A sporting chance: the (dis)advantage of disability, and the need for a fair and meaningful contest

Simone Pearce; Jay Sanderson

doi:10.1007/s40318-025-00304-0

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A sporting chance: the (dis)advantage of disability, and the need for a fair and meaningful contest

Journal article

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A sporting chance: the (dis)advantage of disability, and the need for a fair and meaningful contest

Simone Pearce and Jay Sanderson

The International Sports Law Journal, Vol.26, pp.43-56

2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40318-025-00304-0

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Abstract

sport

disability

children

inclusion

adjustment

contest

UniSC Diversity Area - Life Stages

UniSC Diversity Area - Disability and Inclusion

This article considers the impact of adjusting sports rules to ensure a fair and meaningful contest for children with disability, when they do not fit into traditional sporting categories defined by their ability. All signatories to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities are required to implement the human right to non-discrimination, including reasonable adjustments or accommodations, in their domestic laws, to prevent discrimination against people with disabilities. Various cases have considered whether, and to what extent, a reasonable adjustment is necessary in sport including the issue of an adjustment to the contest, pursuant to discrimination law, which results in a competitive advantage for children with disability. This article argues that competitive advantage should not be a factor in considering whether an adjustment is reasonable, and that focus should be on removing disadvantage in the contest for children with disability to provide for meaningful inclusion.

Details

Title: A sporting chance: the (dis)advantage of disability, and the need for a fair and meaningful contest
Authors: Simone Pearce (Corresponding Author) - University of the Sunshine Coast, Queensland, School of Law and Society
Jay Sanderson - University of the Sunshine Coast, Queensland, School of Law and Society
Publication details: The International Sports Law Journal, Vol.26, pp.43-56
Publisher: Springer
Date published: 2026
DOI: 10.1007/s40318-025-00304-0
ISSN: 2213-5154
Copyright note: This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
Data Availability: No datasets were generated or analysed during the current study.
Organisation Unit: School of Law and Society
Language: English
Record Identifier: 991148039302621
Output Type: Journal article

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Web Of Science research areas: Law