Background

Background

Historical Overview

When in 1985 the issue of sport was first mentioned in the so-called Adonnino Report initiated by the European Council it was mainly regarded as a pan-European cultural element, able to make the idea of the integration process more tangible and to create a common European identity. Accordingly, in the late 1980s European sports events such as the “European Sailing Regatta” were chosen as communication tools and were given EU funding. However, this policy was soon harshly criticized by national sports associations, which stressed the fact that the Commission only promoted popular sporting events, whereas the less funded “sport for all” was not taken into account at all. These first attempts of the Commission in the field of sport highlight the fact that sport and politics where at that time merely coexisting in parallel worlds.

This situation changed in 1991 when the European Sports Forum was created to serve as a platform for dialogue on sport related issues between the European Commission, Sports Federations and the Sport Ministers of the EU Member States. Nevertheless, it took another six years of intensive sport lobbying, two EP-Reports calling for a coherent and coordinated EU-sports policy, and a major upheaval in the world of sports initiated by the repercussions of the ECJ’s verdict in the Bosman-case , for sport to be for the first time explicitly mentioned in a Declaration annexed to the “Treaty of Amsterdam” in 1997. This document in principle acknowledged the social importance of sport but did not give the Community any direct legal mandate to actively promote sport. It could thus be said that the Declaration was of political rather than legal importance.

In the following years, the discussion on sports issues was further intensified at different levels within the EU and even entered the “top-political arena” when it was addressed during a meeting of the European Council in Nice. The resulting Nice Declaration on the specific characteristics of sport and its social function in Europe annexed to the 2003 “Treaty of Nice” was more comprehensive than the previous Amsterdam Declaration but still failed to give the EU any kind of legal control over sport. The consequences were many, for instance, the “European Year for Education through Sport” in 2004 had to be implemented with a budget from other EU-sources.

Finally, the last step towards legal recognition was accomplished with the addition of two articles on sport in the European Constitution signed by the Member States in Rome in October 2004. Unfortunately, the constitutional project failed after being rejected in two referendums in France and in the Netherlands in 2005.

So as to overcome this situation, in June 2007 the European Council agreed to amend the existing EU-Treaties by incorporating the content of the unsuccessful European Constitution into a new one, referred to as the “Treaty of Lisbon” - so far ratified by all EU countries except for Ireland, Germany and the Czech Republic.   

Summarizing the above, one can say that over the last twenty years the issue of sport has gained increasing importance within the framework of the European Union’s cultural and educational policy but that it has not until recently been integrated into European law. The EU Commission’s presentation of a White Paper on Sport in July 2007 also highlights this sequence of events. On the other hand, the EU had a growing impact on the world of sports when it passed judgments on sport related matters such as with the Bosman or the Meca Medina case . So, it will be of interest to see how the common history of the EU and the Olympic and Sports Movement evolve once the Lisbon Treaty enters into force.