The Montenegrin Olympic Committee: exploring issues in Sports Governance

Abstract

ABSTRACT The recent doping scandal in Montenegro waterpolo team during the World Aquatics Championships in Qatar this year, yet again opened the debate on a number of sports-related governance issues. The foundation of these challenges lies in the very essence of how the sports ecosystem is structured, organized, and operated. The major outputs of the contemporary studies confirmed that the politicization of relations within the sports ecosystem plays a principal role, in shaping, directing, and utilizing sports for non-sporting objectives. The results indicate that this constellation has been facilitated through the transformation of informal practices into regulatory regimes or bypassing, when needed, existing legislative frameworks in order to contribute to institutional stability. The politicization represents a joint determinant of the closed, vertically structured governing bodies and decision-making system with long-lasting individuals in decision-making positions without any internal or external control in practice. The internal regulations facilitate no restrictions on conflicts of interest, measures aimed to tackle corruption, or to provide a check and balance system between governing bodies. Furthermore, following the public service culture, the Montenegro Olympic Committee maintains its closed and exclusive composition of governing bodies rests on discretionary power and a decision-making approach with a democratic deficit.