Action for good governance in international sports organisations.

It is clear that the governance of international sports is facing many challenges and that a better governance is needed in order to overcome these challenges. The far-stretching autonomy of the sports world has unmistakably resulted in a lack of decent organisational structures in Global Sport Governing Bodies, which constitutes the breeding ground for the many cases of corruption and mismanagement, and the lack of democracy in international sports governance. In addition, we witnessed the erosion of the governing monopoly of Sport Governing Bodies (SGBs) due to the empowerment of certain stakeholders and the governmentalisation of sport. At the same time, due to an increasingly complex sports world, multi-faceted and complex policy issues emerge that SGBs cannot unilaterally deal with. Thus, talking about better governance in sports in this new constellation not only implies scrutinising the governance of SGBs per se, but also the modalities of the complex webs of interrela tionships in the emerging governance model in sport.In particular, the focus is on how and under what conditions a direct EU sports policy may contribute to more democratic and effective governance in European sports?

Keywords:Good governance, Sport, Sports governance, EU sports policy, International sport organisations