The Enhanced Games: Prohibition, harm reduction & the future of sport

Abstract

The Enhanced Games (TEG) has generated significant discussion around doping in sport, with reference to notions of athlete harm, ‘fairness’, and the normalisation of IPED use. This commentary draws on Richardson (2024) in unpacking each of these elements in turn, to offer an overview of the potential positives TEG can offer our understanding of anti-doping in sport.

TEG frames itself around athlete health rather than prohibitionist policies. This commentary unpacks the limits to anti-doping as a form of prohibition, and explores how harm reduction policies may be beneficial to prioritise in the sporting realm if we are concerned with athlete health, reflecting developments in our understanding of drug policy in the non-sporting world.

The commentary then unpacks ideas of ‘fairness’ in sport, and critiques the notion of the ‘level playing field’. This is followed by discussion of therapeutic and medical use of IPEDs, and some of the inconsistencies and limitations relating to TUEs at present. A discussion of technological enhancement, centred around the polyurethane swimsuit controversy, equipped powerlifting and para athletes then points to further opportunities for TEG to explore.

Following this, the extent to which TEG might normalise IPED use in comparison to other factors such as social media and aesthetics culture is considered, with counter-evidence relating to the harms that stigmatising IPED use presents also developed.

To conclude, this commentary suggests that TEG offers a real opportunity for us to examine how doping and anti-doping policy operate and are conceptualised, and offers a positive appraisal of the potential for this controversial proposed Games.