Censorship, Politics and Sport

The relationships between censorship, politics and sport have not been widely studied despite being linked in important ways which are largely obscured from public view. By using censorship as a focus for an intersectional analysis of human rights violations in sport as experienced by athletes and workers in sport-related contexts, this important book makes a necessary contribution to the field of critical sport studies.Censorship, Politics and Sport exposes how most of the rules governing athletes’ eligibility, behaviour and expression constitute a form of censorship, and how international sport federations have unchecked power to enforce them. Author Helen Lenskyj delves into the overt and hidden acts of censorship that the International Olympic Committee, through international federations and national sports organizations, impose on athletes of all ages and levels globally. Applying an intersectional analysis, Lenskyj examines the content, implementation and impacts of rules and regulations developed by sport governing bodies, with a focus on the ways in which women and minoritised athletes experience those restrictions. Moving beyond this, the chapters also show how censorship and self-censorship within legacy media journalism shapes the coverage of sport megaevents, allowing biased and discriminatory content to flourish. An analysis of censorship in the specific contexts of US high school and university/college sport reveals how the presumption of sport exceptionalism and the political ‘neutrality’ of sport shape policies and practices while restricting young athletes’ free speech and expression.With new insights into the hidden impacts of censorship on global sport and the dangers of sport exceptionalism rhetoric, this is ground-breaking reading for scholars of sociology and critical sport studies on the urgent need to uncover, critique and challenge the relationship between censorship, politics and sport.