Verner Møller

With every positive drugs test the credibility and veracity of modern elite sport is diminished. In this radical and provocative critique of current anti-doping policy and practice, Verner Møller argues that the fight against doping – promoted as an initiative to cleanse sport of cheats – is at heart nothing less than a battle to save sport from itself, located on the fault-line between the will to purity and the will to win. Drawing on extensive and detailed case studies of doping in sport, and using a highly original blend of conceptual ideas from philosophy and sociology, Møller strongly criticises current anti-doping regimes and challenges our commonly held ideas about the nature of sport and the risks posed by drugs to health and fair play. He argues forcefully that we must understand the precarious position of the athlete and that only by containing coaches, doctors and drug companies within the anti-doping regime can we hope to ever make progress on this most important issue. Written in a lively and engaging style, and skilfully blending empirical case studies with cutting edge theory, this book represents an important statement on the nature of sport, morality and modernity. It is important reading for all serious students and scholars of the ethics, sociology and politics of sport.

Redeeming the Soul of Sport?

The Ethics of Doping and Anti-Doping

Competition is a basic fact of life. Living organisms need resources. When resources are limited, they fight over them. This is natural. Life in the modern world, based on rationality, ingenuity, and co-operative skills, makes it easy to forget this basic truth and to believe that it no longer applies to us human beings. Developments in the western world since the turn of the millennium appear to confirm this perception. Progress made during the 20th century in gender equality and minority rights have been followed up by schemes committed to securing equal access for all to institutions, facilities, and opportunities for success in life. The equality agenda has been pushed further toward equity by initiatives meant to make up for injustices done in the past. It may be tempting to interpret these developments as the consequence of a civilizing process that has subdued the competitive nature of human beings in favor of improved empathy and moral sensibility. Competition, fairness, and equality in sport and society aims to show that this interpretation is wrong. Based on the workings of elite sport, it argues that the fairness and equality agenda, rather than being a manifestation of a mellowing of human nature, is essentially driven by the same innate competitive impulses. What has changed is that, once basic material needs for survival are covered, as is the case in the developed world, people continue to compete in other arenas attempting to improve their position in the human hierarchies and win status and recognition.

Competition, Fairness and Equality in Sport and Society

Ivan Waddington

John M. Hoberman

Doping has become one of the most important and high-profile issues in contemporary sport. Shocking cases such as that of Lance Armstrong and the US Postal cycling team have exposed the complicated relationships between athletes, teams, physicians, sports governing bodies, drugs providers, and judicial systems, all locked in a constant struggle for competitive advantage. The Routledge Handbook of Drugs and Sport is simply the most comprehensive and authoritative survey of social scientific research on this hugely important issue ever to be published. It presents an overview of key topics, problems, ideas, concepts and cases across seven thematic sections, which include chapters addressing: The history of doping in sport Philosophical approaches to understanding doping The development of anti-doping policy Studies of doping in seven major sports, including athletics, cycling, baseball and soccer In-depth analysis of four of the most prominent doping scandals in history, namely Ben Johnson, institutionalized doping in the former GDR, the 1998 Tour de France and Lance Armstrong WADA and the national anti-doping organizations Key contemporary debates around strict liability, the criminalization of doping, and zero tolerance versus harm reduction Doping outside of elite sport, in gyms, the military and the police. With contributions from many of the world’s leading researchers into drugs and sport, this book is the perfect starting point for any advanced student, researcher, policy maker, coach or administrator looking to develop their understanding of an issue that has had, and will continue to have, a profound impact on the development of sport.

Routledge Handbook of Drugs and Sport

Paul Dimeo

The sense of crisis that pervades global sport suggests that the war on doping is still very far from being won. In this critical and provocative study of anti-doping regimes in global sport, Paul Dimeo and Verner Møller argue that the current system is at a critical historical juncture. Reviewing the recent history of anti-doping, this book highlights serious problems in the approach developed and implemented by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), including continued failure to accept responsibility for the ineffectiveness of the testing system, the growing number of dubious convictions, and damaging human-rights issues. Without a total rethink of how we deal with this critical issue in world sport, this book warns that we could be facing the collapse of anti-doping, both as a policy and as an ideology. The Anti-Doping Crisis in Sport: Causes, Consequences, Solutions is important reading for all students and scholars of sport studies, as well as researchers, coaches, doctors and policymakers interested in the politics and ethics of drug use in sport. It examines the reasons for the crisis, the consequences of policy strategies, and it explores potential solutions.

Causes, Consequences, Solutions

The Anti-Doping Crisis in Sport

Michael Rasmussen was close to winning the Tour de France 2007 when his team Rabobank decided to take him out of the race. This was a consequence of a press campaign without precedence in the history of sport. When it was leaked to the press that Michael Rasmussen had received warnings from the anti-doping authorities for whereabouts rule violations the media ran with the story as if Rasmussen had been caught doping. The Scapegoat, written by Professor of Sports Studies Verner Møller, demonstrates that Michael Rasmussen was not expelled from the Tour on sporting grounds. The book is an uncompromising uncovering of a sports system and an anti-doping campaign driven by an ungraceful mix of fair play promotion and business interests.

The Scapegoat

Michael Rasmussen var på vej til en sikker samlet sejr i Tour de France 2007, da hans hold Rabobank valgte at trække ham ud af løbet. Det var kulminationen på en pressehetz uden fortilfælde i sportshistorien. Det kom frem, at Michael Rasmussen havde fået advarsler fra antidoping-myndighederne, men det blev dækket af medierne, som om der var tale om en positiv dopingtest. Løgn over løgn, som er skrevet af idrætsprofessor Verner Møller, dokumenterer, at Michael Rasmussen ikke blev smidt ud af sportslige grunde. Bogen er en kompromisløs afdækning af en antidopingkampagne og et sportssystem, som i en uskøn blanding af opportunistisk fairplay-profilering og forretningshensyn har drevet sporten til vanvid og spillet moralsk fallit.

Verner Møller

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