Introduction

It is no novelty that the manipulation of sports competitions has become one of the greatest threats to the world of sport and that it has transformed a practice that has always accompanied sport throughout its history into a political and criminal phenomenon. Nor is it especially original to point out that the manipulation of sports competitions has been associated with the infiltration of organised crime into sport and, consequently, entered the political agenda of the entire international political ecosystem – from international agencies to police bodies, to parliaments and governments, and across the full spectrum of sports institutions worldwide, from the international to the regional, from the national to the local. Equally, it is not novel to point out that the manipulation of sports competitions has been redefined by new motivations and opportunities generated by the characteristics of the new global sports betting market, which has come to play a crucial role in the financing of sport, and which has multiplied the risks and incentives to manipulate competitions. In this context, it is easy to understand that, in a world where an important part of the economy is related to illegal markets and criminal groups, the most recent marriages between sport and betting encourage the infiltration of organised crime in sport to multiply wealth or to launder money. Finally, we are not the first to question that the emergence of sport competition manipulation as a political issue has fostered the creation and expansion of a new ‘integrity industry’, which has turned this issue into a highly profitable business for actors external to sport, and from which various conflicts of interest have emerged. By integrity industry, we mean a set of institutions and actors (public and private), external to sport, that have emerged to provide integrity services to the world of sport, including monitoring companies, consultancies, and public and private organisations.