Increased dialogue between NADOs and academics – challenges and possibilities

INDR December 2015 Commentary by John Gleaves and Ask Vest Christiansen

Michael Ask, CEO of Anti Doping Denmark asked INDR managers John Gleaves and Ask Vest Christiansen to respond to the following questions:

• What should the relationship between academics and anti-doping organizations look like?

We would like to start out with a bird’s eye view perspective on that question: What are the roles of academics in the first place?

More than just repositories of knowledge, academics have an obligation to also forge new paths of discovery. As the boundary between what we know and what we still do not know expands, academics are not required to ask “what applied value does this discovery have.” Galileo’s curiosity in the time it took a chandelier to swing, measured only by his heartbeat, was not intended to help create modern timepieces, though it did through the discovery of the tautochrone nature of a pendulum. It was simple curiosity driven by unanswered questions and the human desire to know.

We should pursue truth, and when we do so, we do not (at first) have to look at whether our discoveries are useful for society. It is important to stress that freedom in topics and approaches characterize researchers in the free world. At the same time academics are paid by society, and should pay interest to the larger problems of society. They cannot just hide away with their heads up in the clouds not knowing what problems affect people.

The important thing for academics is to strike the right balance between making discoveries and advancing knowledge that is relevant for society while avoiding acting as servants for any specific group or interest (e.g. an industry or a political party) in society. Moreover, academics know they must vigilantly guard the freedom to inquire and think critically, whether or not their findings and the questions that arises are popular with the general public. If there is a general outcry for action in a certain area such as with obesity, drug use, or cheating in sport, the role of the academic is not necessarily to immediately begin research projects that find a cure for obesity, halt the drug use, or put an end to cheating in sport. Academics may just as well look into larger question addressing why obesity has flourished (by e.g. attending to structural problems), looking at statistics for drug use (to see if the supposed trend actually is a trend), or ask questions that assess the value of personal liberty versus the value of clean sport (to analyse whether the measures we use are proportionate with the aims we have). What is more, academics may inquire into whether a hidden cause, such as moral panic, may explain society’s sudden interest in obesity, drug use, or cheating.

This points towards an important distinction regarding the role of academics and the ideal relationship between academics and anti-doping organizations of doping in sport: As opposed to people employed in NADO’s and WADA, we as academics do not have a vested interest in the topic. We have an independence that people within the NADO’s do not have. Some critics may disagree, claiming that a career in academia can be built on taking a certain position (whether that being pro or against anti-doping). However, such proposition, which claims that anything a person may say is said with a different agenda in mind than that which the person claims, is a nonstarter for any serious conversation. Also, it is our experience that most researchers seek to avoid such, to use the technical term, “bullshit” (which is the passing on of information that disregards the truthfulness of that information but is only interested in furthering the speaker’s own position (Frankfurt, 2005). Thus, our strength as academics comes from the fact that we – to paraphrase Professor Ivan Waddington in the video-testimonial on our website – are not involved in the system. From the outset we are neither for nor against drugs. We are neither for nor against the system. Rather we want to understand how doping and anti-doping works, and why anti-doping is not working as well as it might do. At the same time; even if researchers have the possibility and the obligation to take on the role as the independent and neutral party this doesn’t mean that researchers doesn’t sometimes have an agenda. Some clearly have and we should acknowledge that. With these introductory remarks let’s move on to the following sub-question:

a)      What are the biggest challenges for anti-doping work seen from the INDR perspective, and what alternative recommendations can researchers propose to these challenges?

As co-directors for the largest network of doping scholars, we are privileged to engage many researchers from around the world. From these interactions, it appears to us that doping researchers genuinely desire to have their research findings impact sporting policies. This is true regardless of what they find. They might be critical or supportive of the current anti-doping policies or discourse, but they all still hope that what they conclude reaches beyond the confines of peer-reviewed journals because they believe that their findings will improve sport or society.

Critics might disagree with us and assert that some academic research appears to have little value or application or, even worse, only aims to score intellectual points on the scoreboard of academia. Admittedly, some research is not useful and some research is not very good. But academia does a good job of screening out the good from the bad. Moreover, it is unfair to dismiss academics as a group because less talented ranks do not yet meet the highest standard. After all, one wouldn’t stop going to get their car fixed just because one mechanic did a poor job; one just simply would not return to that mechanic.

The challenge for many of the researchers producing good work is how to make a difference. Though some academics seem to believe that positions and findings which do not uniformly support anti-doping policies are unwelcome, the real problem seems to be breaking through the sound-proof glass that separates the anti-doping administrators from the researchers. It is not that the findings are censored or suppressed, but that they often go unnoticed or unheard. Moreover, the anti-doping administrators’ invitations to academics to produce research, such as WADA’s annual Social Science Research Grant, come pre-loaded with the ADO’s current needs, but do not include open calls for academics to suggest areas where research should be focused. The end result is that academics produce and disseminate research mostly outside of the sphere that anti-doping administers inhabit and that anti-doping administrators create policies and frame challenges with little input from academics.

However, the alternative to this situation is not a symbiotic relationship. Such a scenario would force the pendulum too far to either side. Close ties would potentially jeopardize the independence of inquiry and reduce research to the handmaiden of policy or turn anti-doping administration into another research branch of the academy. Neither scenario is ideal for either party.

On a positive note, WADA’s report (Pound et al., 2015) revealed that academic research is making its way through to administrators. In particular, the report included discussion of sportive nationalism and its link to state-sponsored doping. Sportive nationalism is an area of doping easily dismissed as squishy compared to scientific tests and judicial procedure yet, as the report illustrates, sportive nationalism is also an important cultural component in anti-doping. Policy could not ignore these cultural points, which were long established by widely-respected scholars and INDR members such as John Hoberman, Thomas Hunt, and Kathryn Henne (to only list the ones starting with “H”). However, we venture to guess that today’s research on par with the sportive nationalism work from a decade and more ago, is struggling to illustrate its value to administrators. So academics still face the challenge of translating the squishy, cultural findings of today, which do not immediately present themselves as useful, to administrators in a manner that help illustrate the findings’ applied benefit.

b)      How should academics and anti-doping organizations work together?

A better solution, to borrow another metaphor from the natural world, is working to find opportunities for cross-pollination. In this scenario, both academics and administrators must start by appreciating that both fields need some degree of independence while also relying on the other field to ensure its overall wellbeing. The next step is ensuring opportunities for pollination to occur. This can be conferences where administrators and academics engage one another or publishing articles for each other’s audiences. For example, Herman Ram kindly agreed to publish an editorial in the INDR’s forthcoming special issue in Performance Enhancement and Health and Michael Ask is participating in this dialogue for the INDR newsletter. This allows both Mr. Ram and Mr. Ask to share insights in a medium widely read by doping scholars. Similar invitations to academics who have produced respected work would also help the anti-doping organizations access academia’s new findings.

c)       What commitments, if any, should anti-doping organizations have towards academic research?

Still, such suggested examples of cross pollination seem limited and one directional. Academics can certainly do a better job inviting the administrators to share in the academic field but administrators appear far more reluctant to invite academics to their side. Only a handful of academics, who hold positions closely aligned with anti-doping positions, have found a seat at the anti-doping table. Critical but highly respected scholars, on the other hand, are mostly absent. If the two sides are going to effectively work together, anti-doing administrators cannot cherry-pick the academics they wish to work with. Instead, anti-doping administrators must trust that academics ensure scholarly rigor among themselves to the same degree that they ensure rigor with their colleagues. And if that means highly-respected academics produce findings that are critical or contrary to current anti-doping positions, then administrators cannot simply dismiss or ignore those findings. Listening to them might be uncomfortable, but that is true anytime research challenges paradigms. If the history of academic research is any guide, the biggest advances are often met with the most resistance.

Such consideration may then lead to reflections on how the policy we have created around drug use works. Since the 1960s competition in sport has intensified. This was followed by an increase in the politicisation of sport after the Second World War as the world’s two power blocs used sport as a tool for displaying which political ideology was most superior. Since then, the money involved increased with the associated commercialisation of sport. This all happened in the same period as medicine in general and sports medicine specifically grew and sport thus became more and more medicalized (Waddington and Smith, 2009). Along with the increasing complexity of doping that was associated with this process anti-doping has moved “in one direction: mores rules, more restrictions and more testing” (Møller et al., 2015). This has led academics to pose questions about anti-doping policies, e.g. whether there is a secure ethical basis for imposing severe restrictions on athletes as is seen with for instance the whereabouts regulations.

Also, if a final analysis can demonstrate that anti-doping system and its regulations not only impose problematic violations on athletes’ civil rights and liberties, but that the system that does so is largely ineffective in preventing athletes for doping while at the same time being very expensive and potentially criminalise athletes and their entourage then academics need to pose the question of whether the system put in place actually provides more harm than good (Kayser and Broers, 2013). In such a situation it would be futile if academics reaction to these challenges only were to a) suggest a change of the rules so the civil rights’ problems can be circumvented; b) make better test to catch one percent more athletes; c) create more cost-effective administrative systems for the NADOs or d) help athletes to more and better counselling so they don’t end up being criminalised. Such suggestions would likely be welcomed by – if not all – then some NADO’s because they would help the internal effectiveness of the NADO, but they wouldn’t have addressed the larger problem. In that sense the scholar would therefore have failed his or her obligation as an academic.

To conclude, it seems worth repeating that academics desire their research to make a difference. Any hesitation to closely align with an industry, a political party, or, in this case, anti-doping organizations stems from the neutrality that academics collectively share. While we agree that the vast majority of anti-doping administrators show up to work every day desiring to serve a noble good, academics do the same. For them, that noble good is truth. The better their work is, the closer they will get to it. And if they do it really, really well, it may be that they produce something that outlives them. In the short run, however, academics must do a better job communicating their findings beyond the academic spaces. For those in doping research, that includes anti-doping administrators. In return, anti-doping administrators could better support academics by engaging our diverse voices, including the critical ones, and finding ways to encourage high quality research, regardless of the anticipated outcome. 

Frankfurt, H. G. 2005. On bullshit, Princeton, N.J., Princeton University Press.

Kayser, B. & Broers, B. 2013. Anti-doping Policies: Choosing Between Imperfections. In: Tolleneer, J., Sterckx, S. & Bonte, P. (eds.) AthleticEnhancement, Human Nature and Ethics. Dordrecht Heidelberg New York London: Springer Netherlands.

Møller, V., Waddington, I. & Hoberman, J. M. (eds.) 2015. Routledge Handbook of Drugs and Sport, London & New York: Routledge.

Pound, R. W., McLaren, R. H., Robertson, J., Tinsley, D., Dubbey, M., Talay, B., Connon, N., Kitsell, G. & Re, G. 2015. THE INDEPENDENT COMMISSION REPORT #1. Montral, Canada: WADA.

Waddington, I. & Smith, A. 2009. An introduction to drugs in sport: addicted to winning?, Abingdon, Routledge.