Carl Schmitt, sportspersonship, and the Ius Publicum Ludis

In this paper, I argue that sportspersonship is a means of performing fundamental sociality; it is about the conversion of a foe (inimicus) into an enemy (hostis). Drawing on Carl Schmitt’s distinction between enemy and foe – inimicus and hostis – as well as his discussion of the ius publicum Europaeum, I suggest a model of sportspersonship that sees it as expressing the competitive relations between equals that undergird the most minimal form of sociality; relations that any deeper union takes as its foundation. It is the performance of this fundamental sociality, I argue, that grounds the value of sport in general (though this does not mean that there cannot be other, contingent values in sport).