When 109 journalists, lecturers, sports activities officers and different stakeholders from 34 nations turned up for a convention within the Danish countryside in 1997, they didn’t know they might be the very first members in what was later named Play the Recreation – an initiative and a collection of worldwide conferences that present an unbiased discussion board for open, unrestricted, and fact-based debate on an important challenges dealing with fashionable sport.
In 2022, the initiative celebrated its twenty fifth anniversary with the twelfth Play the Recreation convention, and now Play the Recreation additionally marks the numerous years of sports activities debate with the ebook ‘When the silence of sport was damaged: Sports activities politics within the instances of Play the Recreation.’
Fairly intentionally, the ebook doesn’t give attention to re-telling all of the fortunes of Play the Recreation as an organisation and convention organiser.
As an alternative, the ebook follows the lead from the title and makes a journalistic account of key debates and developments in worldwide sports activities politics from the 1990’s onwards in regards to the position of sports activities journalism to the struggle in opposition to doping, corruption in sports activities, playing, abuse of athletes, the usage of sport in exercising tender energy, governance issues, whistleblowing, the rights of athletes, and the position of authoritarian states in sport.
“The ebook paperwork what hard-working investigative journalists, brave whistleblowers, sharp educational analysts, athletes, survivors, antidoping officers, NGOs, and plenty of different stakeholders – even just a few sports activities leaders – have set in movement over 1 / 4 of a century,” says Jens Sejer Andersen, worldwide director of Play the Recreation.
He hopes that this tour-de-force by means of sports activities politics over 1 / 4 of a century can function inspiration for numerous audiences:
“Those that have been round sports activities politics for as a few years as Play the Recreation could also be reminded of occasions they’d forgotten or be motivated to share the tales we now have disregarded. Newcomers will hopefully discover a richness of data that helps clarify why sports activities politics has turn into what it’s at present.”
The ebook is written in a collaborative effort between Danish journalist Lars Jørgensen and Jens Sejer Andersen. Lars Jørgensen is the creator of a number of books within the discipline of sports activities and politics, and he has carried out in-depth analysis on the subjects to offer accessible introductions to the subjects. Jens Sejer Andersen has supplemented the ebook with details, quotes, footage, textual content, and anecdotes from Play the Recreation’s conferences and different actions.
The 336-page ebook was formally launched at a reception on the opening day of Play the Recreation’s thirteenth convention in Trondheim, Norway, the place it was offered as a present to the greater than 400 members within the convention.
On the identical time, the ebook has been made accessible in pdf format and may now be downloaded without cost from Play the Recreation’s web site.
