S. Sports Corruption, Discrimination, and Equity Concerns in U.S. Sports

Competitive sports are a multi-billion dollar industry in the United States, and corruption in that industry has been a problem for decades. Historically, sports corruption was thought to encompass things like doping, match-fixing, and governance problems like fixing the selection of host cities for major events. More recently, discrimination and inequality on the basis of race, sex, and gender have raised additional corruption concerns in sports governance. Consider the Brian Flores lawsuit against the NFL alleging race discrimination, the findings of harassment and discrimination in the National Women's Soccer League, and the efforts to prohibit the participation of transgender athletes across the U.S. at various levels of sport. This course will explore all of these sports corruption issues and more, in an effort to understand the forces at work that cause corruption in sports, the obligations of government and sports leagues and organizations to uncover and eradicate corruption, the structures in place in both the public and private sectors to fight corruption, and how sports corruption matters are adjudicated. Class time will consist of lectures by the instructors as well as presentations by guest speakers who are practitioner experts and/or leading academics in the field. Class participation is expected and encouraged.