ABSTRACT
Juridification has been identified as a feature in many areas of civil society including sport. The debate originated around the extent to which law could or should become involved in issues that occur on the field of play. Many sports’ governing bodies have set up quasi-judicial systems to deal with disciplinary issues which provide a clear example of the increasingly tight embrace of law and sport.
This chapter is not concerned with these obvious manifestations of juridification, nor legal decisions or statutes, but rather how those involved in delivering sport may think and feel about law itself and how it applies. It draws both upon the concept of legal consciousness and empirical work in the psychological area of ‘concerns about litigation’ within the context of claims of a ‘compensation culture’. It argues that how people think and feel about law is an unrecognised, but vital, area of the juridification of sport, given that it has the capacity to alter behaviour and impact on both policy and practice.
