NATIONAL ANTI-DOPING GOVERNANCE OBSERVER Final report Report / June 2021 Arnout Geeraert (ed.) Play the Game 2 www.playthegame.org Play the Game 3 www.playthegame.org Titel National Anti-Doping Governance Observer. Final report Main author Arnout Geeraert (ed.), KU Leuven Authors of national chapters Denmark: Christina Friis Johansen, Play the Game Germany: Jürgen Mittag & Lorenz Fiege, German Sport University Cologne Ireland: Daniel Hayman, Play the Game Poland, Slovakia, Bulgaria, India, Kenya, Norway: Pawel Zembura, University of Warsaw Brazil, Portugal: Luiz Haas, University of Lisbon Other contributions Edith Drieskens, KU Leuven Reference Geeraert, A. (ed.) (2021). National Anti-Doping Governance Observer. Final report. Aarhus: Play the Game / Danish Institute for Sports Studies. Cover photo Getty Images/Alan Thornton Layout Play the Game Edition 1. edition, Aarhus, June 2021 ISBN 978-87-93784-51-2 (pdf) Published by Play the Game c/o Danish Institute for Sports Studies Frederiksgade 78B, 2. sal DK-8000 Aarhus C E: [email protected] W: www.playthegame.org Quoting from this report is allowed with proper acknowledgements. The National Anti-Doping Governance Observer has received funding from the European Commission under the programme Erasmus+. The Commission is not responsible for any communication and publication by the project or any use that may be made from information contained therein. Play the Game 4 www.playthegame.org Content Introduction ........................................................................................................................................ 7 Project background .......................................................................................................................... 10 Methodology .................................................................................................................................... 12 Theoretical and conceptual framework .................................................................................... 12 Best practices ................................................................................................................................ 13 Indicators ....................................................................................................................................... 18 Data collection and scoring ........................................................................................................ 19 Aggregation and weighting of scores ....................................................................................... 20 Presentation .................................................................................................................................. 20 What the NADGO provides – and what not ............................................................................ 21 Acknowledgements ..................................................................................................................... 23 References ......................................................................................................................................... 24 Anti Doping Denmark (ADD) ....................................................................................................... 28 Reflections from ADD ..................................................................................................................... 49 National Anti-Doping Agency of Germany (NADA Germany) .............................................. 51 Reflections from NADA Germany ................................................................................................ 74 Sport Ireland Anti-Doping ............................................................................................................. 76 Reflections from Sport Ireland ....................................................................................................... 89 The Polish Anti-Doping Agency (POLADA) ............................................................................... 91 Reflections from POLADA ........................................................................................................... 107 Slovak Anti-Doping Agency (SADA) ......................................................................................... 109 Reflections from SADA ................................................................................................................. 125 Brazilian Doping Control Authority (ADCD)............................................................................ 129 Bulgarian Anti-Doping Center (ADC) ........................................................................................ 137 Indian National Anti Doping Agency (NADA India) .............................................................. 148 Anti-Doping Agency of Kenya (ADAK) ..................................................................................... 154 Anti-Doping Norway (ADNO) .................................................................................................... 166 Anti Doping Authority of Portugal (ADoP)............................................................................... 177 Annex: How WADA became a hybrid organisation ................................................................ 184 Play the Game 5 www.playthegame.org Play the Game 6 www.playthegame.org By Arnout Geeraert1 Introduction Few notions are referred to so frequently within the context of sports governance as ‘good governance’ (Geeraert & van Eekeren, 2021). In recent years, corruption scandals have galvanised scrutiny of the governance structures of international sports federations. This attention for good governance in sport at the international level has trickled down to the national and local levels. As a result, an increasing number of public and sports authorities at all levels are adopting and promoting principles of good governance in sports federations. To inspire and support these efforts, Play the Game has issued the benchmarking tools Sports Governance Observer 2015 and 2018 (Geeraert 2015, 2018a) and the National Sports Governance Observer (Geeraert, 2018b). These instruments allow for measuring and comparing good governance in international and national sports federations, respectively. This report introduces the National Anti-Doping Governance Observer (NADGO), a benchmarking tool for good governance in national anti-doping organisations (NADOs). To any observer of anti-doping governance, the present focus on NADO governance should come as no surprise. The highly mediatised Russian doping scandal has indeed underscored the need for better governance in the anti-doping regime and, thus, incited institutional reform. At the international level, the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) has responded to criticism by implementing institutional arrangements that are aimed at improving independence, ethical conduct, and transparency. These reforms took effect in November 2018, when the WADA Foundation Board approved a series of recommendations by the WADA Governance Working Group (WADA Working Group on Governance Matters, 2018). A Working Group on the Review of WADA Governance Reforms has recently been established to review WADA’s governance (reforms) on a continuous basis (Working Group on the review of WADA Governance reforms, 2021). In parallel to these international developments, there are also serious discussions about how anti-doping governance can be improved at the national level. They focus mostly on NADOs, which are defined by WADA as ”the entities designated by each country as possessing the primary authority and responsibility, at the national level, for the anti- doping programs in a country” (WADA, 2021). That NADOs play a pivotal role in the fight against doping is underscored by the scope of their activities, which include adopting and implementing anti-doping rules and education policies, conducting investigations, directing the collection of samples, and managing test results at the national level. There is an increasing realisation that enhancing the 1 Assistant Professor, Utrecht University; research fellow, KU Leuven. Play the Game 7 www.playthegame.org effectiveness and trustworthiness of NADOs implies enhancing the quality of their institutional design and practices. The Russian doping scandal, for instance, demonstrated both the importance of operational independence in the fight against doping and the difficulties involved in actually achieving it. Other aspects of NADO governance are also put into question. Notably, Tomczyk & Palmer (2017) empirically demonstrated a general lack of transparency in European NADOs. Two important knowledge gaps hinder ongoing efforts to improve NADOs’ governance. The first one relates to the uncertainty about the current state of affairs. Simply put, a clear and holistic overview of where NADOs’ governance is lacking in quality is missing. Without a solid diagnosis of (the severity of) existing governance deficits, it is difficult to achieve better governance. The second, related, knowledge gap concerns the lack of a commonly accepted standard of good governance in NADOs. ‘Good governance’ is an elusive concept for which there exists no single definition or operationalisation (Geeraert & van Eekeren, 2021). Without a clear understanding of what elements of good governance are important and why, NADOs that are willing to improve their governance may thus very well be unable to do so. By contrast, those that are unwilling to enhance the quality of their institutional