Court of Arbitration of Sports

Introduction Established in 1983 and starting its operation in 1984, the Court of Arbitration for Sport (“CAS”) is considered essentially an international “Supreme Court” for sport. Headquartered in Lausanne, Switzerland, the basic function of the court is to resolve legal disputes in the field of sport through arbitration. It does this issuing arbitral awards; these have the same enforceability as judgments of an ordinary court. Throughout the years, certain instances have questioned CAS’s jurisdiction and impartiality. The Court’s short, but relatively rich history includes many benchmarks and milestones that have shaped the court to what it is today. Currently, the Court is governed by the International Council of Arbitration for Sport (“ICAS”) which was created in 1994. As the governing body of CAS, it overlooks all of the CAS operations, its funding, and arbitrator selection, among other duties. The ICAS and CAS are governed by the “Code”, a charter-like document created in 1994 as a result of the Paris Agreement on 1994. The Court rules on issues of sport instances that are “off-the-field.” These may come in the form of a commercial or disciplinary nature. Generally speaking, the cases involve issues of contractual nature among teams, governing bodies or corporations, and doping, eligibility, or jurisdictional issues. The Court will seldom rule on an “on-the-field” issue; when it does, the claim must be of a nature that a concern has been raised regarding the validity, legitimacy, or fairness of a rule of play. The CAS is organized in four divisions: the Ordinary Arbitration Division, the Appeals Arbitration Division, the Ad Hoc Division, and the Mediation Division. (tas-cas.com) Each division handles cases of the same nature. The divisions are differentiated in how the cases reach the Court and the type of decision the case will produce either binding or non-binding. The ICAS is composed of 20 high-level jurists with significant experience