John Gleaves & Ask Vest Christiansen

Here is your tearful farewell editorial. Well, it is with some melancholy that we now state that this will be our last editorial for the INDR as mangers of the Network. We, John and Ask, have co-worked on this since we took over from Verner Møller in 2012. Back then, Verner passed the network on saying: “It is about time to hand over the management of the network to younger colleagues with new ideas and who are more familiar with the new media and their potential and a vision to modernize the network so that it does not stagnate in inertia.” Some may have felt that Prof Møller was being slightly grumpy when he, in the same editorial, quoted Marshall McLuhan’s renowned statement “The media is the message” as a prophetic account on how academics (like elite athletes) with new technologies were constantly being monitored to check the quantity of their research output so that “public money is not wasted”. If it also sounded like he was preparing the ground for us to spend hours and hours on Twitter with statements and comments on big and small related to INDR, it was a prediction that was never realized. None of us are good at that, so regarding the network’s appearance on social media, not much has changed since 2012.

Our main goals for the INDR were modest and mainly of an academic nature. First, we hoped to preserve INDR’s founding mission, which was, “to share and encourage research on doping practices in their broadest cultural, social and political dimensions.” As such, we sought to maintain the INDR as a broad platform of scholars with diverse views, methods, and subject matter. Our only requirement was “a willingness to participate in rational and open-minded debate and research that can deepen our understanding of controversial pharmacological practices that require serious and continuing study by an international and interdisciplinary community of scholars.”

Our second and third goals were to grow the INDR membership and to improve the quality of scholarship devoted to doping. Fortunately, the INDR members took care of both. The INDR members helped recruit new scholars to the network’s ranks, both by inviting colleagues and students to join.  Such efforts are vital to the continued health of the Network. Similarly, we are proud to see so many INDR members producing high quality research. It is especially gratifying to see the collaborative research that exists among INDR members in publications, grants, and curricular activities. We would be remiss if we did not acknowledge that the growth in scholarship owes a great debt to the peer-reviewed journal Performance Enhancement and Health, founded by INDR member Jason Mazanov, which has published four special issues from the INDR conferences. Now with INDR member Katinka Van De Ven as Editor in Chief for Performance Enhancement and Health, we hope that the mutually productive partnership between the journal and the network will continue to improve the quality of scholarship globally.

One change we did initiate however was the newsletters that came out to INDR members and subscribers every three months. Recently the frequency has dropped, so we might have been struck with some fatigue in this regard. Newsletters have usually had commentaries from members and an editorial from the management along with some network housekeeping. Launched in association with the first newsletter in 2012 was an INDR (or INHDR as it was) statement written by professor Ivan Waddington and cosigned by a host of international scholars, with a call to WADA “to remove non-performance enhancing recreational drugs, such as marijuana, from its Prohibited List of Substances and to stop testing for such drugs at sporting competitions.” While we still have not met an athlete defending cannabis being on the list, eight years later, the drug is still there. The call did however create a thought-provoking debate and a full issue of Performance Enhancement and Health was dedicated to discussions on this and neighboring issues (vol 2, issue 2).

Since then a number of other important issues related to doping has been discussed and dealt with in the network. Whereas the revelations around Lance Armstrong in 2012 was a watershed moment leading many ADOs to include intelligence in their work procedures, the corona pandemic of 2020 may prove to be structurally equally important in influencing doping and anti-doping in the years to come. USADA, for instance, have, with Olympic gold medalists Katie Ledecky and Lilly King volunteering, tested the possibility of surveilling and testing athletes from a distance by using Zoom or FaceTime. If it is true that “the medium is the message” such new scenario certainly lead to a number of enduring and fundamental questions concerning for instance data protection and privacy rights being intensified and asked again. INDR members will surely follow the development in the years to come.

As managers of the INDR, the newsletters and the biennially conferences has been the focus of our attention. While the member base has been growing steadily over the years, the conferences has remained at a status-quo with between 25-40 papers presented and 45-70 delegates joining in. Compared to other areas of research – not least in the health sciences – that is a small meeting. However, it is a quality meeting and one that many members look forward to and prioritize. We have been grateful for that commitment. Consequently, the challenge has not been the quality of the papers given but rather how to organize an event logistically where most delegates want to attend most presentations. That challenge remains for the next INDR conference, which will be in August of 2021.

As it transpires, while the INDR has slowly evolved, it has also stayed much the same. Aarhus University will keep hosting it, and John and Ask will continue to support and contribute to initiatives within the network. With such qualified and competent people as Jörg Krieger, April Henning and Paul Dimeo waiting in the wings, the time was right to bring in a new generation of leadership. It has honestly been a privilege for both of us to serve as co-managers for the INDR. The position has probably given us more than we gave to it. We are grateful that Verner Møller trusted us to continue building upon the solid foundation that he established and we hope that our contributions have set up the next generation to further develop our common project. We are also grateful to Jörg, April, and Paul for agreeing to continue driving the INDR forward; it is a great feeling to step aside for such talented and hardworking colleagues. Finally, a thank you to all of the INDR members. Without your support and contributions, managing the network would have been a futile exercise. So it is with high spirit and only a few tears we hand over the baton to the next generation of INDR management.