ABSTRACT
The use of performance-enhancing bio-medical technology in sport, with the paradigmatic example in what is usually referred to as doping, can be discussed from many angles. In the public discourse and the mass media, such use is often portrayed as a matter of individual choice and, in the case of banned substances, of individual shortcomings and moral failure. In the academic discourse we find more reflective insights. John Hoberman (1992) has written on the history of the use of performance-enhancing drugs, medical sociologists such as Ivan Waddington (2000) see drug use in the background of what is called the medicalization processes of society, and cultural critics understand excessive use of performance-enhancing technologies as expressions of a culture obsessed with unlimited growth and progress – a culture out of control (Loland, 2001b). In the literature on sport ethics, performance-enhancing technologies are discussed with reference to what is seen as ‘the nature of sport’, to fairness and justice, and to the health and well-being of athletes (Butcher and Schneider, 2000). All these perspectives, perhaps with the exception of the first, add significant insights to the field.
