU law: Chronicle of an Encounter’, Maastricht Journal of European and Comparative Law, forthcoming.

[39] See, R. Parrish, ‘Article 17 of the FIFA Regulations on the Status and Transfer of Players: Compatibility with EU Law ‘Maastricht Journal of European and Comparative Law, forthcoming. See also, Pearson, G. (2015), Sporting Justifications under EU Free Movement and Competition Law: The Case of the Football ‘Transfer System’. European Law Journal, 21: 220–238.

This is the first part of a blog series involving the Real Madrid State aid case.

Apart from being favoured by many of Spain’s most important politicians, there have always been suspicions surrounding the world’s richest football club regarding possible financial aid by the Madrid City Council. Indeed, in the late 90’s a terrain qualification change by the Madrid City Council proved to be tremendously favourable to the king’s club. The change allowed Real Madrid to sell its old training grounds for a huge sum. Though the exact price for the grounds remains unknown, Real Madrid was suddenly capable of buying players like Figo and Zidane for record fees. However, the European Commission, even though agreeing that an advantage was conferred to the club, simply stated that the new qualification of the terrain in question does not appear to involve any transfer of resources by the State and could therefore not be regarded as State aid within the meaning of article 107 TFEU.

Agreements between the club and the Council have been a regularity for the last 25 years.  A more recent example concerns an agreement signed on 29 July 2011 (Convenio29-07-2011.pdf (8MB). The agreement regularizes two earlier agreements between the Council and Real Madrid dating from 1991 and 1998 respectively. The commitments deriving from those earlier agreements were not followed by the relevant parties and therefore had to give way to a new agreement. A closer look at the 29 July 2011 Agreement exposes a bizarre chain of events. It turned out that in 1998 Real Madrid transmitted an undivided half of their old training grounds to the municipality. Apart from a large sum of money, the club was to receive a number of terrains spread out over the municipality, including a terrain located in the area called Las Tablas valued at €595.194 in 1998. However, due to its qualification for sporting usage, the Council concluded in 2011 that the parcel could not be transferred to the club due to the fact that Madrid’s urbanity laws only permit a transfer of urban or urbanizable terrains. For that reason, the Council agreed to compensate the football club not for the original value of €595.194 but for a staggering €22.693.054,44! Real Madrid was not compensated in the form of a sum, but rather it was presented with a packet of terrains including four terrains of a total area of 12.435 m/2 in the street Mercedes Arteaga in the Carabanchel district of Madrid.

The year 2011 also saw a second agreement between the Council of Madrid and the football club, this time concerning construction works on the Real Madrid stadium Santiago Bernabéu. This agreement, dating from November 2011, is known as operation Bernabeú-Opañel and includes the following plans. The Council is to transfer to the club a terrain constituting a 12.250 m/2 buildable surface which borders the west-side of the Bernabéu stadium. This acquirement permits Real Madrid to cover the stadium with a roof, to build a shopping centre and a hotel on the façade situated on the Paseo de la Castellana (one of Madrid’s most important streets). In return, the club firstly agreed to transfer to the Council the shopping centre Esquina del Bernabéu, which is situated at the South-East-side of the stadium with a buildable surface of 6.858 m/2. The Council would then demolish the shopping centre and convert it into a public park. Secondly, the club is to transfer back to the Council part of the four terrains located in the street Mercedes Arteaga that it received as part of the 29 July 2011 Agreement.  In addition to the transfers of the old shopping centre and the terrains located in the street Mercedes Arteaga, Real Madrid is also to pay €6.6 million to the Council. The Council, however, encountered an obstacle in its own urban laws. The Plan General de Ordenación Urbana de Madrid de 1997 (PGOU) did not permit private parties, like Real Madrid, to construct on public terrains owned by the Council. Therefore, on 16 November 2012, the Government of the autonomous region of Madrid announced that the PGOU is to be modified ad hoc for the operation Bernabeú-Opañel.

By means of the operation Bernabeú-Opañel, Real Madrid expressed that it hopes to “convert the Club in a sporting institution of reference in the world. The aim is for the stadium to have a maximum level of comfort and services superior to the most modern and advanced sporting stadiums in the world” (PropuestaRealMadrid.pdf (914.2KB)). According to the Council, the operation will not only improve sporting and leisure facilities in the city, it will also create up to 9.546 m/2 of “green zones”. Moreover, the investment for the construction works will be borne only by Real Madrid and it is expected that the construction works will give employment to more than 2 000 people and the exploitation to 600 people.

In 2012, the ecological movement Ecologistas en Acción found several legal irregularities with regard to the 29 July Agreement operation Bernabeú-Opañel and (unsurprisingly) concluded that the agreements appeared to be very beneficial for Real Madrid. It therefore started legal proceedings in front of the Spanish administrative Court claiming that the ad hoc modification of the PGOU was illegal. It would later on launch on appeal in front of the Tribunal Superior de Justicia de Madrid, or Madrid High Court (TSJM-Order-31-07-2014.pdf (112.3KB)). Simultaneously, it informed the European Commission of potential unlawful State aid granted by the Council of Madrid to Real Madrid. To Spain’s outrage, on 18 December 2013, the Commission declared that it had enough reasons to believe that the incriminated transactions might involve State aid and launched a formal investigation in accordance with Article 108(2) TFEU. Concretely, the Commission expressed the following concerns:

1) The Commission doubts whether it was impossible for the Council of Madrid to transfer the Las Tablas property to Real Madrid;

2) The Commission doubts that a market value of the Las Tablas plot of land has been sought;

3) The Commission doubts the market conformity of the value of the properties which were transferred to Real Madrid by the 2011 Agreement and at the occasion of the subsequent further exchange of land around the Bernabéu Stadium, and;

4) The Commission doubts that there is an objective of common interest, which could justify selective support to a very strong actor in a highly competitive economic sector. 

The Commission’s doubts seem, in light of the facts at hand, reasonable. To decide whether or not the land transactions qualifies as unlawful State aid, however, the four cumulative criteria of Article 107(1) TFEU need to be fulfilled. (1) The aid must confer an economic advantage on Real Madrid; (2) it must be granted by a Member State or through State resources; (3) the advantage must be selective and distorts or threatens to distort competition; and (4) it must affect trade between Member States.

Advantage to Real Madrid over its competitors

As the Commission pointed out in paragraph 21 of its notice initiating the infringement procedure against Spain, “Real Madrid appears to enjoy an economic advantage from the fact that a plot of land, which at the time of its acquisition was valued at €595,194, appears 13 years later, in an operation to offset mutual debts, with a value of more than €22 million”. Furthermore, there are also doubts regarding the market conformity of the lands transferred in the operation Bernabéu-Opañel. In situations where the public authorities wish to sell public property to private investors, it should make sure that the revenue obtained from the sale is comparable to market level. This criterion is also known as the “market economy vendor principle”. In accordance with the Land sale Communication, should the public authorities wish to avoid any advantage to the recipient over its competitors during a land sale transaction, it should apply one of the two following procedures: (1) an unconditional bidding procedure or (2) a procedure where the land is valued by one or more independent asset valuers prior to the sale negotiations. The Court of Justice has ruled that other methods may also achieve the same result, but in order to comply with EU State aid rules, the national provisions establishing rules for calculating the market value of land must in all cases lead to a price as close as possible to the market value.[2] Special obligations for the buyer, such as urban planning requirements, do play a role when determining whether or not the land was sold at market value. Furthermore, land transfer deals, which often consist of more than just one land transaction, have to be scrutinized in their entirety.[3] Therefore, to determine whether an advantage was conferred to Real Madrid, both agreements between the club and the Council have to be take into account with a special focus on the valuation methods used.

In 1998, the valuation for the terrain in Las Tablas (€595,194) was done by the administration of Madrid, on the basis of legislation which offers a technique to determine the value of urban real property. The calculated value for the same terrain in Las Tablas in 2011 amounted to €22.693.054,44. According to a valuation report released by the Municipal Valuation Department, the value was calculated in accordance the same application rules. Yet it has to be borne in mind that the Municipal Valuation Department forms part of the Área de Gobierno de Urbanismo y Vivienda del Ayuntamiento de Madrid. Not only is the Área de Gobierno de Urbanismo y Vivienda the main public authority regarding urban planning in Madrid, it is together with Real Madrid the main party in the 2011 Agreement itself.

Real Madrid was not compensated in the form of a payment, but rather it was presented with another packet of terrains valued at €19,972,348.96. In the valuation report released by the Municipal Valuation Department, a list is included with average terrain values per district calculated by the independent appraiser Tasamadrid. In continuation, the Municipal Valuation Department applied a formula based on its own legislation to determine the final value of the terrains. This packet of terrains included land in the street Mercedes Arteaga, valued at €4,360,862 which were transferred back to the municipality in the operation Bernabéu-Opañel.

The operation Bernabéu-Opañel also included the club transferring the old shopping centre Esquina del Bernabéu and added a payment of €6,6 million. A second valuation report indicates that the value of the Esquina del Bernabéu is €3,861 per square meters passed on the average values of terrains found in adjacent streets. Furthermore, the Council “requalified” the terrain between the Bernabéu stadium and the street Paseo de la Castellana by ad hoc modifying the local urban laws (PGOU) before transferring it to Real Madrid. The value of this terrain is also calculated in the second report and ads up to €1,208 per square meter. Even though two of the terrains in question can be found in the same area, the value per square meter of the Esquina Bernabéu is much higher (€3,861) as compared to the value of the land between the Bernabéu stadium and the street Paseo de la Castellana (€1,208). True, the terrain with the Esquina del Bernabéu has already been built on, thereby increasing the value, but one should keep in mind that the operation Bernabéu-Opañel consists of demolishing the Esquina del Bernabéu and turning it into a green zone. On the other, the other terrain will be used for the construction of a hotel and a new shopping centre. Secondly, a quick glance at other real estate transfers in the same area of Madrid shows that the value of the terrains is in fact much higher. In 2012, the Picasso tower was purchased by a private firm for €400 million, or €5000 m/2. Today, the building Torre Titania can be bought for €11,000 m/2 and the building Castellana 200 is for sale for €150 million.

With all the above in mind, one could legitimately get the feeling that the actual aim of the Agreement of 29 July 2011 was to pave the way for the operation “Bernabéu-Opañel”, as some media suggested. Unlike in the Konsum Nord case, where the General Court held that the presence of a link between different transactions could mean that the measure in question does not constitute State aid, the link between the agreements in the Real Madrid case only increases suspicions regarding unlawful State aid. Furthermore, the Council of Madrid has also been inconstant regarding its valuation methods. The value of the terrain in Las Tablas was calculated without an independent appraiser and the value of the Esquina del Bernabéu was calculated using the average value of terrains found in adjacent streets. In short, there are good reasons to believe that the transactions were made in order to provide a financial advantage to Real Madrid.

The remaining three criteria of Article 107(1) TFEU and possible justifications will be discussed in an upcoming blog post.

[1] Notes are omitted. A comprehensive article can be accessed at Oskar van Maren, "The Real Madrid case: A State aid case (un)like any other?".

[2] Case C-239/09 Seydaland Vereinigte Agrarbetriebe [2010] ECR I-13083, §33-35

[3] Case T-244/08 Konsum Nord ekonomisk förening v Commission [2011] ECR II-0000, §58

Three weeks ago, I gave a talk for a group of visiting researchers at Harvard Law School on the accountability of the IOC for human rights abuses caused by hosting Olympic Games. On the day of that talk, Human Rights Watch announced that the International Olympic Committee (“IOC”) would insert new language into the Host City Contract presumably for the 2022 Olympic Games onwards. The new language apparently requires the parties to the contract to:

“take all necessary measures to ensure that development projects necessary for the organization of the Games comply with local, regional, and national legislation, and international agreements and protocols, applicable in the host country with regard to planning, construction, protection of the environment, health, safety, and labour laws.”

This language would apply to the National Olympic Committee, the Organizing Committee for the Olympic Games, and the host city.

This language has been hailed by Human Rights Watch as a strong first step, and for good reason. It seems that the IOC is listening to complaints about the construction of the Olympic Games. The IOC has said before that it would address the violations of labour rights associated with the Olympic Games, in the XIII Olympic Congress, and its Recommendations, made in 2009:

The IOC will intervene at the OCOG level in the event of serious abuse, such as:

·       Mistreatment of people displaced due to Olympic venue construction sites;

·       Abuse of migrant workers at Olympic venue construction sites;

·       Child labour;

·       Improper restrictions on the media’s freedom to cover the Games, including cultural aspects.

The IOC will establish a system for correctly identifying and dealing with “legitimate complaints” from official sources.

The IOC will not intervene in non-sport human rights issues.

The leverage that the IOC has towards the Organising Commitres for the Olympic Games (OCOGs) should be determined. This might lead to amendments to the Host City Contract and Documentation for Bid Cities.

However, the experience of Sochi with its displacement of persons, and abuse of migrant workers at Olympic venue construction sites appears to have put lie to that promise. Therefore, it would seem that the prospective contractual language would be a strong first step. But, looking closer at the language, there are some causes for concern.

Old Wine in New Bottles?

First, it should be noted that this language is not novel. The IOC has similar language in its Candidature Procedure, under “Environment”:

Provide (a) guarantee(s) from the competent authorities stating that all construction work necessary for the organisation of the Olympic Games will comply with:

·       Local, regional and national environmental regulations and acts

·       International agreements and protocols regarding planning, construction and protection of the environment (2020 Candidature Procedure, Q 5.4)

That the new language in the host city contract is under the heading of “Sustainable Human and Environmental Development” should therefore not be surprising. However, the environmental requirements presented above were in the host selection process. This new language is contractual language, and should be evaluated as such (one could make the same argument re the host selection process documents – but, just like the IOC…small steps).

A “Toothless” Paper Tiger

Overall, however, the clause in the Host City Contract appears to fall short in four key ways:

1)    Weak standard: The standard used in the contract is compliance with national laws and international agreements/protocols. This standard has been problematic, as it can be a moving target. National laws can be changed. Consider the next two states hosting the FIFA World Cup. Russia has passed Law 108-FZ in advance of the 2018 FIFA World Cup. The law affects the rights of migrant workers brought in to work on the World Cup facilities. Migrant workers no longer need to be registered with local authorities. Restrictions on the length of the working day are removed, and overtime pay is replaced with time off in lieu. Law 108-FZ is a national law, and presumably the parties would comply with it. Although a question arises if the national law conflicts with international agreements…which prevails? The same can be said for another FIFA World Cup host – Qatar – that has also bid to host the 2016 and 2020 Summer Olympic Games. Qatar’s kafala system is certainly national legislation. But compliance with said legislation would not improve human rights.

2)    Vagueness: Vagueness in a contract will lead to conflict. In this case, what is “compliance”, or more to the point, what is “non-compliance”? Who determines non-compliance? Is non-compliance simply a complaint? Or an adverse court ruling? Who makes the determination of non-compliance? Is it in the IOC’s sole discretion? Or an agreement of the parties? Presuming this is meant to be an enforceable contract, a lack of precise terminology is problematic. Also, given the language of “take all necessary measures”, does this require a host to take all measures, regardless of the cost? Or to the point of undue hardship? This seems to be a rather high bar, but is it a reasonable one?

3)    Remedies/Enforcement: While in an ideal world, everyone will adhere to an agreement, breaches do occur. In the 2014 Host City Contract, the one particular remedy for breach is that the IOC can withdraw the right to host the Games. However, given the complexity of removing the Games to another city (which to my knowledge was only done in 1976 – with a move from Denver to Innsbruck), this is likely to remain a “nuclear option”. What other remedies might there be to make a sanction a reasonable deterrent? In addition, if there are disputes over whether or not there is a breach of this clause, the Court of Arbitration for Sport has jurisdiction. It may deny jurisdiction, and if it does so, then the proceedings move to the Swiss courts. Would CAS or the Swiss courts be interested in adjudicating what is essentially human rights litigation in another state? Would a Swiss court truly say, for instance, “Russia has not complied with international human rights standards”? It does not seem likely.

4)    Absence of Dialogue: The problem with inserting such language into a contract is that it creates a “take-it-or-leave-it” environment, without specifying what the “take-it-or-leave-it” is. Using the host selection process to tease out human rights concerns enables the IOC to ask questions of the potential hosts about best practices, concerns, or processes that could be put into place to address future problems. The answers in the host selection process would then create a more robust standard to hold a host to, giving the language in the contract more weight. Absent this, the language becomes window-dressing. Also, in the event of a host breaching this provision, will there be dialogue? Will that dialogue be public?

Given the above, the contractual language falls far short, if it is to be taken as an actual contract. However, it is a strong signal that the IOC seems willing to address human rights issues caused by the Olympic Games. If this is so, then the language is a meaningful first step. Other steps, however, are required. For instance (and here is the shameless plug), my PhD research examines the use of the host selection process to tackle human rights issues in the host countries, amongst other proposals. For now, those expecting to use the contract as a legal mechanism to ensure that future hosts respect human rights, it might be best not to hold your breath.

Introduction: The new WADA Code 2015
Day 2: The “Athlete Patient” and the 2015 World Anti-Doping Code: Competing Under Medical Treatment
Day 3: Proof of intent (or lack thereof) under the 2015 World Anti-Doping Code
Day 4: Ensuring proportionate sanctions under the 2015 World Anti-Doping Code

Editor's note
Herman Ram is the Chief Executive Officer of the Anti-Doping Authority the Netherlands, which is the National Anti-Doping Organization of the country. He has held this position since 2006. After working twelve years as a librarian, Herman Ram started his career in sport management in 1992, when he became Secretary general of the Royal Netherlands Chess Federation. In 1994, he moved on to the same position at the Netherlands Badminton Federation. He was founder and first secretary of the Foundation for the Promotion of Elite Badminton that was instrumental in the advancement of Dutch badminton. In 2000 he was appointed Secretary general of the Netherlands Ski Federation, where he focused, among other things, on the organization of large snowsports events in the Netherlands. Since his appointment as CEO of the Anti-Doping Authority, he has developed a special interest in legal, ethical and managerial aspects of anti-doping policies, on which he has delivered numerous presentations and lectures. On top of that, he acts as Spokesperson for the Doping Authority. Herman Ram holds two Master’s degrees, in Law and in Sport Management.

Introduction
The 2015 World Anti-Doping Code is not a new Code, but a revision of the 2009 Code. In total, 2,269 changes have been made (see here for the redlined version). Quite a number of these changes are minor corrections, additions and reformulations with little or no impact on the work of NADOs. But the number of truly influential changes is still impressive, which makes it hard to choose.

Luckily, WADA has identified the – in their view – more significant changes in a separate document and I have used this document to bring some order in a number of comments that I want to make on the impact of those revisions on our daily work.

Part of what follows is based on our experiences with the implementation of the revised Code so far, but quite a bit of what follows cannot be based on any actual experience, because the revised Code has only been in place for seven months, and only a rather small number of disciplinary procedures in relatively simple cases have come to a final decision under the revised rules. As a result, and because I am not in the business of predicting the future, on this occasion I have decided to share some of my expectations with you. Only the future can tell whether I am right on those issues.

Theme 1: sanctions
Probably the most discussed aspect of the revision is the longer period of ineligibility that can be imposed on – as WADA formulates it – ‘real cheats’. In other cases, especially cases of unintentional violations, the revision should lead to more flexibility to impose lower sanctions. Due to the amendments in most cases it will be crucial to establish ‘intent’ – or the lack of it – in order to be able to determine the appropriate sanction. And because of the Strict liability principle that applies to the burden of proof in cases with Adverse Analytical Findings, NADOs have not focused very much on the establishment of ‘intent’, simply because under the previous Codes it was not relevant for the outcome of most cases.

In the case of non-specified substances, it is now up to the athlete to prove that the violation was not intentional, and in the case of specified substances it is up to the (N)ADO to prove intent. This is new, and our current practice shows that this kind of evidence is very hard to deliver for both parties. As a consequence, four year sanctions have been imposed rather matter-of-factly until now in cases where non-specified substances are involved. And such severe sanctions will remain common if non-specified substances are detected, but they will be quite rare in other cases. No doubt, jurisprudence will be developed that will help to assess specific situations, but for most cases the four year sanction will more or less automatically result from the simple fact that a non-specified substance is involved.

Some exploratory analysis of the sanctions imposed under the 2009 Code for specified substances has shown that panels have already established a practice with a lot of flexibility in those kind of cases under the 2003 and 2009 Codes, and I do not expect major changes there.

Quite interesting from our (NADO’s) point of view is Article 10.6.3, which introduces a role for both the (N)ADO with result management responsibility and WADA in cases where athletes or other persons promptly admit an anti-doping rule violation. If both the (N)ADO and WADA agree, a sanction reduction from four years to a minimum of two years is possible. We do not yet know what WADA’s position will be in this kind of cases, but I do know that many NADOs will be inclined to grant a reduction of the period of ineligibility, because we want to stimulate admissions as much as possible. Information given by athletes and other persons is most valuable, and (less important, but still…) we can spare ourselves a lot of costly work in the process.

Somewhat related to prompt admissions (not new, but amended and expanded in the revised Code) is the possibility to reduce sanctions based on substantial assistance (Article 10.6.1). Because of the growing importance of Investigations and Intelligence (see Theme 3 below) and the increased emphasis on Athlete Support Personnel (Theme 4) I think that we will see that this Article will become more important in the work of NADOs. It seems to me that the revisions will help us considerably in all cases where athletes or other persons need reassurance that an agreed-upon reduction of sanctions will be respected ‘no matter what’. At the same time, more information will become available that may help us in uncovering and prosecuting other anti-doping rule violations.

Theme 2: proportionality and human rights
I can be quite short here: I have not identified a single consequence of this Theme for the NADO that I work for, and I can hardly imagine that other developed NADOs will see this differently. This is not because this Theme is not important (quite the contrary) but because NADOs do not need extra encouragement in order to ensure that proportionality and human rights are taken into consideration on an everyday basis. And because – at least in Europe – data protection issues and the related issues of public disclosure and the protection of minors are primarily governed by legislation, not by the Code.

Theme 3: Investigations and intelligence
Indeed, the development of ‘Intelligence & Investigations’ is one of the major issues that quite a few NADOs are dealing with now. In less than two years’ time, more than a dozen NADOs have attracted new staff for this purpose, and cooperation between NADOs (and some IFs) in this field is gradually developing, at a pace that is primarily determined by taking care of the legal side of things. The Code revision has not initiated this development, but it certainly confirms and strengthens it. And we are well aware that Intelligence has played a major role in practically all cases (old and recent) where large-scale, organized, doping practices have been uncovered. Which does not mean that we are all prepared for this kind of thing…

First of all, it is necessary to develop and sign bilateral cooperation agreements in which the preconditions for sharing information between (N)ADOs are defined. I have signed several, and there are more to come. But it is also necessary to start and develop a cooperation with customs and law enforcement agencies, and this kind of cooperation needs even more legal preparation in order to be successful (or just possible). Indeed, information sharing with government agencies is just as logical as it is complicated in practice.

I do not know one NADO that does not feel the need for cooperation with law enforcement agencies. And that fact, supported by the revised Code, means that NADOs are slowly but surely getting better acquainted with government agencies. It is my opinion that several legislation proposals in various countries in Europe illustrate this development nicely. Countries which have done without specific anti-doping legislations for years – including my own country – are now working on legal measures that aim to facilitate a close(r) cooperation between governments and (N)ADOs (in line with the expansion of Article 22.2 in the 2015 Code).

The investigative powers of Intelligence Officers of NADOs on the one hand, and law enforcement agents on the other hand, are wide apart. In most countries, an Intelligence Officer has no other rights than any citizen, while there are elaborate laws that define and regulate what law enforcement officers may and may not do. The gap between the two has to be narrowed, in order to facilitate and stimulate further cooperation. Which means that Intelligence Officers will need to have specific authorizations that enable them to do their job within sport, but without becoming law enforcement officers themselves. The solutions will be different per country, but the common factor will be that NADOs will have more tools to fulfil their tasks.

Apart from these legislative and regulatory developments, which open doors that have been firmly closed until now in many countries, there are not many ’quick wins’ to be expected because of ‘Intelligence & Investigations’. In the long run, however, ‘Intelligence & Investigations’ will probably have a significant impact on the effectiveness of doping control programs, which will not really become ‘smarter’ (more brain power has been invested in the testing programs under the 2003 and 2009 Codes than most people can imagine), but certainly more ‘targeted’ and tailor-made. This may be an equally important effect of ‘Intelligence & Investigations’ as collecting evidence.

The extension of the statute of limitations (Article 17) to ten years will not make a big difference in numbers, but the cases where this extension pays off, will for a large part be the kind of cases that we find especially important to bring to justice. There is a downside to this as well, of course, and one of the aspects that I have not seen mentioned often is the fact that relevant samples will have to be stored for another two years, which will lead to additional costs. Few people realize how expensive the storing of samples – under the right conditions – is.

Theme 4: Athlete Support Personnel (ASP)
This Theme is closely connected to Theme 3, because anti-doping rule violations by Athlete Support Personnel cannot be proven by the traditional means of proof of ADOs, i.e. the analysis of urine and blood samples. There can be no doubt that catching those coaches and doctors that supply and administer doping to the athletes must be a high priority for NADOs. We are well aware that athletes do not function in a vacuum. As a consequence, NADOs will dedicate a considerable part of their ‘Intelligence & Investigations’ capacity to ASP. A rise in the number of cases where ASP is involved can be predicted, although – unfortunately – a huge effect is unlikely. Not only because these cases will always be hard to prove (no matter what) but also because large groups of ASP are not (properly) bound by anti-doping regulations. The seriousness of this problem varies per country and per sport (discipline), and the problem may – at least partly – be solved through legislation. But in my own country, I do not see how the Code revision will help the NADO in prosecuting ASP, unless and until we manage to find ways to sufficiently bind all relevant ASP to our rules.

The new anti-doping rule violation ‘Prohibited Association’ brings us some serious new challenges, I think. One of them being the burden of proof, which often will not be easy to discharge. Here again, ‘Intelligence & Investigations’ will play a crucial role. But even if it can be proven that an athlete is working with an ineligible coach, trainer or doctor, there may be several legal challenges if the ineligible person has a private practice outside organized sport, and working with athletes is the livelihood of that person.

Theme 5: Smart testing and analyzing
As I mentioned above (see Theme 3) ‘Intelligence & Investigations’ will probably have a significant positive impact on the effectiveness of doping control programs. However, it remains to be seen whether this effectiveness will show in terms of the detection of more anti-doping rule violations, or in a better deterrence. Whichever it will be, a consequence of the development towards more targeted and tailor-made testing and analyzing, is that the price of testing will go up. Tailor-made testing means more individual testing, on odd hours, in (sometimes) strange places. This is – no surprise – considerably more expensive than testing a number of players at random after a training session of a team.

On top of that, the Technical Document for Sport Specific Analysis (TDSSA, https://wada-main-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/resources/files/wada-tdssa-v2.2-en.pdf) that has been developed after the implementation of the revised Code (based on Article 6.4 of that Code), prescribes a minimum percentage of additional analyses per sport discipline, with even more cost increase as a consequence. Some NADOs have managed to get additional funding in relation to these new requirements, but most of us have not (and not many of us foresee a budget increase in the near future). So the global number of tests performed by NADOs will in all likelihood decrease.

Whether this decrease in numbers will be acceptable, depends on the value added by the additional analyses that are now performed. If less tests bring more proof, then it is a good development. However, for the time being, there is no way to tell. And it is predictable that decreasing numbers of tests (the number of tests performed being the most commonly used measuring stick to assess the performance of a NADO) will generate critical questions about how serious we take the fight against doping in sport.

While I am writing this contribution, we are in the middle of the ‘IAAF controversy’, following the leakage of confidential information to the media, and the subsequent publication of sensitive data. I am not in the position to comment on what exactly is right and wrong in this case (I simply do not know) but I do know that the IAAF anti-doping program is ‘smarter’ than most, and that it can show results that few IFs can. Nonetheless, the public discussion is focusing on what has not been accomplished with all these data. So the large amounts of data that become available through ‘smart’ testing and elaborate biological passport programs, may become a burden instead of a blessing if the burden of proof is not reached in too many cases. Which – I fear – may be the case.

Theme 6: International Federations and NADOs
Another development that is not initiated by the Code revision – but certainly is supported and accelerated by it – is the improvement of NADO-IF cooperation. The revised Code clarifies and solves several of the problems that we have experienced with the 2009 Code. Examples are the control of therapeutic use exemptions (Article 4.4), the testing authority during international events (Articles 5.3, 5.2.6 and 7.1.1), and the coordination of whereabouts failures (Article 7.1.2). All these changes are improvements.

However, cooperation is more in the soul than it is in the rules, and we must acknowledge and accept that there are relevant differences between NADOs on the one hand and IFs on the other hand, in terms of culture, position and tradition. WADA has created Ad Hoc Working Groups of NADOs and IFs separately, and these groups have made inventories of existing problems that are subsequently brought to the table in joint meetings. The Articles in the Revised Code that underline the need for better cooperation will have no meaning if we stay separated in two worlds. But the impact will be huge, if and when we benefit from each other’s knowledge and experience. And although I am not an optimist by nature, I am pretty sure that this will work out fine.

Theme 7: A clearer and shorter Code
I think it is obvious that this Theme is quite ambitious, and I can only regretfully conclude that the revised Code is neither clearer, nor shorter than the 2009 version. The Code is the most important legal tool in the anti-doping world, and both lawyers and administrators may (and do) delight in the fact that the Code has proven to be an indispensable tool in our toolkit. It is, however, not a tool for athletes (except for those who are also lawyer or administrator) and it will never be. Clarity about the rules is delivered by the Education departments of NADOs, in the form of numerous publications, leaflets, manuals and (more and more) digital tools. And it is my personal opinion that there is not much wrong with accepting that the Code is not meant to educate athletes, but to protect them.

Miscellaneous
It is difficult to choose what other aspects of the revised Code are worth mentioning here. Let me name only a few.
The new possibility for an athlete to return to training during the last part of the period of ineligibility imposed on him (Art. 10.12.2), is – in my opinion – a balanced compromise between the need to fully execute sanctions, and the interests of team members that have not been sanctioned themselves. However, this refinement of the sanction regime further complicates the task that has been a burden for many NADOs for years already: how to monitor that sanctions are observed correctly and fully. This monitoring task usually cannot be fulfilled without the help of sport federations and clubs, and – to a certain extent – fellow athletes. Publicly known elite athletes will hardly have an opportunity to violate their sanction without being ‘caught’, but for lesser gods the situation is different, which fact collides with the Level playing field that we want to achieve.

Article 6.5 of the revised Code addresses the storing of samples for further analysis. It is good that these rules are now clarified, because it is to be expected that the percentage of samples that are stored for future analysis will rise over the years. The revised rules are meant to do justice to both the athlete and the (N)ADO and I think they actually do that, although I am sure that both NADOs and athletes will disagree in any particular case they are involved in.

The importance of the explicit wording of the Articles 20.4.3 and 22.6 that address the need for NADOs to be free from interference in our operational decisions, cannot be overestimated. Anti-doping issues can get a lot of attention in the media, and that may or may not lead to unleashing certain political powers. In my country, parliamentary questions have been asked about specific doping cases on several occasions. Thankfully, in no case this has led to actual interference in our work, but it is very good that the Revised Code is there to ward off such interference in countries where this may be necessary.