Finally got around to doing a translation of Pedro Horillo's Open Letter to Pat McQuaid originally published in 2007.
Open letter to Mr McQuaid, President of the International Cycling Union
PEDRO HORRILLO
2007
Mr McQuaid, I haven’t had the pleasure of meeting you personally, although to make things clear from the start, I am not inclined to in the slightest. However, it should not be so, because being the highest representative of our sport, you should be supported and welcomed by all those who are a part of it. But sadly this is not the case.
Maybe at this time you are congratulating yourself on the success of your latest initiative, the famous letter entitled “Rider’s Commitment to a New Cycling” that we have just been compelled to sign by you. And I am not mistaken in using the verb, compel, because many who have signed have done so under duress and threats, the fact is we simply sign, or don’t ride. What seems not to matter is whether the riders are in agreement, or not, whether we have a debate about the issues and whether we work together for a common objective. No, you have simply written the letter without consulting anyone. No, the only thing you care about is that we have signed our names, our ‘agreement’ and that we have jumped through the hoops you have demanded. This is the substance of the issue, although you sell it as otherwise.
Everyone will have their opinion, I've specifically signed the letter, but to me it seems to be the most absurd letter that has lately come from a thinking person. Though if I was to get to the bottom of the matter, I am in favour of tightening up the fight against doping, the scourge that is on track to finish our sport, and I commit myself as a rider to that. But I do not see why as proof of this I should refuse to get paid or give away my wages if I am somehow implicated in a doping scandal. “¿Donde vas? Manzanas traigo” ("Where you going? I bring apples") says the popular Spanish proverb. What is the reason? Where did you get such a brilliant idea from? It seems to me that the reasoning was as simple as ... we will hit you where it hurts most: money. I can assure you are wrong about me, as what it hurt me the most was the fact that I had to swallow my pride to comply with your command, but I know that you do not care about that at all. The fact is that I signed.
And by the way, I signed it knowing that this document is unlawful and undemocratic. That is to say, a useless piece of paper, you have a large collection of useless pieces of paper in a folder, but of course, all signed, as you wanted. Anyway, my most sincere congratulations.
And finally, a wish. I hope that with the departure of the first rider in this Tour de France 2007, your central role is over and from now on the attention will be drawn back to the rightful owners: the riders.
Sincerely,
Pedro Horrillo
Tuesday, June 16, 2009
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
“Mr Adams, whereabouts are we?”
Following Agamben's signposts in cycling's state of exception.
Abstract for talk at Doping and Legal Rights Conference, 20 – 21 August 2009, Department of Sport Science, Aarhus University, Denmark.
This paper seeks to take as its starting point Moller's view that the contemporary religious engagement in anti doping campaigns signals a farewell to the ideas of modernity, that is, it is a symptom of the crisis of modernity.
The paper will not seek to dispute this assessment of anti doping policy. What it seeks to do is to build upon Moller's work by taking his argument and examining it within the context of contemporary legal philosophy.
If we consider anti doping policy to operate in a situation where the old boundaries of the national state have been compromised and where there is a general movement to a supranational form of sovereignty, what is at play here is a symptom of the coming of what Hardt and Negri have described as Empire. It will be contended that in such a context the administration of anti doping law and policy appears to play a much more profound role as part of the contemporary system of governmentality, discipline and control. Following the work of Foucault and Agamben, amongst others, it will be argued that at its core what is at stake is a question of biopower and of the permanent state of exception.
By reference to Operacion Puerto, the events surrounding it and the reactions to it, we are able to discern that, what is at stake, is in fact the end of law in its modernist sense and the coming of a profound movement in respect of how we do law in a global system. Puerto reveals a space of 'critical opalescence', where media, law, politics all converge into 'a zone of indistinction'. It is about functionality and utility within a global system and not about rights and the rule of law.
With this movement, those who have taken it as their task to undertake the administration of doping decide at once a rule and a criterion – what becomes 'natural' is a rule that decides the fact and decides upon its own application without reference to any norm other that of preserving the integrity of the state's and capital's investment in the spectacle. As the coming of the Biological Passport tells us, the law of doping is neither now definable as a rule, nor as a breach, but upon what is said to be 'natural' or 'normal' values - in the world of cycling the formation and the execution of the rule are indistinguishable moments. That is the 'fight' against doping in cycling is nothing but an example of what Agamben describes as the permanent state of exception in which we live. It is not until we come to grips with this situation that we will be able to commence to formulate a meaningful and sustainable anti doping policy.
References
Agamben, G 1998, Homo Sacer, Sovereign Power and Bare Life, Stanford University Press, Stanford.
Agamben, G 2005, State of Exception, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago and London.
Agamben, G 2002, Remnants of Auschwitz, The Witness and the Archive, Zone Books, New York.
Deleuze, G 1988, Foucault, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis.
Foucault, M 2008, The Birth of Biopolitics, Palgrave Macmillan, Hampshire.
Moeller, V 2004, The Anti-Doping Campaign – Farewell to the Ideals of Modernity?, in Hoberman, J & Moeller, V, Doping and Public Policy, University Press of Southern Denmark.
Hardt, M & Negri, A 2001, Empire, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Abstract for talk at Doping and Legal Rights Conference, 20 – 21 August 2009, Department of Sport Science, Aarhus University, Denmark.
This paper seeks to take as its starting point Moller's view that the contemporary religious engagement in anti doping campaigns signals a farewell to the ideas of modernity, that is, it is a symptom of the crisis of modernity.
The paper will not seek to dispute this assessment of anti doping policy. What it seeks to do is to build upon Moller's work by taking his argument and examining it within the context of contemporary legal philosophy.
If we consider anti doping policy to operate in a situation where the old boundaries of the national state have been compromised and where there is a general movement to a supranational form of sovereignty, what is at play here is a symptom of the coming of what Hardt and Negri have described as Empire. It will be contended that in such a context the administration of anti doping law and policy appears to play a much more profound role as part of the contemporary system of governmentality, discipline and control. Following the work of Foucault and Agamben, amongst others, it will be argued that at its core what is at stake is a question of biopower and of the permanent state of exception.
By reference to Operacion Puerto, the events surrounding it and the reactions to it, we are able to discern that, what is at stake, is in fact the end of law in its modernist sense and the coming of a profound movement in respect of how we do law in a global system. Puerto reveals a space of 'critical opalescence', where media, law, politics all converge into 'a zone of indistinction'. It is about functionality and utility within a global system and not about rights and the rule of law.
With this movement, those who have taken it as their task to undertake the administration of doping decide at once a rule and a criterion – what becomes 'natural' is a rule that decides the fact and decides upon its own application without reference to any norm other that of preserving the integrity of the state's and capital's investment in the spectacle. As the coming of the Biological Passport tells us, the law of doping is neither now definable as a rule, nor as a breach, but upon what is said to be 'natural' or 'normal' values - in the world of cycling the formation and the execution of the rule are indistinguishable moments. That is the 'fight' against doping in cycling is nothing but an example of what Agamben describes as the permanent state of exception in which we live. It is not until we come to grips with this situation that we will be able to commence to formulate a meaningful and sustainable anti doping policy.
References
Agamben, G 1998, Homo Sacer, Sovereign Power and Bare Life, Stanford University Press, Stanford.
Agamben, G 2005, State of Exception, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago and London.
Agamben, G 2002, Remnants of Auschwitz, The Witness and the Archive, Zone Books, New York.
Deleuze, G 1988, Foucault, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis.
Foucault, M 2008, The Birth of Biopolitics, Palgrave Macmillan, Hampshire.
Moeller, V 2004, The Anti-Doping Campaign – Farewell to the Ideals of Modernity?, in Hoberman, J & Moeller, V, Doping and Public Policy, University Press of Southern Denmark.
Hardt, M & Negri, A 2001, Empire, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts.
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