Zero tolerance or null effectiveness?: Public policies and sports rules to fight match-fixing

• In Event: Crime in sports: manifestations of organized crime and white collar crime in the sport sector

Abstract

Through semi-structured interviews and documentary analysis this article assesses and exposes how the “zero tolerance” policy implemented by UEFA, the European football’s governing body, is inefficient in inducing compliance in football players, at the level of match-fixing practices. The excessive emphasis on individual ethics, the externalization of the phenomenon as an organized crime problem and the reluctance to admit internal governance failures are the main explanatory reasons. The article claims that football regulation should move from a logic of compliance to enforcement politics.

Authors

• César de Cima, Instituto Universitário de Lisboa, Centro de Estudos Internacionais (CEI-Iscte) e Centro de Investigação e Estudos de Sociologia (CIES-Iscte)

• Marcelo Moriconi, Instituto Universitário de Lisboa, Centro de Estudos Internacionais (CEI-Iscte)